Christian charity
Sir: A little over a year ago, you published an article on Christian Aid. At the time, I visited Christian Aid to discuss a political murder involving organisations they fund.
Throughout the 80s, European aid agen- cies supported organisations in Central America controlled by left-wing groups responsible for substantial corruption and internecine political violence. Those agen- cies have wasted large sums of money on their political friends around the world while at the same time making appeals for victims of famine in Africa and elsewhere.
Your original article only scratched the surface of a massive ethical failure by the aid agencies. They have not defined clearly the relationship between development work and political solidarity or human rights concerns. This failure provided the context in which someone in a senior posi- tion in Christian Aid could tell me that political murder by people they fund had to be dealt with 'in broad brush strokes'.
Not enough has been done to address the causes of that cynicism. Aid agency people talk continually about the need for democ- racy and respect of human rights. They appear both to promote such concepts actively in their own life and work. It is obvious to any well-informed observer that European governments, as well as those in the aid agencies, who affect social demo- cratic radicalism, have exploited money raised for charitable purposes abroad in order to further their own political agenda. The real losers are the impoverished peo- ple in the regions concerned and those who give so generously to the aid charities.
Stephen Sefton
c/a Padre Lucis Nunez, Casa Cural, Marcala, La Paz, Honduras
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