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Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Geoffrey Lofthouse) : Order. I understand that the wind-ups are to begin at about 9.20 pm. Five hon. Members are still waiting to catch my eye, and most of them have sat here all through the debate. If we have a bit of co-operation in the length of speeches, I may be able to call them all.

8.43 pm

Mr. David Trimble (Upper Bann) : Like many hon. Members, I want to concentrate on the situation in former Yugoslavia. Events there in the past few years have been rather depressing to observe. I am afraid that the conclusions that they may have for us are also depressing.

Before the crisis in Yugoslavia broke, there was some reason for believing that we were in the process of putting into place, through primarily the Conference on Security and Co-operation in Europe, a set of principles which would regulate relations in Europe and deal with the sort of problems that later emerged. The principles involved such fundamental matters as recognition of existing boundaries, provision for minority rights through concern for the human rights of members of minorities and the

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principle that changes should come only by way of agreement. These principles were the bedrock on which the CSCE process was supposed to operate.

When we see that that process has not operated effectively in Yugoslavia and consider the present position, we see something that is in conflict with the principles. The Owen-Vance plan for Bosnia has been described as the only show in town, but it is a most unsatisfactory show. It proposes to recognise as administrative units the ethnic divisions and ethnic units in former Yugoslavia. We are going to create a series of Serb states, Croat states and Bosnian Muslim states. This plan can operate only as a prelude to the break-up of Bosnia.

I know that under the plan there is a suggestion that there will still be some vague central authority, but the logic of events will point towards the break-up of Bosnia as presently constituted into those ethnic units because Owen-Vance recognises the ethnic units. As a corollary, the present ethnic sorting out that has started within that area will be accelerated. There may be proposals to deploy peacekeeping forces to police the operation of the Owen-Vance plan, but I suggest that it is only likely to slow down the process of break-up.

The implications of that for other areas will be considerable. If Bosnia breaks up on the ethnic lines for which Owen-Vance is laying the groundwork, inevitably the Bosnian Serbs will want to develop their relationship with the rest of Bosnia and with the Serbs in Krajina. That has implications for the territorial integrity of Croatia. It also has implications further south. The Albanians of Kosovo and the Albanians of Macedonia will ask, if the ethnic minorities are going to be recognised in Bosnia, why they cannot be recognised too.

We may feel that we can keep those areas in separate compartments mentally and try to apply to Kosovo the principles that we set out in CSCE agreements, which I understand is the position of the Government, because the Government say that they will continue to recognise the existing Serbian state and to tell the Albanian population in Kosovo that they should rely on autonomy and provide for human rights in that way, but they will not necessarily see it that way.

I attended a briefing on the subject the other day at which a gentleman who had been in the territory and was familiar with it said that the minute that a major peacekeeping force arrived in Bosnia, Kosovo would erupt, that the Kosovo Albanians realised that this would be their chance and would seize it with both hands. In the light of that, while the Owen-Vance plan may be the only show in town, it is going to be curtains for a number of territories in the way in which it operates. I do not consider that it will be a good plan or a good experience.

Having said that, I recognise that it is impossible to turn the clock back- -I wish it were. We may be unable to rectify the mistakes that have been made with regard to Bosnia, but must we just sit and wait for their implications for Kosovo and Macedonia to unfold? If we cannot vindicate all the principles that underlay the CSCE process, can we at least vindicate the principle that change, if inevitable, comes only by way of agreement? At the very least can we not recognise the present state of Macedonia? I feel very concerned about the situation there.

We are told that the Greeks have no territorial ambitions over the present Slav state of Macedonia, but their blockage of recognition is, I fear, opening the way to other territories which do or may have territorial

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ambitions. I refer to Albania, Serbia and Bulgaria. By keeping Macedonia in limbo, we are making it something that is up for grabs, an unstable area, in which other states may be tempted to intervene. Looking at this rather depressing situation, I think that the overriding lesson is that the CSCE process and the United Nations itself have not worked very well. It may be said that it is working better than it did during the cold war, and that is a fair point, but we must not deceive ourselves. Let us not say that we have a new world order or that we have new international authorities which can be effective. They are not being terribly effective when put to the test. Experience in Yugoslavia and elsewhere shows that they do not have an effective decision-making process. The Yugoslav crisis emphasised that. Their reactions were too late and slow.

