Democracy allows all people to express opinions freely even seafarers.

(From Lloyds List)

Byline: From Andreas A Constantinou

Letters To The Editor

SIR, I refer to the letter from Ronald Vopel, entitled 'No democracy if owners dictate to politicians' (Lloyd's List, July 18).

Democracy is a big festival of words, which allows Mr Vopel to publicly express his anti-Hellenic prejudice or menace. I am afraid, however, that Mr Vopel's perception of democracy and his suggestion that only 2.5% of the European population is against the introduction of criminal sanctions in cases of accidental pollution are very wrong, as he deliberately ignores the fact that the entire global maritime industry has strongly voiced its concern over this development.

It is also important to stress to Mr Vopel that the principle of democracy is to allow all of its constituents to express freely their views and opinions and finally the voice of the majority to be respected by all. If Mr Vopel's idea is to suppress the freedom of the press either to favour the opinion of one of the two sides or to bring to public attention the views of the minority, I am afraid to say that his concept of democracy is not the right one and he has to revisit his opinion.

The inference that Cyprus and Malta do not have an opinion of their own and have their opinion dictated to them by Greece or the Greek owners, is fundamentally wrong especially as I know that Cypriot seafarers' organisations were consulted prior to the country formulating its response to the proposals of the European Commission, not to mention the fact that at least Cyprus in the initial stages raised the matter of legality of this European action in accordance to International ...