Examination of Witnesses (Questions 100
- 119)
THURSDAY 18 NOVEMBER 1999
MR EMYR
JONES PARRY,
SIR JOHN
GOULDEN, AND
MR BRIAN
DONNELLY
100. Does the model of rewarding the governments
for good behaviour by giving them greater access to the European
Union, not rely on having a strong and effective government? Is
it not a problem for a lot of countries that they do not have
strong and effective governments, with the exception of Serbia,
but they do have strong and effective criminal networks and, therefore,
you cannot work on a model which rewards the government because
it is not the government that can necessarily deliver?
(Mr Jones Parry) It would be preferable to reward
governments rather than reward the others.
101. I am not suggesting rewarding criminals.
(Mr Jones Parry) That is the other side of this. To
the extent the DTI have looked at it the argument would be that
they doubt the benefits would come any sooner down that route
than down the route that the Commission has proposed. The other
problem is that it assumes you would simultaneously do everything
between those countries and the Union and between these countries
themselves. On the Stability Pact, while it is trying to bring
these countries closer together by offering a framework for common
action, the reality is that we are better placed doing things
bilaterally between the Union and the individual countries. It
is a formula which has worked more easily in the past, it is easier
to negotiate and you end up with the Union bringing all its expertise
to help these countries.
102. Do you think the experience in Bosnia has
actually been helpful and are we doing some things differently
because of what has happened in Bosnia? The second thing I wanted
to ask is is it your view that there is the same strength of commitment
to building the peace, so to speak, from the international community
as there was when we were involved in military action?
(Mr Jones Parry) Are we doing things differently?
Yes, I hope we are learning from experience and I will pick out
two things, if I may. One, Mr Patten as the Commissioner responsible
is trying very hard to make sure the Commission disperses more
efficiently, more effectively and more coherently and what is
done on the ground is more appropriate to the circumstances. It
is a fair comment that bilateral programmes especially out of
the United Kingdom are more flexible and more able to respond
to situations than what the Union does. He is trying to get a
grip on that. The big difference in Kosovo as opposed to Bosnia
was in Bosnia we put in a lot of money without having a macro-economic
framework on how Bosnia was to develop. The difference in Kosovo
is that a very coherent approach is being put in place first and
then we are looking for the Donors Conference so we are trying
to find a basis for the sustainable economic development of Kosovo
in a way that perhaps we did not do in Bosnia. As to political
will I think there is a will but the challenge of the Stability
Pact and making it work and ensuring that it does not become a
white elephant making sure that the other organisations which
by definition are the instruments which would apply, be it NATO
security, be it the Union in terms of assistance and trade or
the IFIs in terms of the large sums of money that are necessary
to categorise all those and make them coherent, is a tremendous
challenge.
Chairman
103. Can I move on to Kosovo. One can despair
of the separate communities ever learning to live together again.
The Government of Croatia point to Eastern Slavonia as a place
where the Serb minority and the Croats as a result of, it is said
by them, their own policy are living together in a reasonably
harmonious position. Is that your reading of what is happening
in Eastern Slavonia?
(Mr Jones Parry) I think the administration of Eastern
Slovenia was a comparative success and having former General Klein
who was the supremo backed by a military presence was actually
able to bring that area towards some sort of development. That
was a good model. Where it fails on the analysis is to assume
that the Serbs are now living harmoniously there because a large
number of the Serbs have actually left and it is a point that
is not often appreciated that Serbia today has refugees in excess
of 650,000 a lot of whom came from Eastern Slovenia. One of our
continuing things which is sometimes lost sight of is the challenge
to meet the humanitarian needs of Serbia which continue and large
sums are being expended precisely to do that as winter comes.
104. What does the territorial integrity of
the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia incorporating Serbia and Kosovo
mean in practice in terms of the current relations between Serbia
and Kosovo, for example in terms of travel documents, financial
arrangements, or any other of the network of arrangements that
states have within a single unit with each other?