Another lesson is that we cannot deal with all the problems that exist in the world : to do so would place too heavy a burden on the few countries willing to bear them. If we cannot deal with all the problems, dealing with only some of them may bring the process into disrepute because selectivity would then arise. There is no difference in principle between the situation in Azerbaijan and Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh and that in the Balkans. For various reasons, we are involved in one but not in the other. Such selectivity will bring the international organs and the international process into disrepute.

The answer is that until we have better and more effective decision-making processes and clearer principles on which to operate we should be cautious in our approach and should confine the use of international organs and intervention to clear and flagrant cases. We need better agreed principles on which to act and greater legitimacy for the way in which we act against states.

There has been a tendency in this debate to concentrate on what could be called the military nuts and bolts. Good and sensible points have been made about military command structures, the need for amphibious forces and so on, but the essential problem is not one of command or forces but political, and until we find more effective international organs and decision-making processes we should not talk up the process. We should move more cautiously and try to work out and achieve the necessary political consensus--if not globally, at least regionally--that can provide a basis for peacekeeping operations.

8.51 pm

Mr. David Faber (Westbury) : I am grateful for the opportunity to speak briefly in this important debate. I had planned to follow some of the more general points that have been made about the United Nations, but, mindful of your advice, Mr. Deputy Speaker, I shall move straight to the subject of Bosnia.

I have sat through every word of this thoroughly good wide-ranging and extremely interesting debate. Like other hon. Members, I have been fortunate enough to visit Bosnia. I spent some time in Sarajevo just before Christmas, where I had the opportunity to see the peacekeeping operation at first hand.

I should like to consider the four categories of UN peacekeeping into which our role in Bosnia falls. The first is the delivery of humanitarian aid, which the Cheshires are so successfully undertaking in Bosnia and the

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Americans in Somalia. The second is peace monitoring, in which UNPROFOR 2 in Sarajevo faces the most difficult task. The third is peacekeeping, such as in Iraq or by UNPROFOR 1 in Croatia, to which our Government may be asked to contribute should the Owen-Vance plan succeed. The fourth is peacemaking, which has been dealt with at length : the enforcement of no-fly zones, the imposition of troops on the ground and the removal of the arms embargo on the Muslims, all of which, I am happy to say, have been ruled out by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State.

The deployment of United Kingdom troops in Bosnia has been an outstanding success, and I join other hon. Members who have paid tribute to their skill and bravery. There can be no doubt that they have saved tens, if not hundreds, of thousands of lives, but the death of Corporal Edwards reminded us of the dangers that they face daily and of the greater dangers that they would face in a peacekeeping or peacemaking role.

One example that is often forgotten is the importance of the co-operation of Belgrade in delivering humanitarian aid. However much we may dislike the Belgrade Administration, we should remember that the majority of aid reaches Bosnia from there. It has a safe two-hour trip from Belgrade to the border at Zvornik, and were we to impose peacemaking or peacekeeping resolutions on Serbia, that route would be cut off, leaving only the more dangerous route that our troops are using from Split andVitez north to Bosnia.

It is in the peace monitoring role that the United Nations has the greatest difficulty on the ground, as I saw for myself in Sarajevo. When it was first set up, logistically, the operation in Sarajevo left much to be desired. It is the United Nation's job to monitor the clashes that take place, and the firing of heavy weapons. It issues daily press releases describing what it has seen, with a disclaimer about where shelling came from.

The shelling of Sarajevo has been an extremely emotive point throughout. It has barely been reported in the west that a great deal of it has come from Mount Igman overlooking Sarajevo, which is controlled by a rogue Muslim commander, Juka, who is not under the control of the Bosnian presidency and whose actions the United Nations has been unable to assess.

We saw emotive scenes of the shelling of the bread queue in Sarajevo and of a cemetery when a funeral was taking place. The United Nations locally now acknowledges that both may have been carried out by Muslims in an effort to curry favour with the west. That is certainly what we were told by UNPROFOR when we were in Sarajevo. Most recently, General Morillon has ticked off the Bosnians for the murder of a French soldier and the wounding of several French soldiers, the blame for which he laid squarely at their door. Logistically and politically, there are problems, which the hon. Member for Stockton, North (Mr. Cook) summed up very succinctly. How can Egyptians be seen as neutral observers by the Serbs and Croats in a war involving muslims? Similarly, how can Ukrainians be seen as independent observers in a war involving Serbs, when in many parts of Bosnia they openly fraternise with the Serbs and when convoys being taken by Ukrainians rarely come under fire? That is when they are not too busy playing the black market, as my hon. Friend the Member for Dorset, West (Sir J. Spicer) pointed out.

