Letters: US should uphold the Iran nuclear deal

There’s much talk of Iran’s lack of human rights and democracy, concerns not apparent in US and British government arms and training for the Saudi dictatorship which murders dissidents and journalists, while deliberately targeting civilians, including schoolchildren in Yemen.

US claims so far seem no more reliable than those on Iraq and WMD given the crew of one tanker – the Kokura Courageous – say the vessel was holed above the waterline by a flying object (a rocket or missile?), while the Trump administration claimed it was limpet mines, which would usually be placed below the waterline

The greatest causes of current instability are the war in Yemen; the US and British invasion of Iraq; the NATO-assisted overthrow of Gaddafi in Libya; and the funding, arming and training of armed rebel and jihadist terrorist groups in Syria by Saudi and other Sunni Gulf dictatorships with US assistance.

In Libya “intervention” has left a population at the mercy of warring militias and terrorist groups who also ethnically cleanse, rape, torture or murder any black Libyan or immigrant or refugee ; plus buying and selling them as slaves. The perpetrators include militias paid by the EU and member states, including the UK, to prevent people crossing the Mediterranean.

Even if reliable evidence of Iranian sabotage of tankers emerges, ending the blanket sanctions on Iran would remove any motive for them to continue such sabotage.

Duncan McFarlane, Carluke.

I FREELY admit that my knowledge of naval sabotage has been gleaned from the cinema but there is much that defies reason in the alleged Iranian attempt to sink tankers in the Gulf of Oman ("Foreign Secretary: Great risk of war after tanker attacks in Gulf", The Herald, June 17). Let’s ignore why Iran would possibly want to do it and concentrate on how it was done. Given the heightened tension in the area and reputed recent attacks on shipping I find it impossible to believe that ships do not have 24/7 onboard surveillance during transit in the Strait of Hormuz; why then, since everyone seems to have a mobile phone with a camera is there no pictorial record of the crime being committed? If the mines were placed high on the hull one imagines that the perpetrators operated from a sizeable vessel which would be obvious on radar as would its approach to the tanker.

Why is the film of a mine being supposedly removed by the perpetrators taken from another vessel and not the ship under attack? Why was this intruder vessel not shadowed to its home port and the origin of the attackers positively identified? Why would anyone who had clandestinely placed explosive charges then decide to remove one and risk being identified? Why given the fact that limpet mines can function under water and damage created there potentially more destructive would saboteurs place them high above the waterline? Why incapacitate rather than destroy the target? None of it makes sense unless the agents wanted the devices to be seen. I keep asking myself is this happening in the Gulf of Oman or the Gulf of Tonkin.

David J Crawford, Glasgow G12.

I NOTE that the UK is still behaving like America's lapdog, following the United States in saying Iran is behind the attacks on the tankers.

Both governments will say "but Iran told lies when they said they didn't do it". I seem to remember both America and Britain told lies about weapons of mass destruction, which did not exist. But they still bombed Iraq and Afghanistan into the Stone Age.

When is somebody going to stop these warmongers?

Margaret Forbes, Kilmacolm.