(Mr Jones Parry) In terms of what Resolution 1244
says it is very clear that we are talking about the territorial
integrity of the FRY as a whole. The situation is that effectively
the sovereignty of Kosovo has been passed temporarily to the United
Nations and the organisation of the territory, what happens within
its structures and what happens on its borders is delegated to
the Special Representative of the United Nations and he with the
strategies set up and with commander of KFOR is responsible for
the territory. He has that in trust, if you like, subject to Security
Council resolutions.
105. So it is a form of UN protectorate but
is there anything in reality linking Kosovo to Serbia?
(Mr Jones Parry) May I on the detail ask Brian to
respond.
(Mr Donnelly) It is still in legal terms open to citizens
of Serbia to travel through Kosovo. The obvious problem, I do
not want to make light of it, is the security one. In other words,
there is no passport check at the border to stop people from Serbia
entering Kosovo. The problem clearly for them is personal security.
What is happening under the direction of the UN administration
is that they are starting a process of establishing new registration
documents and new identification papers to facilitate free circulation
and movement within Kosovo itself but in terms of economic links
with Serbia at present they are obviously virtually nil because
the UN administration is in truth establishing new institutions
from the ground up, whether it is economic or political or social.
So I suspect that there are no significant revenue flows although
there is no barrier to people bringing in money from Serbia to
Kosovo if that is what they choose. Goods entering from outside,
from Macedonia, are being subject to Customs collection by the
UN administration but goods flowing in from Serbia or Montenegro
would not be.
Mr Rowlands
106. To get a clear picture of what is the score
in Kosovo itself, all this huge effort was put into maintaining
presumably a multi-ethnic Kosovo. I understand from about a quarter
of million Serbs in Kosovo there are now less than 100,000.
(Mr Donnelly) Slightly less.
107. Frankly, is it not the case de facto
despite all this effort about ethnic cleansing one way or the
other that we have now got a virtually ethnically cleansed Kosovo
with a small minority of Serbs left?
(Sir John Goulden) I was there a month ago with the
Council and we were very much asking this question. Quite a few
of the Serbs who left had good reason to leave and presumably
have good reason not to go back, but quite a few who left would
like to go back and we are seeing a trend, particularly in Eastern
Kosovo, of quite large numbers coming back because they are not
enjoying the experience they are having in the FRY proper. They
do not like the way they are treated and they do not feel they
have got much of a future there. There is a slight trend towards
coming back. We will see in the spring whether that is a growing
trend. At the moment the figure seems to be about 100,000. There
are several other ethnic minorities too, you know them of course.
Giving security to these minorities, particularly the Serbs but
including the others including the Bosniacs who are often confused
with Serbs is the top priority of the KFOR commander. That is
what he said to us. It is our top priority that the troops guarantee
the security of these people, so they stay. Because we want to
preserve a society where, if not totally integrated at the moment,
people are able to co-exist and see a future together. It is going
to take a long time.
108. How is he going to do that? Is he going
to surround these little enclaves and have a military presence
there to make sure?
(Sir John Goulden) We are trying to get away from
enclaves in either direction. The sort of thing they are doing,
I think you will find it fascinating when you are there, is that
British soldiers are living in apartment blocks to make sure Serbs
in those apartment blocks are safe at night. Old ladies are being
taken to the shops by British soldiers so they can go and buy
their bread, so they do not feel at all insecure. That is not
something that can be done for years and years but it is something
that is needed in this rather special post-war situation. It is
a huge effort. Large numbers of British troops and others are
doing this sort of low-level security and confidence building.
We hope this will eventually lead to a better sense of background
security for the Serbs that stay behind and encourage some more
to come back. Because we do not want an ethically cleansed Kosovo.
109. Press reports—and they may be just
typical copy—imply there is huge disenchantment on both
sides, from the UN civilian side on what the Kosovans are up to
and vice versa and the civilian administration is not helping
on the ground to any extent and the local managers are not doing
their job and there is no real effective law and order in any
sense in Kosovo. Is that an exaggerated view? How realistic is
it to say there is a civil society in Kosovo?