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The first paragraph of the article in the Sunday Times to which he referred said :

"Russia's first military force to serve with the United Nations has turned out to be a disgrace, according to angry UN officials. Its men have been accused of black marketeering, defying orders from the UN commander in Croatia skimming UN funds and collaborating with Serbia's most ruthless paramilitary force."

The article, however true or untrue, lists a catalogue of cases in which the Russians have at best turned a blind eye and have at worst been helping the Serbs.

What will happen if the Owen-Vance plan succeeds, as we all hope it will, and achieves a peace settlement, and the UN asks us to contribute some form of peacekeeping force, probably run by the United States? I urge my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State to treat such an application with extreme caution. I appreciate that there is a catch 22 here : what is the point of sending troops to enforce a peace if the peace is already thought to be holding? I believe that we should be extremely cautious about joining any peacekeeping force, unless an established and workable peace is already agreed and has proved possible.

UNPROFOR personnel with whom we spoke in Sarajevo acknowledged that they were treading on eggshells. Their perceived neutrality is vital, which is one reason why British troops have been outstandingly successful in Bosnia. I am concerned that, were a peacekeeping force to be sent with United States troops at the head, it would not be perceived as neutral by Serbs, just as Russians playing a role in a peacekeeping force would experience great problems in convincing opponents of the Serbs that they were not closely allied to them. In the United States, the debate has been much more one-sided than it has in the rest of the west, especially in the press. My right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary mentioned the worst excesses of The New York Times, which has attempted to whip up a fever in the United States throughout this unfortunate and tragic war. It is clear that the vast majority of atrocities have been carried out by the Serbs, but I believe, for instance, that if we are to look at setting up a war crimes tribunal--I was concerned to hear the United States ambassador to the United Nations last night paying attention only to the Serb atrocities--this has to be handled in a very careful and cautious manner.

To sum up, Mr. Deputy Speaker, in the hope that other hon. Members will be able to catch your eye, I urge the Government to be extremely cautious in agreeing to help with any peacekeeping force in what is now Bosnia.

8.59 pm

Mr. Harry Cohen (Leyton) : I wish to take a different angle on the subject of tonight's debate. The question of which circumstances are right for the use of peacekeeping troops is complicated, and I support the humanitarian efforts of our troops, both in Yugoslavia and elsewhere, and pay a tribute to them. However, I wish to make another fundamental point.

Even if only one British soldier is deployed in a peacekeeping role, I am sure that hon. Members on all sides of the House agree that as much protection as possible should be provided under international law. It is this aspect of international law which leads me to question the Government's stance on the 1981 inhumane weapons convention and the 1977 additional protocols to the

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Geneva conventions, each of which has great significance for British troops on peacekeeping duties. I will deal with the additional protocols first.

Protocol I relates to the protection of victims of international armed conflicts. This protocol supplements rather than replaces the 1949 Geneva convention, incorporating many important developments--for example, the identification and protection of medical aircraft, and provisions ralating to indiscriminate attacks on civilians. Protocol II relates to the protection of victims of civil war. It would be under this second protocol that any British soldier would have to claim protection, as the war in Bosnia is a civil war.

The former federal state of Yugoslavia ratified both those protocols on 11 June 1979. This ratification should apply to the replacement states, including Serbia and Croatia.

The second protocol includes a prohibition on "outrages upon personal dignity", in particular, humiliating and degrading treatment, rape--which, of course, has happened in the former

Yugoslavia--enforced prostitution and any form of indecent assault. Maximum pressure must be brought to bear on those guilty of such offences, because they have broken the Geneva Convention rules. However, we must not appear hypocritical. This protocol, although signed by the United Kingdom, has not been ratified by us. If we are to put the maximum pressure on those who are carrying out such hideous offences, should we ratify it? Further ghastly offences, such as

"forced detention of civilians in appalling conditions", are also in breach of this protocol, as is the "forced movement of civilians".

If we are to make a case to the United Nations or any other international body about abuses of these protocols in the former Yugoslavia, we will risk looking quite foolish. Anyone opposed to such investigations will ask us why, if we are so concerned about these protocols, we have not ratified them.

