John Sands (Letters, December 6) is to be commended for pointing out the objectives of the US military campaign in Afghanistan and how the conflict is inextricably linked to the US government's relentless pursuit of resource and trade domination throughout the world.

This hegemony was already in full swing before the tragic events of September 11 and it is bitterly regrettable the US took these attacks as reason to intensify its attempts to control Central Asian resources by military means.

There is not the slightest justification for its bombing campaign against Afghanistan under international law, especially as it is claimed a Saudi citizen (Osama bin Laden) is responsible for the World Trade Centre attacks and not the Afghani nation.

A country already deep in poverty and ruins since previous conflicts deserves better than this from the world community.

If all disputes between nation states are to be resolved in this way, we are in danger of slaughtering more innocent people in the years since the Second World War than in that awful conflict.

Is this to be what faces the peoples of the world in the 21st Century?

-Name and address supplied