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As Member of Parliament representing a Tyneside constituency, it gave me great pride to see the Ark Royal set sail for the Adriatic. The Ark Royal was built and designed eight years ago in my constituency, and it is a great tribute to the workmanship and excellence of Swan Hunter shipbuilders in Wallsend. We must acknowledge that the Ark Royal and the Royal Fleet Auxiliary Argus are not the best vessels for the delicate job that now needs to be undertaken by the task force.As many hon. Members will know, the Ark Royal and the Argus are not the ships to carry out the role that is now expected of them. Between them, they lack the proper facilities for the accommodation of support helicopters, of artillery and of combat troops. It must be a matter of concern to all hon. Members that men who may be deployed are sleeping tonight on the hangar deck of the Ark Royal. We need to upgrade and enhance our amphibious capability. It is vital to international peacekeeping, and it has political value. It is flexible and versatile. It can be maintained in a state of readiness, and it has considerable deterrent value. It can go covertly or in a blaze of publicity. It can be stationed either close to or at some distance from a potential area of conflict. Amphibious capability has a strategic significance. As Sir Basil Liddell Hart said :
"A self-contained and sea-based force is the best kind of fire extinguisher because of its flexibility, reliability, logistic simplicity and relative economy."
The case for an amphibious capability, especially in the international peacekeeping context, is overwhelming. However, we must recognise that it will have consequences for our defence procurement programme.
It will mean that the order for the landing platform helicopter vessel must be proceeded with. It will mean that Intrepid and Fearless, which are now both more than 25 years old, will have to be replaced by a new generation of assault ships. We need to be clear that, if those developments do not happen, real doubt will be cast on the future of the Royal Marines, because there will be no suitable capability and no suitable vessels to deliver the Royal Marines to potential areas of conflict.
Mr. Michael Fabricant (Mid-Staffordshire) : Will the hon. Gentleman give way?
Mr. Byers : No, because I am under a 10-minute restriction. The most pressing of the orders must be that for the landing platform helicopter vessel. No other vessel presently in service can provide the same function. It was originally thought that Invincible could cope, but it is now accepted that the role of task force commander and amphibious assault are virtually incompatible. It is clear that, to fulfil our international peacekeeping obligations, the landing platform helicopter vessel is vital. Its cost is £170 million, compared with a total defence budget of £24 billion. It is a small investment, but it will ensure and greatly enhance our amphibious capability. As the then Minister of State for Defence Procurement said on the "Statement on the Defence Estimates 1991", when he spoke strongly in support of the amphibious programme :
"There is no other means of providing such a variety of operational choices."--[ Official Report, 15 October 1991 ; Vol. 196, c. 178.] At a time of world uncertainty, the order for the helicopter carrier is vital. Not only would it bring renewed
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hope to shipyard workers in my constituency on Tyneside ; it would also ensure that our Government are in a position to discharge their international responsibilities and play their part in keeping peace throughout the world.7.50 pm
Sir Geoffrey Johnson Smith (Wealden) : I hope that the hon. Member for Wallsend (Mr. Byers) will understand that I do not follow him, because of the 10-minute restriction.
With my colleagues from the House who are, like me, members of the North Atlantic Assembly, I went to Washington and New York and among our discussions we met those who were knowledgeable about the United Nations. We wanted to find out a little more about what was happening. I should like to say a few words about NATO and the lessons that it has for the United Nations and for peacemaking in general.
If the cold war taught us anything, it was the realisation that NATO, which is a regional multilateral collective defence and security system not previously seen in western Europe, has provided and will continue to provide the best chance of keeping the peace. I do not think that the significance of NATO can be exaggerated. Its impact on the world has been profound and has helped to save democracy.
NATO is significant because, first, its members got in the habit of working together ; secondly, the system demanded a willingness to pool and share resources ; thirdly, a multinational command became acceptable. That is demonstrated in the Rapid Reaction Corps where the ground troops are commanded by a British general and the air force is commanded by a former member of the Luftwaffe, and no one turns over in their grave at such a mixed multinational command. Fourthly, NATO succeeded because it was more than a military alliance. It had a political dimension which called upon its members to strengthen the democratic ties between them and to reinforce the humanitarian values that they all shared. There is now talk of NATO combining with the Russians and the Americans to advance the Owen-Vance plan in Bosnia.