The same is true of the 1981 inhumane weapons convention, which also has great significance for British troops in the former Yugoslavia. The use of napalm is controlled by this convention, although its use is not banned altogether. Napalm has been used many times in Bosnia, apparently by Serb forces. If British troops on humanitarian or peacekeeping operations are hit by napalm, Her Majesty's Government will have reduced political clout in international circles for any redress, because we have not ratified the convention.

Moreover, in statements, Ministers have questioned protocol 3 to the convention, which restricts the use of incendary devices such as napalm. I believe that this is a mistake, and it severely weakens the position of British forces on the ground. We are not talking about political embarrassments ; we are talking about people's skins. The Minister stated in a letter to me that the inhumane weapons convention cannot be ratified until the additional protocols have been ratified, and he linked this to possible

"interpretative or operational problems for NATO".

However, the linkage between the ratification of the convention and possible NATO problems with the protocols seems rather strange when one considers that other NATO states, such as Denmark, France, Italy, the Netherlands and Norway, have all ratified it. I think that

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the inhumane weapons convention and the additional protocols could be ratified easily, and I urge the Secretary of State to start the process immediately.

Lord Glenarthur, then a Minister, told the other place in 1987 that he hoped that consultations in NATO about the additional protocols would be completed in 1988, so enabling a decision to be taken on ratification. We are still waiting.

There is a principle in international law that one does not sign a treaty unless one intends to ratify it. Unless Her Majesty's Government are breaking international law, the ratification decision must be a question of when rather than if. The time to ratify is now. Let us not leave the treaty to go the way of protocol 4 to the European convention on human rights, which we signed in 1963 but have not yet ratified.

Peacekeeping will be an important role for the British army. If a British soldier is to be sent to any danger zone, he should have the full protection of international law and be freed from the hypocrisy of the British Government's attitude to international law. I urge the Government to ratify those instruments.

9.5 pm

Mr. Jacques Arnold (Gravesham) : In view of the time, I shall confine my remarks to the Balkans. The Foreign Secretary today detailed the scale, scope and record of British forces in Bosnia and Herzegovina. We can be proud of them. Their humanitarian work has saved thousands of lives, but for how long can that go on? Are we not treating the symptom and not the disease?

Are we perhaps postponing the inevitable? Are we waiting for an agreement between the combatants which--although we may get one--they would not keep? The long, sorry record of events recently in Bosnia has been of civilian leaders agreeing and military commanders on the ground brazenly disregarding agreements and carrying on with the slaughter.

The sense of futility engendered by the situation was well articulated by Lord Carrington during his briefings to Committees in this House. We must face two brutal alternative realities : either we let the war take its course or, on behalf of the world community, we impose a solution by the world community. The first has attractions, about which we have heard in the debate. We have heard echoes of the old saying about a faraway country of which we know nothing or, to recycle an old quotation, about Bosnia not being worth the bones of one British grenadier.

We could argue that they are all Slavs, let them do battle among themselves and sort it out for themselves. Were we to take that approach, the outcome would see the majority of Bosnia and Herzegovina come under the Serbians, despite the fact that they made up less than one third of the Bosnian population at the beginning of this sorry series of events. Were that to happen, it would be thanks to their access to the Federal Yugoslav armoury. The Croatians would also hold large territorial tracts of Bosnia Herzegovina. But the Muslims would be squeezed, cleansed and exterminated. We would see the sack of Sarajevo, and we would see it night after night on our television screens. The slaugher would be inevitable, and inevitably it would be that of the innocent.

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The end result of such a policy would be a greater Croatia. They would settle for that and they would go off the international agenda, like Slovenia before them. The Muslim Slavs would join the fragmentary minorities, such as the Jews, prevalent in central and eastern Europe. Greater Serbia would be the greatest danger of all. We would have proved that force pays, that defiance of the international community pays and that defiance, regardless of the activities of negotiators, even their own, wins. They would have won thanks to enjoying the heritage and armed forces of Federal Yugoslavia.

Let us be absolutely clear that greater Serbia would not stop at Bosnia Herzegovina. It would roll on to Kosovo, Vojvodina and even to Macedonia. Kosovo, the former autonomous province within Serbia, is populated to the extent of 80 per cent. by Albanians. Under Tito, the people had rights of language, education and even to fly the Albanian national flag as the provincial flag of Kosovo. Under Milosevic, the autonomous province and its national assembly have been abolished. The university of Pristina and the Albania schools have been closed. Repression is the order of the day.

