The weakness of our government in standing up for human rights is presented starkly in your stories about Mohamedou Ould Slahi (From inside Guantánamo, a tale of torture and torment, 17 January) and Raif Badawi (Saudi blogger’s case referred to supreme court, says his wife, 17 January), each foully mistreated by governments with whom we are hand in glove commercially and politically. We seem to spend time protesting loudly and fruitlessly about the actions of our enemies – whom we are actually unable to influence – while standing by as our so-called “friends” get away with officially sanctioned crimes, torture and injustice.
Karl Sabbagh
Newbold on Stour, Warwickshire
• Tania Branigan’s excellent article on North Korea (16 January) quoted an expert describing its economy as one that “generates benefits for a small ruling clique and key regime constituencies, but does not deliver prosperity for the bulk of the population”. Obviously quite different from the situation in the UK.
David Hoult
Stockport
• Coincidental that the three political parties currently set to be excluded from the forthcoming TV election debates are led by women and the four to be included are led by men (Report, 17 January)?
Dave Young
London
• My daughter is an unpaid intern in Geneva. Given the shock increase in value of the Swiss franc (Report, 16 January), is she now working for nothing plus 30%?
Dr John Doherty
Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwickshire
• Marty Feldman turned the French text on HP sauce (Letters, 16 January) into a heart-rending chanson. Just type “Marty Feldman a song for sauce lovers” into a search engine.
Michael Vaughan-Rees
Butlers Cross, Buckinghamshire
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