The willingness of the Russians to co-operate with NATO does not surprise me. The North Atlantic Assembly already has representatives of the Russian and eastern European Parliaments as associate members, and they tell us time and again that they would like their countries to join NATO one day. Be that as it may--I do not mean to be at all hostile to the concept--I think that we are a little way off that. In July, NATO put its resources at the disposal of the conference on security and co-operation in Europe. As my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary said earlier, that offer is parallel with a similar offer to the United Nations. Iraq opened our eyes to the fact that the NATO system of co-operation had a new and wider application. NATO was not involved in Iraq as such, but its military command and control structure ensured the vigorous and efficient prosecution of the war. It was NATO's logistical capabilities and planning procedures which made possible the transfer of so many munitions, arms, guns and tanks from Germany through the NATO logistic facilities in Rotterdam to the middle east. When my right hon. Friend
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commented on NATO's involvement, he was specifically referring to the involvement of the former Yugoslavia when he said :"This is not NATO involvement for its own sake but reflects the reality that the alliance has resources which cannot be duplicated elsewhere."
In an article in The Times recently, Professor Laurence Freedman pointed out :
"NATO is not always seen as an impartial and neutral source." I agree with that. There will be times when nations will look to the United Nations or elsewhere to help with peacekeeping and sometimes the peace enforcement process. The Gulf war opened our eyes to the fact that the UN had a more vigorous part in peace diplomacy and the protection of refugees.
As we have been reminded by hon. Members both sides of the House, the ending of the cold war did not usher in a new world order. Rather, it ushered in a world of disorder or more disorder. It suspended--I do not know for how long--the dreadful paralysis of the inevitable veto which had constrained the United Nations' ability to act during the previous decades.
Not long ago, Major-General Lewis McKenzie, Canadian commander of the United Nations forces in Sarajevo--the first commander and a very able man- -was quoted as saying that he found it extremely difficult to contact the United Nations because it seemed to work a five-day week. He found it especially difficult to contact the United Nations on Friday evenings at 5 pm New York eastern standard time. That is probably a little unfair but, be that as it may, we can probably understand the frustrations of the military commander at the time. He was only reflecting those frustrations.
Before we censure the United Nations, I have no doubt that its ability to carry out its functions is seriously inadequate. We have heard that one of the rasons is that the United Nations does not have enough cash. I shall not rehearse those difficulties now, because I have only a few minutes in which to make my other points. While member states fail to meet their financial commitments and peacekeeping operations, it is clear that the credibility of the United Nations will be undermined. I find it especially nauseating that three or four months can lapse between the Security Council's authorisation of a mission and its becoming an operation in the field. As the Secretary-General has pleaded on many occasions, it is essential that he should be provided with a working capital fund for the start of new operations.
I agree that forces should be earmarked by nation states for more rapid reaction. They should learn to train together. The hon. Member for Stockton, North (Mr. Cook) made that point in his vivid description of conditions in Yugoslavia. Training is vital. We have seen the training that our troops undergo for NATO missions and then they must be trained to do police work in Northern Ireland. I shall never forget having to face a mob of people in an Indian peacekeeping operation. A bombardier turned to me and said, "What happens if they charge?" I said, "They won't ; they're a damned sight more frightened of us than we are of them." We were not even allowed to put a bullet up the spout. That was the training that we had to endure. No one had a go at us, because we looked rather fierce and determined. We must therefore have forces earmarked and well trained.
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There should also be a reserve of basic stock, including radios and all sorts of bits of equipment which some scratch forces do not have when they come under United Nations command. They will need, as NATO has, a common set of procedures for military communications, shared information systems, and so on. That is NATO's strength. The military staff committee has long been without a function in the United Nations. It should be given a practical role to ensure that the changes are implemented. That is done with NATO, through the supreme allied commander and his staff.All in all, there are quite a few lessons which could be learnt, but not only from NATO's experience. Not only military proposals are important. We have heard about the importance of sanctions and having an organisation which can examine sanctions more keenly. Such an organisation needs economic and financial back-up to ensure that peace is sustained once it is kept. Humanitarian as well as social purposes will need to be fulfilled.
The need to strengthen United Nations arms control and verification procedures is important. That is one way of helping to cure the disease of instability, as my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary said earlier today. The failure of the safeguards of the United Nations nuclear proliferation treaty to detect Iraq's weapons programme is convincing evidence of the need to strengthen the inspection team. The proposal of my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister for the establishment of a United Nations conventional arms register must be welcomed. It would help transparency in the defence capabilities of nations, but it should be extended to weapons stockpiles.