Is the next step of Serbian ethnic cleansing to be carried out in Kosovo? The passions of greater Serbia could be fired by the emotions of the ancient battle of Kosovo, so emotive in Serbian folklore. The tolerance of the Albanians in Kosovo could break into violent revolt, which would make what we have seen in Bosnia look like a kindergarten.

Vojvodina, the other autonomous province within Serbia, has also been abolished and it has large minorities--18 per cent. of the people are Hungarians. Macedonia, as yet unrecognised, is 65 per cent. populated by people akin to Bulgarians, and 21 per cent. are Albanians. Events there could provoke Greece and Bulgaria. Events in Vojvodina could provoke Hungary. A trail of minorities, like a powder train, stretches from the Balkans across Europe : Hungarians in Romania and Slovakia, Slovaks in Hungary, Sudetenland exiles in Bavaria looking to the new Czech republic, Silesians in Poland rediscovering their German roots, Poles in Lithuania-- so one could go on.

We must do all we can to back up the Vance-Owen plan to find a settlement in Bosnia-Herzegovina, which is the start of the train of powder. It would be quite credible to cantonise Bosnia and Herzegovina. The origins of the Swiss confederation were to find a stable settlement between three communities there with roots in adjacent lands, and the record of Switzerland shows what can be achieved.

If we do not want the powder train across Europe to be ignited, as it was in 1914, we must give every support to a United Nations led and multinationally staffed back-up to a peace settlement in Bosnia- Herzegovina. It should not rely on the United Kingdom alone or even on a United Kingdom lead. We must show off the effectiveness of the foreign affairs pillar of the European Community which has been boasted of lately in the House. We must use the Conference on Security and Co-operation in Europe and western European countries must put their forces where their mouths are. If, because of their 20th century history, Germany and Italy cannot intervene with us in Bosnia-Herzegovina, they must put up the money- -as, indeed, the Germans did in the Gulf. If necessary, we must keep the peace and even make the peace.

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9.11 pm

Lady Olga Maitland (Sutton and Cheam) : In his opening remarks, the Foreign Secretary prompted us with the question, to what extent should we take part in peacekeeping? I believe that we should take part wholeheartedly and without hesitation, not only because it would be a gesture of leadership from a country which should be proud of the professionalism of its armed forces but because we have the finest tradition of leadership. I for one should be disappointed if ever we fell down in that respect.

I appreciate the Foreign Secretary's saying that Great Britain would assist in a United Nations peacekeeping force in the event of a ceasefire and a peace agreement. I also welcome the fact that the Secretary of State for Defence recognised the possibility that Britain would contribute a force to NATO under a United Nations cap. I must stress that duty begins at home. Whatever commitments we take on overseas, it is important that we do not do so at the expense of our important commitment in Northern Ireland, which must be our priority. It would be a tragedy if the Irish Republican Army misunderstood our determination to ensure that its violence never pays.

My hon. Friend the Member for Carshalton and Wallingford (Mr. Forman) rightly mentioned our priorities. After our priorities at home must come those in Europe. I have absolutely no doubt that our moral responsibility lies within the European boundaries, so Bosnia must be top of the list. I place on record my enormous appreciation not only of the Cheshires and their fantastic work with the humanitarian convoys but of the less heralded Royal Irish Regiment. How often do people remember to thank them? There is also a special interest in my constituency, because 150 Crown agents have been sent out by the Overseas Development Administration to help with the convoys.

As we speak today, the bombardment continues in Bosnia. I heard this morning that the heavy artillery attacks on Tesanj, Gorazde, Cazin and Miljanovci continue unstinted. I hope that those dreadful events will be a spur to the peace talks.

As we are now discussing peace talks and something is likely to happen, the time has come to think ahead. I welcome the initiatives by Lord Owen and Cyrus Vance. Their plan for 10 cantons is not perfect, but we should encourage them to fight on to achieve the right mix and the best possible fair deal for everyone.

A peace agreement will lead to peacekeeping, but how will we keep the guns silent? That brings us to peacemaking. Forcing sniping warlords into demilitarisation will call for a considerable United Nations force which must be as broad, wide and deep as possible. It is not simply a United Kingdom responsibility ; it is absolutely right that the Government should insist that the burden must be shared, and not simply with those who have already accepted their responsibilities. I welcome the fact that the Americans are now wholeheartedly joining in the planning and will be making a contribution.