(Mr Jones Parry) It is a pessimistic view but it is
close to being realistic. What you are getting at in your question
is one of the biggest challenges we have. We did not go through
this in order to see created a ethnically pure state but the challenge
of co-existence and avoiding cantonisation and developing something
where the communities work together is going to be very, very
difficult. UNMIK was slow off the ground in starting. It still
needs a little bit of reinforcement but law and order and policing
covers 60 per cent of the territory. A number of municipalities
are now up and running. I think again UNMIK has some rapid work
to do to make sure there are people exercising some control in
all the local villages and municipalities and then to move from
that to elections which I hope we can do sometime by the end of
the spring.
Chairman
110. Have they not been postponed?
(Mr Jones Parry) There has been no decision made but
the report that has been done I must say I find a little disappointing
because it talks about elections probably by September next year
but then says perhaps as soon as July but it could even slip into
the year following. To tackle these problems and get some form
of common ownership of the development Kosovo at least at the
local level we need those elections I would have thought by about
August next year and we need to move forward but it is going to
be very difficult.
Mr Rowlands
111. 60 per cent is a quite significant figure.
Does the size of KFOR need to be bigger and, frankly, as the sceptics
have been saying from day one are they going to be there for a
long, long time?
(Sir John Goulden) They are certainly going to be
there for quite a long time but perhaps not in today's numbers.
We did not get the impression that the KFOR commander needed more
troops. The gap, which I am sure you will want to look at when
you are there, is the police gap. How do we train a mixed force
of Kosovars to become a legitimate police force when there was
not much of a tradition there at all? And how do we make sure
that the international community does not have to do that job
itself indefinitely? KFOR can certainly do its job, which is a
substantial one. It is a seven day a week job they are on, with
the present staffing and numbers. We would hope that, as with
Bosnia, with time it will be possible to down-size. But nobody
is talking about that immediately.
Sir David Madel
112. Mr Jones Parry said no discussions, no
negotiations, no conversations with Mr Milosevic but we are talking
to the Serb opposition. What is their view about Kosovo becoming
independent?
(Mr Jones Parry) I think, Sir David, when you meet
the opposition you will understand part of the problem we confront.
I do not find it the sort of politician that one would naturally
want to see running Serbia. I will not hide that from you. It
is not just their nature but also the degree of unity and policies
they are actually promoting. I went through Belgrade in September
1996 and met most of the opposition figures then and apart from
Mr Avramovic, who is a decidedly honourable gentlemen but I am
afraid an exception, I found no-one who was prepared to contemplate
at that stage Kosovo having any separate status. By separate status
I do not mean independent, I mean just something analogous to
Montenegro. No-one was prepared to look at it and we do need to
firstly get the opposition united and then to explain to them
the sorts of policy which we think they need to pursue. Of course
in the end it is up to them but the concept of a contract for
Serbia, which the Foreign Secretary has been putting forward with
his Danish colleague, and which the European Union is pushing,
is basically to say—covered in some of the earlier questions—"This
is what is available, what we would be prepared to do for Serbia
but it is not a freebie, attached to it are the conditions and
the sort of society that we want to see evolve. If you are prepared
to do that and you are prepared to fight elections then there
are sizeable benefits which we will make available." The
Commission is already talking about setting aside someone to help
with the reconstruction of Serbia. That sort of thing is there,
membership of the Stability Pact, and to bring Serbia back into
the mainstream of European thinking.
113. If we take Serbia and Kosovo together are
we inching towards trying to create a bi-zonal state?
(Mr Jones Parry) I think given the complexity of Rambouillet
and the inherent political sensitivity of this, it is a mistake
now to try and put forward any particular model. What both sides
will have to do once we have gone through province wide elections
in Kosovo, once there is a representative group—and that
assumes that we have also got democracy rather more deeply based
than it is now in Kosovo—we will find the political parties
in Kosovo are something of a disappointment but they need to be
encouraged. We are trying to do things through the Westminster
Foundation, partner countries are trying to do the same, to try
and get things established in a way that after those elections
we can sit down—hopefully with a change of regime in Belgrade—and
have a sensible discussion which will lead to them agreeing what
the future will hold.