Such measures appeal to me. The proposal which I find the most appealing of all is that we must help the United Nations to reorganise bureaucratically the distinction between its two different but complementary roles of peacekeeping. There is chapter VI, relating to peacekeeping, and chapter VII, by which the United Nations establishes peace enforcement. The United Nations should establish two separate departments--a department which deals with political affairs and conflict resolutions, and an international peace and security department. I would not mix up the two. In that way, the United Nations is much more likely to make the efficient and capable response that we increasingly come to expect from it, but we must help it to achieve that objective.
7.59 pm
Mr. John Home Robertson (East Lothian) : This time last week, I was with the hon. Member for Gosport (Mr. Viggers) and three other colleagues from the Select Committee on Defence in Vitez in central Bosnia. All of us found the journey to that part of former Yugoslavia an extremely distressing experience. We must have seen thousands of refugees, countless houses that had been torched or bombed and large numbers of heavily armed young men, some of whom may have been disciplined soldiers while others clearly were not. No doubt some had been involved, whether under control or not, in perpetrating atrocities against civilians in that unfortunate country. It is important to stress in a debate of this nature that by no means all the atrocities that have taken place in
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former Yugoslavia are the responsibility of the Serbs. They are all at it : I saw plenty of evidence of Croat brutality against Muslims and Muslim brutality against Serbs. On the day we passed through the town of Gorni Vakuf, a British United Nations Warrior crew had to destroy a Croat position which would not stop shooting at them despite the fact that they were flying the United Nations flag and carrying the United Nations colours.It is bloody chaos, but the abiding image for me must be the children playing in the snow, smiling and waving to United Nations vehicles escorting the aid convoys and bringing a little hope into their God- forsaken country--I suspect, much as the children of Northern Ireland waved to British troops who bought time there 24 years ago. Perhaps there are lessons to be learnt from such parallels.
This is a tragedy that is unfolding on our own doorstep, the doorstep of western Europe, in a country where thousands of our constituents took their holidays until two years ago, in Sarajevo which hosted the winter olympics in 1984. Yet people in that area have not had the benefit of any peace dividend from the end of the cold war. On the contrary, they have been pitched into a vicious hot war, just like many other people around the vortex of what used to be the Soviet Union, in Tadzhikistan, Moldova, Georgia and other areas, not to mention Iraq, Somalia and elsewhere--some peace dividend! That is the background against which the British Government decided to slash its Army strength by 40,000 soldiers while continuing to build another three Trident submarines purely to be able to destroy Moscow. I do not understand it, but that is what they decided to do. Mercifully, the great British public is, as ever, ahead of the Government in understanding such questions.
People are concerned about what is happening in Yugoslavia, Somalia, Kurdistan and the marshes of southern Iraq--not as far away places of which we know little, as Mr. Neville Chamberlain might have said, because, thanks to Kate Adie and other reporters, we know quite a lot about them. Our people care and they want to help, as they have shown clearly by their generosity in the relief effort and by the pressure that they brought to bear on the Government to deploy British troops with the United Nations to help to resolve the situation in Yugoslavia by taking an active part in the United Nations protection force last summer.
People understand pretty clearly why we could not help in Somalia. A helpful Ministry of Defence official recently told the Select Committee on Defence that we could not help the United Nations sponsored effort on the ground in Somalia because we do not have enough troops to do so.
I confirm what a number of my hon. Friends have said today. The British United Nations soldiers in their blue United Nations helmets in Bosnia are doing a truly magnificent job--partly, it must be said, because they have had the good fortune to be deployed in an area where it has been possible for them to operate effectively ; their French counterparts have not been so fortunate in Sarajevo and the Canadians have not even been able to deploy into the area around Banja Luka where they were supposed to be operating. The other reason why the Cheshires have been able to achieve so much is because they are well trained professional soldiers with excellent logistic back-up and a wealth of highly relevant experience from peacekeeping in Northern Ireland.
