Delicate subject
Sir: I am no lawyer, but I cannot believe that Con Coughlin is correct when he says, in his sour review (Books, 2 October) of Terry Waite's memoirs, Taken on Trust, that if Mr Waite 'had not been languishing in a Beirut cell, . . . he would almost cer- tainly have been required to give evidence at the congressional committees which sat throughout the summer investigating the Iran-Contra affair'.
Mr Waite is a subject of the British Crown, not a citizen of the United States of America, and I do not believe that a US congressional committee has any power to require one of Her Majesty's subjects not resident in the United States to appear before it.
If it does have such a power, then it bloody well shouldn't, and the Foreign Office should act to correct the matter.
Allan Massie
Thirladean House, Selkirk, Scotland
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