It is also significant that we are now discussing the problem with the Russians. A multinational force is essential to gain the confidence of all parties. Many people will not find the Russians acceptable as they are working too closely for comfort with the Serbs ; none the less, the balance has to be struck. I particularly welcome the trip by

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Reg Bartholomew, the United States special envoy to Moscow. Let us consider for a moment the implications of a Russian contribution.

Mr. Seamus Mallon (Newry and Armagh) : Will the hon. Lady explain what she means by the term "Russians" ? She has now used it twice and it needs some clarification in the context of the debate.

Lady Olga Maitland : When I refer to the Russians, I refer particularly to the state of Russia and not to the Commonwealth of Independent States. I am not trying to embrace all the republics of the former Soviet Union. A contribution from the Russians would be significant, as it would be the first time that that country had co-operated with NATO. It could be attractive to Moscow and it is for the west to make it politically attractive. We must make it abundantly clear to Mr. Yeltsin that he has more to gain from the good will of the west than anything he could achieve by encouraging Milosevic.

We are well aware that there is a natural kinship between the two countries ; they are Slavs and they share the same Orthodox Church. However, it is important that we ensure that Milosevic, who is the inspirator of this murderous performance in Bosnia, should be politically isolated and made as uncomfortable as possible. Indeed, sanctions should be brought to bear which will cripple his style and standing in his own country. I was in Belgrade just before Christmas as one of the official observers for the election, and he was defiant to the core.

We must push forward and encourage those within the country of Yugoslavia who support a proper peace process. Next week, the former Yugoslav Prime Minister, Milan Panic, will be in London. We should listen to what he has to say. Meanwhile, it is important to enforce sanctions with the greatest energy. I congratulate the Government on drafting new proposals, suggesting the closure of all rail and road links and the enforcement of no-fly zones. In those matters, Russia would have to back the United Nations resolutions.

My hon. Friend the Member for Westbury (Mr. Faber) drew attention to concerns about bringing Russians into a peacekeeping force. They are not experienced. We have plenty of evidence, as shown in The Sunday Times, that their behaviour has been militarily atrocious. Therefore, we need to consider carefully what role they should have. Where is the practical place to put them? Under whom should they serve? Should they work on the ground or in the air? Should they work alongside the Serbs whom they have been encouraging?

I should like to continue my comments, but it is time to finish. Britain has a duty to show real leadership. We are proud of our record and of the fact that we have had successful humanitarian convoys. I hope that they will continue undaunted.

9.20 pm

Mr. George Robertson (Hamilton) : It is traditional to say in one's reply that the debate has been interesting and wide-ranging, but indeed this debate has been. It has also gone beyond that. There has been common concern throughout the House about the problems that face our continent and the world. Perhaps the debate has been a small but troubled oasis in the normal frenzy of political

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activity which characterises our rumbustious but perhaps enriching political debate. Certainly it makes a change after last night. The unity on deep troubles and serious problems shows the willingness of hon. Members in all parts of the House to try to come to terms not just with describing the problems but with finding solutions. We have to consider peacekeeping in its widest sense and not just in the clinical sense used in the military context. On peacekeeping, we were right to focus most attention on the United Nations. With its belatedly renewed prominence, the United Nations is the last great hope of us all for something better in future. The Foreign Secretary entitled his talk recently at Chatham house "The new disorder". That description is unfortunately all too true of events in the world today. Despite that description, and despite the eloquent emphasis by many hon. Members in the debate, the United Nations is the only hope we have. My hon. Friend the Member for Dundee, West (Mr. Ross) spoke with considerable passion about the new role which the United Nations could and must have.

If the United Nations is to fulfil all the hopes and expectations of so many hon. Members and people outside the House, it will need the money, the physical resources and the personnel to put behind its policies. It will require the political will of all who participate in it. All those are preconditions for a renewed United Nations which might give hope to us all.

At the end of his speech, the Foreign Secretary referred to preventive diplomacy. Perhaps there was a hint of self-interest in his flying the flag for the Foreign Office, in what is probably a bitter and animated debate taking place inside Government as we talk--the traditional battle between Ministries and the Treasury. The Foreign Secretary has our strong support in the fight that he may be putting up--if that comes as any reassurance. If he wants to tell me that an attack would be better, I will be happy to write to the Chancellor. I will do anything to ensure that the message gets through.