At the beginning of the operation, when I and my colleagues on the Defence Select Committee listened to
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evidence from the Minister of State for the Armed Forces on 22 September 1992, I wondered what could be achieved under the terms that he described. He said that the Cheshires could do no more than ride shotgun on convoys, and that, if the going got difficult, they would withdraw. What we saw in Bosnia last week was a much more proactive deployment. The British United Nations troops are opening up roads, rebuilding bridges, patrolling their area, talking to people, using their good offices to minimise the risk of conflict in local areas wherever possible and generally making their presence felt. They are doing all that as well as escorting a large volume of humanitarian aid which is getting through and helping the civilian population--although, sadly, far too much is going to the armies in that part of the world. We should be concerned about that. The representatives of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees whom we met last week were delighted with the way in which the battalion is operating and it would be good news if the operation could be similarly enhanced in other parts of former Yugoslavia. That is the point which must be put across in this debate : the exercise cannot stand still-- either it will have to be stepped up in line with the Vance-Owen plan, or it will have to be abandoned.The existing United Nations operation is at risk of becoming bogged down in a disillusioned and hostile environment, rather like our forces in Northern Ireland. In Northern Ireland 24 years ago, the troops bought time and raised hopes, but when those hopes were not fulfilled, due to the failure of politicians, the troops were left in the quagmire where they remain today. That must not be allowed to happen to the United Nations in former Yugoslavia.
That means that the United Nations operation should be driven forward to make the Vance-Owen plan work. I do not like that plan any more than anyone else does. Such partitioning is unhealthy, but it is the only hope for that part of the world. To do that, the United Nations needs better co- ordination, better command and control and probably substantially more troops. It is also essential that there should be a direct representative of the United Nations General-Secretary in the area to take command of the operation with its political, military and humanitarian aspects. I hope that that will be considered.
American participation in the operation is obviously important, but Bosnia is no place for air power or massive ground forces. The "Stormin' Norman" approach would only degenerate into a sort of European Vietnam ; that is a risk which should be understood by all concerned. Yugoslavia requires a combination of diplomacy and force, and the forces should be genuinely multinational. That, presumably, should include an enhanced British presence in UNPROFOR. I sincerely hope that when and if the Americans become involved in the operation they will listen to the people who have been deployed there during the last year and learn from those experiences.
What should Britain's role in all this be? On 13 October the Foreign Secretary said :
"our commitments"--
military commitments--
"could well increase--provided, that is, that we wish to maintain our position as a medium-sized power with a developed sense of international responsibility."
We are, after all, still a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council.
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We have also assumed the leading role in the new post-cold-war NATO ACE rapid reaction corps, which should develop into a highly trained force ideally suited to play a key part in the United Nations peace enforcement role outlined in Secretary-General Boutros- Ghali's document, "An Agenda for Peace", submitted to the Security Council on 17 June 1992.The Foreign Secretary has had to admit, however, that British forces are overstretched at present. He did so in a speech on 27 January before the Select Committee on Defence published its second report on the matter on 9 February. British defence policy is a shambles as a result of the Treasury's headlong rush to take a cash dividend from the end of the cold war without the benefit of any kind of review of the military risks and commitments facing Britain in the coming years. The Defence Select Committee's second report shows incontrovertibly that the 26 per cent. cut in the strength of the Army in "Options for Change", even after the 2 per cent. add-back on 3 February, still leaves our forces overstretched and, in many cases, treble-hatted, and certainly in no position to increase their commitment to the United Nations peacekeeping operations around the world. They are already unable to fulfil their existing tasks within reasonable constraints for training, intervals between emergency deployments and other important military factors.
The Select Committee unanimously concluded that we should add back a further seven infantry battalions to make it possible for the Army to undertake the tasks and to meet the risks which exist. I am not suggesting an increase in defence expenditure, but an objective review suggests that we should cut Army manpower by 21 per cent.--not the 26 per cent. proposed by the Government in "Options for Change". I would happily suggest substantial alternative economies in other parts of the defence budget. I hope that the Foreign Secretary will bring wiser counsel to bear in the Ministry of Defence.
There is much peacemaking to be done in today's world--whether in Yugoslavia, Kurdistan, southern Iraq, or Somalia--and that is just the start. I urge the Government fully to support the United Nations Secretary- General's efforts to make that possible, and to reconsider the irrational defence cuts initiated by the right hon. Member for Bridgwater (Mr. King) when he was Secretary of State for Defence. We can help to restore hope and life to the suffering people of places such as Bosnia. Peace itself is a far more precious dividend than anything that cash can buy.
8.10 pm
Sir Jim Spicer (Dorset, West) : I was relieved to hear my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary say that the United Kingdom will not play any major part in flying supplies into Bosnia or any other part of Yugoslavia. Most right hon. and hon. Members will welcome that statement. Dropping supplies is not easy at any time, as we learned in northern Iraq. It becomes even more difficult under small arms fire or ground-to-air fire in the form of SAM missiles. If the United States wants to take that line and the United Nations countenances it doing so, be it on America's head. I would not want to see British planes taking part in that operation, which might also put at risk everything that we are doing so effectively on the ground.