Dr Starkey
114. You said there is not a particular model
that you are working towards. Are there some models that we have
ruled out and, in particular, are we trying to avoid at all costs
aligning state boundaries with ethnicity, given the consequences
for the region if we actually go down that route of trying to
align state boundaries to ethnicity which essentially is Milosevic's
agenda anyway.
(Mr Jones Parry) Our great hope is that existing boundaries
will be preserved, that is the basic premise of the OSCE, and
that we should do everything possible to reject the idea that
we should have ethnic cleansing within those boundaries. If you
look just south to Macedonia, and the implications of that policy
on Macedonia, it would become inherently destabilising for the
whole region.
115. And the option of Kosovo joining with Albania
for example.
(Mr Jones Parry) Yes.
Mr Rowlands
116. What happens if there is an overwhelming
majority in Kosovo when you have created your free and democratic
institution and Kosovo says "We want to join the Greater
Albania"?
(Mr Jones Parry) I do not think the concept of Greater
Albania is actually that much of a threat, arguably Greater Kosovo
is a bigger threat. Between the Albanians in Albania and the Albanian
community in Kosovo, there is not that wish, as we see it, to
move forward nor do I think there is at the moment in Macedonia
between the Albanian community there.
Sir Peter Emery
117. Is it not the case that we are faced with
nearly every politician in Belgrade having to subscribe to Serb
nationalism in some form or other and the position in Kosovo whereby
forgiveness is very difficult for many of the Kosovans and we
have to accept that the action is revenge. It is a human and ghastly
aspect of human nature but when you have suffered, as so many
of the Kosovans and Kosovan families have, that factor, and particularly
in the spirit of the structure of Balkan societies that is massively
dominant. So we have a situation whereby you have two entirely
variable and different factors. The Serbs are determined that
Serb nationalism should hold and the Kosovans are absolutely determined
that they will no longer wish to be associated with Belgrade.
Now it is all very well for us to talk nicely about democratic
institutions being set up but we are faced with national problems
and it looks to me as though the ability of the west—let
me put it as the west, in general, whether it is Europe, whether
it is America, whether it is ourselves—to be able to relinquish
the major financing of Kosovo for some considerable time to come
is an impossibility. They are not going to be able to stand on
their own feet. There is no structural organisation ready for
them to do this and it is going to take a considerable time before
we can relinquish the funding and the support for Kosovo and we
must face up to that.
(Mr Jones Parry) I think the way you put that question,
Sir Peter, underlines why Rambouillet was so difficult because
we were trying to reconcile the facts you set out which are very
difficult and I think in the way Sir John answered the question
about the military involvement we expect to be there for some
time. I do not see the financial involvement nor the international
community underpinning through the United Nations and all the
other huge effort that has gone into this, abating in the near
term. It will continue for quite a while which brings us back
to our involvement in this exercise. I think you will find as
you go to the region that it will underline the immensity of the
challenge and be something that confronts us on a daily basis
but I think it is going to be part of your agenda for some considerable
time too.
Sir Peter Emery: The point is there is no quick
solution.
Chairman
118. And we understand your problem in formulating
policy in an evolving situation and things which cannot now be
said which may in the fullness of time become inevitable. Gentlemen,
we could do a tour around the neighbouring countries, be it Albania,
Bulgaria, Rumania, Hungary, and I think we can put particular
questions of detail to you. I would like to clarify for my own
piece of mind one area we touched on earlier and that is Operation
Horseshoe. Can you help me understand it. Is Operation Horseshoe
a name which the Serbs themselves gave to a specific operation?
(Mr Jones Parry) I do not know who gave the name.
I suspect the first public report I saw was in a German newspaper.
I am not sure if it came in that direction.
119. Is it something that is of 30 years' duration,
a long term plan? Is it something that developed last year?
(Mr Jones Parry) Chairman, it comes back to how little
we knew of this. As I say, we had one uncorroborated bit of raw
material which referred to this. I am not even sure it covered
it by name.
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