Readers’ letters: US-Russia peace plan is a demand for Ukraine's surrender

The details of the plan reportedly agreed by the United States and Russia to end the war in Ukraine are of great concern. Ukraine is expected to hand over the Donbas to the aggressors wholesale, despite the Russian army having failed to take it after three years and hundreds of thousands of deaths on both sides. Not only that, but the size of Ukraine’s armed forces would be limited to 600,000 personnel. That means when US attention is elsewhere in future, Russia can simply walk in and take the rest of the country over with precious little resistance.

This is eerily reminiscent of so much else that characterises Russia’s emulation of Nazi Germany’s conduct before and during the Second World War. They have used a Russian population in another nation – ie Russians in the Donbas and Crimea – as an excuse to take over, just as Hitler used the Sudeten Germans to take over Czechoslovakia in two steps. They are bombing and murdering civilians, abducting children and so on, just like the Germans. Now, they are attempting to have their own 2025 version of the 1938 Munich conference in which the Sudetenland was handed over to Germany with the Czechs having no say in the matter. The US did not invite the Ukrainians to participate in the discussions about the future of their country. That is wholly unacceptable.

Although the Ukrainians are facing many problems with desertions from the army and corruption scandals, I hope they understand that accepting this is effectively surrender, because that is what it is. It will simply allow the Russians to take over just when it pleases them in the same way that Germany took over the rest of Czechoslovakia in 1939.

People inspect cars destroyed at a service station following an air attack on Odesa in Ukraine yesterday (Picture: Oleksandr Gimanov/AFP via Getty)

Peter Hopkins, Edinburgh

Spy ships

We have in the past had reports of ships possibly loitering with intent to gather information around our wind farm areas in the North Sea.

Now we have definite sightings of spy ships recently in the English Channel and now off the north coast of Scotland (your report, 20 November).

Fairly obviously, these vessels are not there to take photographs of our scenery but to gather information that would be extremely useful for disrupting communications and also UK energy. The next step is cargo vessels dragging their anchors in these areas by accident at a time that would produce maximum disruption.

I realise that it is rather shutting the door after the horse has bolted, but shouldn’t we, in areas we have direct control over, declare these areas as sensitive to this country on marine maps and prohibit access to all foreign shipping except by permission from our government.

A Lewis, Coylton, South Ayrshire

Divisive Sturgeon

Should we have forgotten due to her departure from frontline politics, Nicola Sturgeon’s responses to the Covid Inquiry report (your report, 21 November) remind us all as to how divisive and self-interested she remains.

Her claims that she was not “politically” motivated in her actions during Covid are at best implausible and at worst simply untrue. The damning verdict on her supposed “Gold Command” structure highlights her belief that she could do no wrong. Regretfully what has followed from the SNP administration since her departure is more of the same.

Richard Allison, Edinburgh

Questions remain

Nicola Sturgeon cannot distance herself from the failures of Scotland’s Covid policies. She took it upon herself, with the aid of John Swinney, to rule the roost and present herself as saviour of the nation.

This almost certainly gained her more votes and electoral success. Whilst Boris Johnson at least enabled us to have a vaccine rather quicker than expected, just what did Nicola Sturgeon do except front a thinly-disguised daily SNP party political broadcast? Ms Sturgeon may be leaving politics but her deputy, John Swinney is not. Every cloud did not have a “Gold Command” lining. There are serious questions still to be answered.

Gerald Edwards, Glasgow

Gone to the dogs

John Swinney winning the Scottish Politician Of the Year reminded me of an old Arab proverb I heard in the ’80s in Qatar: “if you don’t have any horses you just have to saddle the dogs”, meaning if you don’t have the ideal tools or resources for a job, make do with what is available – in this case the award nominees.

Hopefully the result and message of next year’s Holyrood elections will be “move over, Rover” but I doubt it. That will be Stephen Flynn’s job.

Allan Sutherland, Stonehaven, Aberdeenshire

Name and shame

Since taxing the rich seems not to work, why not try just naming and shaming them.