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My right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary asked to what extent we should take part in international peacekeeping. We have probably the proudest record in the world in international peacekeeping. It goes back to the Korean war, when admittedly we operated under powers delegated by the United Nations, and followed through to Desert Storm, also under powers delegated by the United Nations. Desert Storm deployed half a million troops from no fewer than 30 countries. However, those two operations were the exceptions to the general rule.Over the past 30 or 40 years, the scale of United Nations operations has grown year by year. In the Arab-Israeli dispute in 1965, in UNF1, only 4,000 troops from seven countries participated. Although they did a reasonable job, the moment there was any trouble, they were invited to stand to one side--and they did. In Cyprus, United Nations forces numbered 6,238 in 1974, but by 1990 had fallen to 2,108. We may see the need for that force disappear over the next year or two. I am optimistic about the abilities of President Clerides and President Denktash. The two are old friends, and if they cannot work together to produce a future for Cyprus, then God help us.
I regret having to introduce a slightly sour note, but there was talk of 1974 and the Turkish invasion of Cyprus. Mr. Ecevit, then Prime Minister of Turkey, will be visiting London next month, when I hope Opposition Members will meet and discuss with him the events of 1974, when he came to London and begged the then Labour Government to intervene alongside Turkey. It was not convenient for them to do so. Had that Labour Government intervened, as they could and should have as a guarantor power there would be no partition today ; Cyprus would be a united island, with a federal state established.
The United Nations will have an increasing role to play in the rest of this decade, and Yugoslavia is only the beginning. I follow the hon. Member for Stockton, North (Mr. Cook) in referring to the composition of the United Nations forces there. UNPROFOR 1 in Croatia has a Canadian commander on the ground. Poor chap--I do not envy him this task one little bit. He has 14,000 troops from 31 countries. The hon. Member for Stockton, North described in some detail where those troops came from, how they were picked, and how ill equipped some of them are.
By contrast UNPROFOR 2 in Bosnia, under a French commander, comprises 7,740 troops, one third of whom are British. All come from NATO countries. It is a unified force, virtually working under a NATO command structure. It knows its business, and it is getting on with it. If I were offered the choice of those two commands, I know which I would take.
There will be more United Nations commitments, and all will require quality troops that are well trained, well equipped, well led and disciplined. The hon. Member for Stockton, North made the point that a large number of seconded troops do not exhibit any of those characteristics.
As to being well disciplined, who has the right to ask for troops to be withdrawn once they have been committed to a United Nations operation? Right hon. and hon. Members may have read a report in The Sunday Times about the behaviour of the Russian battalion in Croatia.
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What right does it have to be there if its soldiers are behaving in that fashion, acting in a partisan way, and not doing their job properly? Who has the right to tell them to withdraw from the field? That is a difficult situation, because a political decision was made to put in troops from all over the world--but if certain troops are not up to the job and of high enough quality, someone must bite the bullet and tell them to get out of the field and get out of the way. Having made that point, my hope is that that report was not correct.There must also be proper command control--a well trained headquarters staff, and not one cobbled together from outside. That is where NATO becomes so important. There must be commonality of equipment and language, plus a generous allowance of engineers within any force, because they are needed in all such operations. There must be clear and incisive political control alongside military control--and someone of calibre from the political side to work with and enjoy the confidence of the military commander. Only one organisation is capable of providing a proper command structure that will work under fire if necessary, and that is NATO.
Also is the United Nations structure man enough to deal with the problems that will emerge in the course of the next decade--and does it have the resources to do so? The answer is clearly no. We and every other member of the United Nations must be prepared to come forward and to play our part not only in making the United Nations in New York worthy of the name but in ensuring that, when our troops put on the blue beret, they can wear it with pride. All too often, our troops do--but some other contingents that take part in United Nations operations do not.
8.18 pm
Mr. Tam Dalyell (Linlithgow) : During the speech by my right hon. Friend the Member for Copeland (Dr. Cunningham), the Foreign Secretary pointed out that Saddam Hussein went to war and obliterated Kuwait. All right. But the Foreign Secretary then talked about decent people. It is high time that "decent people" remembered the children of Iraq as they are now.
