letter: No Western help for the Kurds

Sir: The current crisis in northern Iraq underlines just how badly the main lesson of the Gulf War has been learnt. That lesson was that the West has only one interest in Iraq, and that is in keeping the area stable so that oil, and profits, continue to flow. Hence Saddam was not removed from power, as he easily could have been, but simply warned off.

It is no surprise that a section of the Kurds should look, if not exactly to Saddam, then to the force he can exert, since the main Western ally in the region, Turkey, continues to pursue its murderous war against the Kurds. Neither Saddam not the West will do anything for the future of ordinary Kurds. The Turkish and Iraqi working classes might, if they can boot out the current regimes which run their respective countries. There will be no prizes for guessing which side of the West would be on in such a struggle however - not that, as ever, of the Kurds.

KEITH FLETT

London N17