There is enough information on the internet and publicly available for this to be possible. With the public being able to quickly see what the rich and powerful spend their money on and how much profit their employees provide them with that they can stash away, things will begin to change.

What needs to go first is the “mushroom management” philosophy: keep them in the dark and feed them with manure. Once the public get used to pointing out the unfairness this country will take a turn for the better.

H Belda, Edinburgh

Net losses

The Scottish Government is unhappy at Scotland's allocation of the UK Fishing and Coastal growth fund (your report, 19 November).

£28 million out of a £360m allocation is absolutely ludicrous given that Scotland accounts for 60 per cent of the UK fishing capacity. The importance of the industry to our island and coastal communities is vital for employment and sustained growth in these communities. Some serious work is needed from our Central Belt politicians at Holyrood to address the issue.

DG McIntyre, Edinburgh

No-go zones

Not long ago the heads of Octopus Energy were calling for zonal pricing for electricity to be applied across Great Britain – something that would have seen businesses and households in Scotland move from paying the highest prices in Europe to the lowest. However, we would also be paying the lowest prices in Great Britain. Something that would have attracted energy-hungry businesses to Scotland, boosting our economy and employment prospects notably, at the seme time as seeing households in London and South East England paying more that we in Scotland. The proposals were flatly rejected by Ed Miliband for that reason.

We’re now hearing that Keir Starmer is proposing low zonal pricing for Scotland and North England – for energy-hungry data centres that want to run their AI centres at the lowest cost. But those same lowest charges won’t be available to households. Thanks for nothing, Mr Prime Minister.

Ian Waugh, Dumfries

Start preparing

The rundown of North Sea oil and gas, the closure of Grangemouth, and now the imminent closure of Mossmorran, all have one thing in common: they have all been undermined by government policy since Ed Miliband passed the Climate Change Act in 2008 and Teresa May made net zero by 2050 legally binding in 2019.

Decarbonisation of the electricity network caused electricity prices to soar because we now have to have two systems of generation instead of one to cover when there is no sun or not enough wind, and have suffered the degradation of pristine landscapes into the bargain. Furthermore, scandalously high taxes on producers have driven investment away, with North Sea producers hit with a 78 per cent tax rate.

But Miliband and May are not the only guilty politicians. We also have the Climate Change Committee with its five-year “carbon budgets” reminiscent of the Soviet five-year plans; actually an organisation rather than a committee with its own CEO and a well-paid staff. They arrive at diktats for the population to drive less, fly less, eat less meat, scrap our gas boilers, drive battery powered vehicles and encourage farmers to feed chemicals to their cows to reduce flatulence.

And all this in the name of controlling the climate, which, as a geographer I find risible. Instead of trying to stop climate change we should be preparing for it.

William Loneskie, Lauder, Scottish Borders

Too many cooks

My wife has started watching a television programme – Celebrity MasterChef. – which has left me in a state of total bewilderment. I caught the end of an episode and I will admit that I was mystified. I have absolutely no idea who these people are. Not even an inkling.

I pondered why this should be and what it was that distinguished those on the show from the rest of the human population. Finally, I think I worked out what made them unique, though “celebrity” isn’t the word I would use. I think that one of them is animatronic. I don’t think that such beings exist in nature, but I am willing to watch a David Attenborough film to have it proved otherwise.

That aside, I suddenly realised that none of them could pronounce the letter “T”, unless it was at the start of a word. “l” seemed to be problematic as well, “O’ and “R” too. Thus, a bottle of Angostura bitters is transmogrified into “a bo’oo ’v Angostoowah bi’ahz”.

What a find! It’s like discovering some interesting life form slithering around the Titanic. Attenborough would be fascinated.

Andrew HN Gray, Edinburgh

Write to The Scotsman

We welcome your thoughts – NO letters submitted elsewhere, please. Write to [email protected] including name, address and phone number – we won't print full details. Keep letters under 300 words, with no attachments, and avoi ‘'Letters to the Editor/Readers’ Letters’ or similar in your subject line – be specific. If referring to an article, include date, page number and heading.