United Nations sanctions are causing the deaths of more than 2,000 people a week in Iraq through lack of medicine, medical services, food and diet supplements, bad water, and a lack of equipment and parts needed for health care, good water, agriculture, and food processing. It is high time that we considered ending sanctions. There can be no doubt about the deaths, or the causal relationship. UNICEF estimates that between 80,000 and 100,000 children under five will die in 1993 if sanctions remain. Among the reports that establish a high death toll is a special report not in some Arab newspaper, but in The New England Journal of Medicine of 24 September 1992. According to that report, the death rate among children under five may be five times as high as the rate before 1991. Doctors estimate that 80 per cent. of child hospital admissions are nutrition-related. As I have said, my figures come from American rather than Arab sources.
Let me address the Minister through those figures. In 1990 there were 485 cases of kwashiorkor ; in 1992, there were 13,744 cases. That is an increase of 28 times. Marasmus is a wasting disease, found especially among children as a result of defective feeding. In 1990, there were
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5,193 cases ; in 1992, there were 111,477-- 21 times as many. Those figures come from the university of Harvard, and they are not doctored.In 1990, there were no cases of cholera ; in 1991-92, there were 2, 100. In 1989, there were 6,229 cases of measles and German measles ; in 1992, there were 21,823--three times as many. In 1989, there were 1,812 cases of typhoid fever ; in 1992, there were 19,276, 10 times as many. The figures are eloquent enough, but heaven knows what will happen in the possibly hot summer of 1993.
In 1989, there were 6,612 cases of pneumonia ; in 1992, there were 17,377, 2.5 times as many. In 1989, there were 19,615 cases of amoebic dysentery ; in 1992, there were 61,939--more than three times as many. In 1989, there were 1,816 cases of viral hepatitis ; in 1992, there were 13,776, seven times as many.
In 1989, there were 2,816 cases of brucellosis ; in 1992, there were 14,546 --an increase of 5.9 times. In 1989, there were 73,416 cases of giardiasis, a duodenal intestinal problem ; in 1992, there were 596,356--an increase of 8.1 times. There was an increase of 4.3 times in cases of whooping cough, and an increase of 12 times in poliomyelitis. The incidence of other protein, vitamin and calorie-related cases increased 11 times, involving great numbers of people.
I am told that virtually all the child population is affected. The percentage of births under 2.5 kg body weight in 1990 was 4.5 ; in 1992, it was nearly four times higher, at 17.6. It is climbing, and is the basis for western medical assessment that Iraq will have millions of stunted--yes stunted--children. We are rightly concerned about what has happened in Liverpool, but we should bear in mind--whatever politicians are in power in this country--that there is a possibility of stunted children in the lands of Mesopotamia. We have some locus in that.
Children over five, and adults, have suffered enormously. The most vulnerable--the elderly, and those with physical disabilities and chronic serious illnesses--have died at greatly increased rates, which comprise much of the approximately threefold overall increase in the death rate. Medical laboratory examinations declined by 60 per cent., from 17,928,000 in 1989 to 7,079,000 in 1992 ; major surgery cases declined by 63 per cent., from 181,000 in 1989 to 65,733 in 1992. Those statistics do not convey the human suffering involved. Anyone who has visited hospitals in Iraq in 1991, 1992 or 1993 could hardly tolerate the sanctions : they are a cruel form of death for their victims, the families of those victims and all who understand that they are the actual, moral and legal equivalent of taking the lives and the health of infants, and of sick and elderly hostages, for the payment of money or other acts of government.
Sanctions violate humanitarian law, because they are known to deprive a population of food and medical care.
The Government ought to pay close attention to a recent visit to Iraq by Ramsey Clark. He was thought fit to become Attorney-General of the United States--the senior legal officer in Washington. Are we now to say that his figures, and his concerns, should be dismissed? There is also the evidence of Dr. Eric Hoskins. Doctor Hoskins is Canadian, but he is also the holder of a Lester Pearson medal. He is very concerned about what he calls nuclear toys. He points out : "Several months ago, when the medical director of the prestigious Albert Schweitzer Institute arrived in Berlin carrying with him one of these mildly' radioactive DU"--
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depleted uranium--"penetrators retrieved from Iraq, he was immediately arrested by the German authorities and charged with illegally releasing ionising radiation'. The DU penetrator he was carrying, its radioactivity confirmed by two independent German laboratories, was quickly sealed in a lead-lined box."
There are no lead-lined boxes in Iraq. We should consider the humanitarian aspects of the matter.
On 22 February, the Prime Minister gave me an answer to unstarred question No. 70, in which I asked
"pursuant to his oral answer of 4 February, Official Report, column 472, how much of the evidence of the key witness"
--in the Matrix Churchill case--
"was given in response to questions which referred to the disclosed documents."