The Foreign Secretary said that it is much cheaper to pay for an ambassador than for an infantry battalion, much cheaper to pay for ambassadors for a dozen embassies than for one aeroplane, and he said how much more good it does. His remarks are valuable, and my hon. Friend the Member for Swansea, East (Mr. Anderson), who was formerly a member of the diplomatic service, also said that preventive diplomacy is important. This is the last time that this or any other country should even dream of cutting back on the people who are engaged in the process that may well prevent conflicts from starting, and who ensure that, when they start, they do not spread beyond the immediate boundaries.

The Foreign Office is facing cuts, and while they will not be severe this year, according to press statements, they will be in the following two years. They will not merely mean dashing the Foreign Office's ambitions to open new embassasies and missions in the new republics of the former Soviet Union and elsewhere, but will probably lead to cuts in British representation abroad, for example in the activities of that eminent organisation, the British Council--I must declare an interest as its vice- chairman--whose

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role in cultural and educational diplomacy is both considerable and valuable. Such cuts should not be contemplated.

The cuts may well lead to reductions in world radio and television services --by any standards, the best broadcasting on the planet. It would be madness if the Treasury got away with any ambition to do that.

Sir Michael Marshall : The hon. Gentleman may be aware that an Albanian parliamentary delegation is visiting the House today. They have told us that many people have risked 10 years imprisonment and the confiscation of their entire property to listen to BBC radio World Service.

Mr. Robertson : That is a welcome intervention, and I know that those on the Treasury Bench listened with sympathy, but the message must get home to those inside the Treasury. If we do not invest properly in diplomacy, it will be infinitely more expensive to this nation and to the world.

Perhaps I have been the Shadow Front-Bench spokesman on foreign affairs for too long. It has been 11 years, and in my museum of the Foreign Office I have seen two European treaties and four wars with British involvement, and 24 Ministers have come and gone, including five Foreign Secretaries. During that time, I have come to recognise the quality and sheer professionalism of the British foreign service. I have no doubt that its contribution to making the world safer and better has been incalculable but fundamental, and we must bear that in mind.

I must deal with reactiveness. I was recently asked whether we envisaged that British troops would be deployed in a peacekeeping role during the next two or three years in Nagorno-Karabakh, Tadzhikistan, Moldova or Georgia. It seems fanciful this evening for us even to consider that possibility. The majority of people do not know where those places are. The majority of hon. Members, including me, cannot spell the names of most of those countries.

Yet it is always worth remembering that there are now 2,800 British troops, as the Foreign Secretary said this afternoon, bravely engaged in Bosnia- Herzegovina. Eighteen months ago, there was no such country as Bosnia- Herzegovina. We now face a world that is moving so fast that we are deploying troops in a country that only a short time ago had no formal existence. My hon. Friend the Member for Stockton, North (Mr. Cook) and the hon. Member for Dorset, West (Sir J. Spicer) rightly paid tribute to the role played by British troops in the area--an invaluable role, given their skill and professionalism. We, as the politicians in charge of the policy making, must think now precisely whose agenda will dictate where deployments will be made. Will the agenda be fixed by the policy-makers elected by the people or by the television cameras and the possibility of their entering areas? The possibility of facing the threat of pax Americana now that the cold war has finished is replaced by the threat of pax television camera.

The world expects that we can solve the problems easily, and if television pictures appear in somebody's front room and the media say, "Do something," there is an automatic belief that we can send our soldiers, our sailors and our airmen to far corners of the world and relieve the suffering that we have seen on our television screens.

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Bosnia is at the front of our minds and at the front of the images that we have. It has rightly dominated many of the powerful contributions this evening. My hon. Friend the Member for East Lothian (Mr. Home Robertson) made a powerful plea on behalf of the ordinary civilian population affected by events in that country today, where the level of bestiality seems to reach worse levels with every day that passes.

Yet we still believe that there is hope for the future. The Vance-Owen plan is not ideal, and it is sometimes not remotely ideal, but it is the only plan there is and the only hope there is. It must therefore have our support. I expressed some reservations last year about Lord Owen being chosen as the European Community's envoy to the former Yugoslavia. I was a close associate of his before he departed to wreak havoc on the British domestic political scene. However, I now believe that he will have made a commendable contribution to achieving peace, if it is eventually achieved in Bosnia. Parliament and the nation should be profoundly grateful to him and to Cyrus Vance for their efforts in the area.

