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5.2 pm

Mr. John McWilliam (Blaydon): I am delighted to follow my hon. Friend the Member for South Shields (Dr. Clark) and the hon. Member for Romsey and Waterside (Mr. Colvin). I thank hon. Members who said that we did a splendid job, which was in no small part due to the leadership and wisdom of the hon. Member for Romsey and Waterside. I am very grateful to him.

We visited Bosnia in April. It is a rapidly moving situation in a volatile part of the world. What we saw in April does not apply now. It was clear from the speech of my hon. Friend the Member for South Shields that some of the problems about which I was worried--humanitarian relief and the inflow of civilian money--are being tackled, but others remain. We were concerned because, although our forces had assisted the civilian populations, there was no evidence that international money was getting to where it was needed--out in the towns and villages. We were concerned, for instance, that there was no planting in the countryside because there were no tractors--the retreating sides had taken them. We were concerned that there would be no harvest. I am unaware of the current position, but I hope that serious work has been done to alleviate that problem.

We were concerned that, despite the fact that we had the best-fed troops in the field from day one--that is always so, and if anyone has tried "meals ready to eat" they will know why there are raids on our canteens whenever the Americans, French or anybody else can get near them--there were shortfalls. We found, for example, that because of logistics delays, equipment had been lying around for ages awaiting parts. Perfectly good bathroom and toilet facilities had been lying around for months because the connecting pipes had not been delivered. The computer and communications system to back up the logistics was not working, and if anything was needed somebody had to jump in the car and drive 40 miles across the mountains to drop a note in.

I pay the highest tribute to the men and women serving not only in the British Army, but in all the armies participating in IFOR. The hon. Member for Romsey and Waterside mentioned the fact that, when we went to see the Americans in Tuzla, there were a couple of Russian colonels in the American battle headquarters, and we were seen off by a Russian general under their command.

We asked our people, "What are the Czechs like?" They replied,"They are super, smashing, professional people to work with who are doing a great job and working extremely hard at it." I cannot praise them too highly.

Where we do have a problem is with the Dayton accord itself. I think that it was too ambitious. The out date of December is not achievable. Our military have achieved all the military tasks, but other tasks have not been met. The money for reconstruction work was not finding its way there, but I am glad that that is no longer true. There is still a long way to go.

The people in Bosnia--the Bosnian Serbs, the Bosnian Muslims and the Bosnian Croats--are lovely people. I remember holidaying there in the balmy days of my

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youth and meeting the people. The trouble is that they love us but hate each other. That will not change overnight. We know that from the history of the Balkans and, tragically, from our history in Ireland too. We must be prepared for that. Having spent the time, money, effort and lives that we have thus far, we should be prepared to spend a little more time to try to achieve some stability, because I do not believe that the elections will bring stability.

My hon. Friend the Member for Walsall, North (Mr. Winnick) asked about war criminals. Our report was written in April, but the warrants were issued only last week. The context in which we wrote our report has changed dramatically. I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for South Shields: if Karadzic and Mladic thought about it, they would walk across the lines now and say, "We give up." They will be caught, because they cannot hide for ever, and the crimes on which they have been indicted cannot be forgiven--ever. They must face up to the fact that they will be caught and punished, and correctly so.

I have witnessed things that will live with me for the rest of my life, such as the fact that a thug can walk into someone's home and say, "Get out by the morning or you are dead, and if you are not out by the morning we will burn the house down around you." On one visit, we saw body bags being taken out of a house--the horror of man's inhumanity to man. They are the same people. The only difference between the Muslims, Serbs and Croats is their history. Ethnically, they are the same people.

It is worrying that people hark back to the evils of the battle of Kosovo in, I believe, the 12th century. The Serbs have never achieved such greatness since, and they look forward to the future. Another worrying portent for the elections is that, unfortunately, the moderate opinions that are widespread in all the communities in Bosnia are not represented by the people who appear to want to stand as candidates.

We must try to reconstruct the country, we must try to keep it peaceful and we must do our best to help the people's future. British forces, whether they were in the Bosnian Serb sector, the Bosnian Croat sector or the Bosnian Muslim sector, were regarded as the guarantors of the safety of the people living in that sector. They were not playing favourites. That is true of all the units in all the sectors.

We must make the commitment that people will be given another chance to rebuild and to survive. We know that the ultimate objective of the leaders in Republica Srpska is to unite with Serbia to form greater Serbia. We know that the Croatian Bosnians and the Muslim Bosnians have their own problems. We know that the potential for fighting and division continues. We know that hunger and deprivation exist.

Our interpreters were local people. Some of the things that they did were amazing. One would find a local Croatian girl, employed as an interpreter, working in a Serbian area, voluntarily teaching two hours a day in the Serbian school because there was no schoolteacher in the village. Things like that are not talked about. We must support and develop them, but we can do so only if we make the commitment to the people not to walk out of there in December and leave them to their own devices.

The trouble is that it is an American presidential election year, and domestic American politics are intruding. It is essential for the future of IFOR that it is

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international and that any continued force has an American ground force element. It would not be credible internationally if it did not, and it would not be right if we did not raise that matter unequivocally in the House.

Mr. Dalyell: My hon. Friend is one of the most technically competent Members of the House of Commons. My hon. Friend the Member for South Shields (Dr. Clark) mentioned land mines. Those of us who heard Sir Hugh Beach of the all-party land mines group know the extent of the problem of identifying and doing something about land mines. Does my hon. Friend have any solution?

Mr. McWilliam: That is an important, thorny problem.

We were told that some youngsters in Sarajevo had learnt how to dig up anti-personnel mines and that they throw them in the river so that they go off there, and that someone else down-river catches the fish killed by the explosion. That is a stupid, highly dangerous thing to do.

Because of the construction of the forces that were operating--working on the Warsaw pact methods of organisation when there were hostilities--the average infantryman would wander out with 12 anti-personnel mines strapped around his body, instructed to lay them out as a defensive perimeter. When he withdrew, he was supposed to dig them out and come back. Unfortunately, what has happened does not accord with the Geneva convention, because there was, and is, no accurate map of the minefields. Some of such records as exist are in Split, and the Croatian Government there deny their existence.

The solution is to spend money training former Yugoslav army sappers of whatever persuasion to clear mines. We cannot do it; we do not have enough sappers to do that highly skilled job. The mines are extremely difficult to clear. The anti-personnel mines are plastic. The only metal in them is the size of an ordinary pin, so no normal detection method works. The Americans are using remote-controlled mine clearance vehicles, but they do not get them all either. The mines do terrible damage, especially to children. I would not willingly walk off a metalled road anywhere in that country at the moment; it is that unsafe.

A huge international effort is needed to clear the mines. The best people to do the work are the people who laid them, but they need training. We need to spend money on the manpower to train them.

Bosnia is a beautiful country, and always was. It happens to be at the crossroads of conflicting civilisations, and it has been for a long time. By and large, however, the Bosnians got on pretty well until Germany forced recognition of Croatia far earlier than any country in that area should have been recognised. That is what blew it up. We all know that. It is too late now. There is no point in crying over spilt milk, but we are responsible in that we acquiesced in that decision. We must take that responsibility by ensuring that we make the commitment to continue peacekeeping in Bosnia.

I wish to conclude by quoting paragraph 80 of the Select Committee report.

"We conclude that in the wide range of post-Cold War scenarios in which the armed forces might be needed, either a prolonged peace-keeping mission like IFOR is too large a task or the Army is too small."

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We ignore that conclusion at our peril. It is either too large a task or the Army is too small. The extent of the overstretch that our forces feel is not fair or right, and it must be stopped.

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