The Prime Minister replied :
"As I indicated in my answer of 4 February, I suggest matters relevant to the Matrix Churchill trail should await the outcome of Lord Justice Scott's inquiry."--[ Official Report, 22 February 1993 ; Vol. 219, c. 436. ]
As soon as Lord Justice Scott's terms of reference were announced, my right hon. Friend the Member for Chesterfield (Mr. Benn) and I asked whether questions would be precluded. Hon. Members will recall that we were told that in no way would answers be treated as if they were sub judice.
Now everything is being put into Lord Justice Scott's in-tray. I do not doubt the distinction or fair-mindedness of this judge, but I am very unhappy about this inquiry. I think that I am the only remaining Member of Parliament who appeared before the Franks committee. That committee, which met under the distinguished Lord Franks, is now reckoned not to have reported in a very satisfactory way. Indeed, when I talked to Sir Patrick Nairne some years later, he, like other members of the committee, was rather embarrassed about some of the things that had happened.
Lord Justice Scott should have at his disposal two Clerks of the House of Commons, independent of the civil service, to help him. In answer to written question No. 5 on 18 February, I was told that he would have the help of one assistant solicitor, one press officer, one grade 7 officer, one executive officer, one administrative officer and one personal secretary. This is not sufficient to sort out the wealth of evidence that is now being produced in book form. During the recess I read the 500 pages of Kenneth Timmerman's book "The Death Lobby : How the West Armed Iraq". Many hon. Members will be familiar with David Leigh's book "Betrayed". Then there is John Sweeney's book "Trading with the Enemy : Britain's Arming of Iraq". If we need any indication of the relationship with Iraq immediately before the war, here it is. But, like a plot twist, says Sweeney, in one of the Reverend Thomas Awdrey's "Thomas the Tank Engine" books, all is not well in the Iraqi shunting yards. When a bright, shiny, brash new engine steamed in, full of puff, its name was David Mellor. That was the discovery of the hon. Member for Christchurch (Mr. Adley). At a serious level, I have to say that this is the relationship that occurred between Britain and pre- Gulf war Iraq. I end by repeating something that I said in an intervention during the speech by the Foreign Secretary--that he must explain a number of matters arising out of the books to which I have referred. They cannot go unchallenged. The House of Commons will be brought into disrepute unless some serious answers are given, especially by the Foreign Secretary with regard to what
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exactly happened on 19 July--a fortnight before the start of the hostilities--when he chaired a Cabinet meeting with the object of removing restrictions on the export of military equipment to Iraq. When I make speeches urging the lifting of sanctions and contact with the authorities in Baghdad, let us all remember what the relationship between the British Government and Baghdad was. That puts into context a request that sanctions be lifted. I wish that the Foreign Secretary were present, for, with regard to the question that I put to him during his speech and Geoffrey Robertson's brilliant performance in the Old Bailey, I have to say with sadness that, for the first time, I do not believe him.8.34 pm
Sir Michael Marshall (Arundel) : The hon. Member for Linlithgow (Mr. Dalyell) will understand if I do not folllow him down his line of inquiry. I wish to take up some of the main themes that I detect emerging from the debate. I have heard almost all the speeches and apologise for having to slip out briefly to meet a constituent. The document "An Agenda for Peace", which was produced last year by the Secretary-General of the United Nations, defines peacekeeping as "the deployment of the United Nations presence in the field, hitherto with the consent of all parties concerned, normally involving United Nations military and/or police personnel and possibly civilians as well".
The document says :
"Peacekeeping is a technique which expands the possibilities of both the prevention of conflict and the making of peace." Things have moved on since that definition was given in the middle of last year. The definition has been sharpened by the way in which the civil war has pointed up some of the difficult questions that the House faces today.
I shall wish to cite the situations in Somalia, northern Iraq and the former Yugoslavia, including Bosnia. These are three examples of the way in which we have had to look again, with some precision, at the problems that face us. I refer in particular to problems arising from the military and civil authorities' coming together under the umbrella of the United Nations. As has been said by several hon. Members, the wider definition of peacekeeping could certainly take in the question, for example, of the organisation of elections, as happened in the post-civil-war situation in Angola. We certainly see this operating in preventive diplomacy. Reflecting my IPU responsibilities, I have to say that it is in the area of parliamentary diplomacy that many people can play a part in this process.
With regard to the specific problems arising from civil war, one thinks of the safeguarding of food supplies and the prevention of human rights abuses. In every respect we have to reflect that the peacekeeping process with which we are principally concerned is disaster relief. If one thinks of the situation in those terms, one begins to see who the principal players are and how we should seek to support them.
