Letters to the editor

OPINION:

The Op-Ed on Planned Parenthood is full of false logic and far-fetched assertions (“The abortion industry,” March 26). The simple truth is that Planned Parenthood is the nation’s leading women’s reproductive health care provider and advocate. Ninety-seven percent of our services are related to preventive care and include education, contraception, breast- and cervical cancer screenings and testing for sexually transmitted infections.

The Op-Ed is dangerously wrong when it incorrectly asserts that Planned Parenthood’s confidentiality principles conflict with the law. Planned Parenthood follows federal, state and local laws regarding confidentiality and parental involvement in health care services provided for minors.

At a time when the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports that at least one in four teenage girls — and nearly one in two black girls — has a sexually transmitted infection, it is important to note that Planned Parenthood offers comprehensive testing for sexually transmitted infections. We fund these services through a combination of fees from patients, contributions from donors and a long-established government program dedicated to providing reproductive health services to low-income women.

Our record on racial equality is clear. Planned Parenthood is a strong advocate for equal access to education and services, regardless of gender, race or sexual orientation, and adamantly rejects racist policies and practices in the delivery of health care.

With health care costs skyrocketing and the number of uninsured individuals on the rise, Planned Parenthood is a safe, reliable source of health care for women, men and families. We help improve women’s health and safety, prevent unintended pregnancies and reduce the need for abortions, and advance the right and ability of individuals and families to make informed and responsible choices for themselves.

Planned Parenthood educational programs and birth-control services help prevent an estimated 642,000 unintended pregnancies and 305,000 abortions every year, something our opponents somehow fail to mention in their misleading attacks against Planned Parenthood. Then again, our opponents seem to care more about misleading rhetoric than results.

CECILE RICHARDS

President

Planned Parenthood Federation

of America

New York

Disrespectful and shameful

It was disgusting to tune in to the Nationals versus Braves pregame and hear many boo President Bush as he threw out the first pitch in Sunday night’s game (“Bush’s presence creates security headaches,” Sports, Monday). It demonstrated a total lack of class, and those who did so ought to be ashamed of themselves. No president of the United States ought to ever be booed in this nation, regardless of party affiliation.

That behavior demonstrates a lack of respect for our country and all that it stands for. It is not about free speech, but about common sense and accepting responsibility. We need to demonstrate to the world that we are a nation that others can look up to and respect regardless of who our leader is.

DOUG SMITH

Montgomery, Ala.

The Cypriots

Bruce Fein, resident scholar at the Turkish Coalition of America, has a skewed view of Cyprus and its history (“Reuniting Cyprus,” Commentary, Tuesday) at a time when what is needed from genuine friends of the island’s people is forward rather than backward thinking. His piece, unconsciously or otherwise, is riddled with bias, and it’s worth pointing out a few flaws.

Cypriots with differing linguistic or religious backgrounds were not historically separated between north and south. They were evenly distributed around the island for centuries, many living together in mixed villages.

The separation happened brutally, after an aborted Greek junta-inspired coup against the island’s autonomous president, triggering an invasion by Turkey’s army.

Ethnic cleansing followed, turning a third of the island’s population into refugees. Greece and Turkey caused this separation, then, as now, members of NATO.

The reality is, the European Union did not and could not promise to end the isolation of Cypriots living in the northern occupied part of the island; an isolation caused by Turkey maintaining upward of 40,000 troops there in breach of dozens of U.N. resolutions.

The EU promised to let Cyprus as a whole enjoy the fruits of accession if the Cypriot people as a whole had been able to accept the Kofi Annan plan. They weren’t able. That’s democracy. Their reasons are well-documented and had more to do with genuine security fears and a continued infringement of their fundamental freedoms, rather than with punishing their long-suffering compatriots living in Turkey’s protectorate.

The Annan plan a blueprint for division and apartheid rather for unification was rejected because it put the interests of foreign powers ahead of those of the indigenous people of Cyprus.

The ignominy of isolation of Cypriots in the north must, indeed, end, but so, too, should the ignominy of isolation of Cypriots originally from the north embargoedfrom their ancestral homes by Turkey’s army.

For whatever conciliatory measures are taken by the regime in the north, they count for nothing while people’s fundamental freedoms continue to be trampled upon in this way.

The United States and EU should give Republic of Cyprus President Dimitris Christofias a reason to be enthusiastic about a settlement, by enabling him and his counterpart in the north, President of the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus Mehmet Ali Talat, to have an opportunity to develop a real reunification plan that benefits the Cypriot people as whole ahead of Turkey’s military.

ANDREAS KOUMI

London

•

I thank you for allowing Bruce Fein to present his commentary (“Reuniting Cyprus,” Tuesday). I fully respect Mr. Fein as a resident scholar and expert on geopolitical issues involving Turkish-American relations. His column was concise and accurate as to the history of the political situation in Cyprus, but I disagree with his opinion that the United States and the EU should be brokers of a resolution to the stalemate.

If lessons are to be learned from history, we must first realize the gravity of the situation. The collapse of Yugoslavia, the Soviet Union and now Iraq should have taught us that artificial unification of people of different cultural and religious beliefs will ultimately fail.

The unification of Germany has taught us that artificially separating people of common cultural and religious beliefs over time will create socioeconomic barriers to integration. Mr. Fein shows that Cyprus is somewhere between the two, and solving it politically will only create artificial solutions.

Solving Cyprus’ problems should not come from the United States or the EU, it should come from within, by allowing the people of Cyprus full and unhindered access to the global economy. The Republic of Northern Cyprus has existed for 25 years, and during that time the two peoples of Cyprus have managed to coexist.

There is no reason to believe that they can not continue to grow together as two nations. If lessons of history are to be learned, the Annan plan, as ratified by the Turkish Cypriots, is our best hope for solving the issues involved.

The United Nations embargo against use of ports under the control of the TRNC by member nations is fundamentally wrong and against the interests of humanity. Lifting this unjust embargo must be the first step. The embargo is knowingly creating an underclass, as Mr. Fein states the per capita income of Turkish Cypriots isolated by the embargo is only half of their Greek counterparts.

If these unjust actions continue, any hope of reunification will have the same backlash as Germany experienced, as the governments implode under the social pressures created.

As Mr. Fein points out, legal action for redistribution of wealth has already begun. Mr. Fein cited multiple examples of promises or intervention by the United States, the EU and others as not bringing solutions.

So, while I applaud Mr. Fein on his historical analyses, I differ in that I believe there should be no external actor, no embargo, and that Mr. Christofias and Mr. Talat, as the democratically elected leaders respectively of the people of South and North Cyprus, continue to work out a just and equitable solution. We need a solution not just for Cyprus’ sake, but for humanity’s sake.

TIMUR EDIB

President

Maryland American Turkish

Association

Columbia, Md.