I am glad that the Foreign Secretary announced this evening that the sanctions against Serbia have been toughened up. To break the cross-party consensus for a moment, I think that we should all share guilt about the fact that sanctions were not implemented with vigour, with enthusiasm and with the political will that was demanded when they were introduced last June. Even if only one man will now be responsible for the sanctions, that sounds slightly better than the previous system. The process towards war crimes tribunals must be welcomed. In itself, it may be an inhibition on some of the wilder and nastier excesses that some individuals seem to believe are legitimised by war in the area.

The problems in the world today are very different from the problems faced by previous generations. They are very different from the problems that faced the world only a few years ago. That change demands of us the imagination to see what the different and new solutions to the problems must be.

It is no use to be nostalgic for the time, only a few years ago, when we faced a vast, but almost completely predictable, military force on the other side of our continent. That force could be measured and analysed indefinitely, and it largely acted in a way that was manageable, even if it was dangerous.

We live in a world in which the problems are severe and complex. They do not involve a military challenge, but they involve refugees in increasingly larger numbers. There is the problem of migrations of whole populations across national boundaries with the huge problems that result for those countries which must then act as hosts. Problems come from minorities in the countries of our continent and beyond, and from the environmental disasters which have been stored up for many years.

Those problems demand new institutions when necessary. They will involve new training institutions, as well as military and security institutions, because trade will be one of the ways in which we will institute stability in many of the troubled parts of the world. If we want to talk about peacekeeping, we should remember that economic deprivation is at the root of so many of the problems and troubles which are occuring in countries. Therefore, economic security is one way in which we can route the democracy of those countries and ensure our security in the rest of the continent.

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Peacekeeping means newly reinforcing old institutions. It means giving life to the Conference on Security and Co- operation in Europe and making it work well. It means seeing what new role NATO can play. NATO exists, so it has a value beyond the simple institutions which it represents today. Therefore, its new role must be developed to encompass its wider responsibilities beyond the military role which it had previously.

Peacekeeping involves adopting new techniques, as the right hon. Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale (Mr. Jopling) said. It involves examining sanctions as an instrument which might be implemented quickly, effectively and toughly, so that perhaps we can stop some of the conflicts before they get out of control.

It involves using techniques of conflict resolution. Many people who live in Northern Ireland have experience of conflict resolution and containment which might usefully be exported to other parts of the continent. It involves informal links and new informal diplomacies, which might produce results. As my hon. Friend the Member for Swansea, East (Mr. Anderson) and the president of the Inter-Parliamentary Union said, peacekeeping means using our parliamentary experience perhaps to export some of our specific pluralistic strengths.

All the time, peacekeeping means new priorities for the world in curbing arms sales. The sale of arms is part of the problem which we face today. In my post this afternoon, I received a copy of the Defence News. It is a worldwide weekly which is sent to many of us and which is extremely interesting. The chilling headline on the front page is : "Iran seeks to join arms export club". What sort of lunatic world are we engaged in when that becomes the headline? In our search for new priorities, we must re- examine nuclear proliferation and how the rules on that might be toughened up. We must establish, police and move forward on new environmental standards for the world, so that individual countries will never again be allowed to store up their problems in a world in which airborne pollution means that no country can be sovereign in protecting its environmental space.

In the new world order, the development of human rights must not be simply a slogan for one country against another, or one blow-up against another. It must be something rooted in international law, so that we can no longer say that another country's problems and the people in those countries are not our problems. We are all part of this planet. If we have the opportunity to escape from the freeze box of the past, the monitoring of human rights and an active human rights policy must be at the heart of it.

This debate, all too brief and all too rare, has highlighted a wide range of serious problems that face us today in Europe and way beyond our continent as well, and the concern that is felt by so many hon. Members about all that is happening. I believe passionately that the changes of 1989 and 1990, the collapse of communism and the end of a wasteful, divisive and dangerous cold war, were genuinely welcome developments. They may have thrown up new evils and new uncertainties, but I for one have absolutely no nostalgia for the so-called certainties which, in turn, enslaved millions of human beings so close to our own country in this continent.

We now have to rise to the challenges and to the questions posed by the world today, just as those in the communist world will eventually rise to the challenges that face them in their countries. If we do, and if we have the will to deploy sufficient resources, imagination and

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