I have long supported the use of the military in disaster relief. I know that there was a certain initial reluctance. That applied even in the case of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation, which was understandable, given the situation at the time. However, events have moved on,
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and, as has been said, NATO has proved itself as perhaps the only coherent regional force that can be deployed under United Nations auspices. But NATO cannot take on everything. There will be situations in which we have to evolve a better structure to deal with the problems confronting us. Very often this has to be done against the problems--in some cases, the resistance--of some of the organisations involved in disaster relief.I am thinking of the views expressed by the International Committee of the Red Cross and some of the religious aid organisations. I respect their views, but my attitude is simply that, when a disaster of this kind strikes, there is no option to turning to the military. It is the only organisation that can produce the rapid response that is needed for humanitarian purposes. It alone has the spread of communications, medicines, transport and, above all, command and control to secure the necessary direction of the operation. But we ought to welcome the wider opportunity in what is happening in a difficult and dangerous world. I refer to the area of international co-operation. NATO and Warsaw pact forces are coming together. That is a welcome development. The idea of east and west and, in the case of the Warsaw pact, the former military being involved has much to commend it. Most right hon. and hon. Members would agree that, in the scheme of things in the world, there must be a place for such people, who, within their lights, gave service to their countries. Co- operation of that type is of the highest importance.
It is also very important in these debates that we should not forget the vast number of countries that are not privy to what goes on in the Security Council, the inner sanctum of the G7 and the "G77"--all those countries in the developing world that suffer in a way far beyond our experience. They too must be taken into account, and their sensitivities respected, when we make our plans. In all our work we should try to draw on the lessons that we have learnt in recent times.
Let me return to my three examples. In northern Iraq, the protection of Kurds has shown clearly what NATO can do in this regard. That action was undertaken directly in response to United Nations resolutions. The matter of Somalia raises some very serious questions. I pay tribute to what the United States has done in responding to United Nations resolutions, but the United States has said that it is there for a finite period, and the question that arises is what is to happen at the end of that period. While we all hope that diplomacy may be brought to bear to help resolve the problems, it would be a sanguine observer who felt that there were not still deep dangers with the war lords in that country. I see that there are already suggestions that forces from other members of the United Nations may be asked to take over this responsibility. Australia has been mentioned, and I have no doubt that we will receive the call.
I come, as most other hon. Members have, finally, to the situation in Bosnia. I was pleased to find such clarity of view from both Front Benches in saying that we cannot impose a military solution by force, nor can we end the fighting by attack from the air.
Sticking within the ten-minute philosophy as far as I can, I will advance just three principles that I hope that we will regard as relevant in our planning for existing and perhaps future commitments. First, if the military is to be employed it is essential that it has a clear objective. There must be some understanding of its purpose, of the period
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in which it is to be deployed and of its relationship with the civil disaster relief agencies and with the United Nations--and that is an area where co-ordination is not particularly good at present. Secondly, we cannot impose these responsibilities on the military if those who command them feel that they are going to be denuded of their traditional role, which is the defence of the free world and not a matter that can be pushed aside as no longer relevant. There are still severe anxieties in the world at large, and there is still a potential nuclear threat. Therefore, if we look at "Options for Change", as we have been doing, and at the wider role of the military, that is fine, but when specific exercises are postulated, we must calculate carefully, their effect on those traditional roles. Finally, the military must be given full support through the United Nations. It is in this area that I have some anxieties. If we look at the way in which the non-governmental organisations, the disaster relief community, the representatives of the United Nations and the military have sought to work together in the field, we see an uncertainty in the United Nations' own direction of these affairs. I would particularly urge my right hon. and learned Friend, when he winds up, to reflect on the role of the Department of Humanitarian Affairs which has been set up to co-ordinate all these matters in the United Nations and, in particular, in some senses, to take over the previous activities of UNRO and other agencies. I believe that the Department of Humanitarian Affairs has not really been given the proper backing and encouragement that it should have. If it is allowed to pursue its work, it can begin to bring together all these agencies, all this relief and all the work of the military in a meaningful way. That is why I very much hope that we may give the United Nations strong support in this task while it is going through a period of difficult and international change.In all the speeches that we have heard tonight, many of them moving and well informed, there is a clear desire that peaceful resolution should be the prime objective of the House as it is of the Inter-Parliamentary Union.
Several hon. Members rose--
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