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Mr. Ingram: I agree entirely with my hon. Friend. It is important to continue all our efforts. The eight standards that have been set—and that will be subject to review in the middle of next year to see what progress has been made—take into account the normalisation of that society, for which the overall security profile becomes important in terms of civil administration, policing and the judiciary. At present those are proving difficult, but that is what we must all strive towards. Important steps have been made. We have achieved some measure of progress, but there is a long way still to go in all this. My hon. Friend is right that, in terms of post-conflict reconstruction, we need to be there for a considerable period because, again, as the old phrase
goes, peace is not an event but a process. It will take time—both in the initial phase that we are now in and in later stages—to get it right.
Mr. Andrew Mackay (Bracknell) (Con): As someone who strongly supports the deployment, may I gently put it to the Minister that it was unfortunate, to say the least, that it was the Father of the House, through an urgent question, who brought a Minister to the Dispatch Box? In future, when there is a major deployment, can we guarantee that the Secretary of State or, if he is absent, the Minister, comes to the Dispatch Box? That is what the House needs and deserves.
Mr. Ingram: In terms of the timing, the call was made in the early hours of Thursday morning, as I explained, and it is a normal deployment; it is what that force stands ready for. The judgment was made, and we would have thought that the House understood that, as it was a normal deployment—[Interruption.] Clearly, some Members do not think so, which is why the Father of the House, my hon. Friend the Member for Linlithgow (Mr. Dalyell), requested an urgent question and was granted one. Clearly, we will take lessons from that if lessons need to be taken. We will take such things into consideration in any future deployment, but should this apply to withdrawals as well? Should justification be given for every decision? [Interruption.] Well, I am only posing the question because I am sure that some would think that they always have the right to ask such questions. If a withdrawal took place, they would ask about the basis of the withdrawal. The right hon. Gentleman says that the deployment is significant. It involves a battalion that stood ready for the purpose, and I explained the reasoning behind that in my opening statement.
Mr. John Wilkinson (Ruislip-Northwood) (Con): As a company of Gurkhas from the stabilisation force in Bosnia and Herzegovina, next door, was promptly on the scene, will the Minister respond to the pertinent question asked by my hon. Friend the Member for Mid-Sussex (Mr. Soames) from the Front Bench? Will such an intervention by a reserve—a back-up—from the stabilisation force in Bosnia and Herzegovina always be available from that country once the stabilisation role is taken over by the European Union? NATO is responsible for that now, so there is inherently no problem—but, if the forces are under EU control, there could be a fatal interval before a deployment takes place.
Mr. Ingram: Those are the very issues that must be bottomed out in considering the future presence in Bosnia. We have not reached a final conclusion, but NATO is comfortable with the development of those talks. We are quite far down the road of working out what the force package should be in Bosnia and how it should be structured and utilised. The hon. Gentleman will be aware that we consider the Balkans as, in a sense, one region because each country impacts on the other, and the force strength there should be best utilised to deal with the problems as they arise. Sometimes that will be straightforward; sometimes it will be difficult,
depending on the circumstances. That is why we need such a significant international commitment to the force; it cannot be delivered by the UK and the US alone. We need many allies to participate. Of course, the Italians, the French and the Germans are heavily committed, along with other European nations, to deliver the very mission that we are seeking to deal with at present.
Mr. Crispin Blunt (Reigate) (Con): The Minister should be aware that when the Defence Committee visited our troops in Kosovo last month, a clear majority of them did not think that a deployment in Kosovo was a worthwhile use of their time. The Government have been warned repeatedly that the political strategy that NATO is following, which our troops are being asked to support, would end in their being attacked by the very people whom they went there ostensibly to help. As the Serbian Government, who after all hold the sovereignty of Kosovo, now appear to be talking about the partition of various parts of Kosovo, I urge the Minister to get hold of the Foreign Office and get it to support any strategy that will bring political closure to the issue and enable us to get our soldiers and the rest of the international community out of Kosovo, there having been a political settlement.
Mr. Ingram: I will not respond to the hon. Gentleman's first comments, where he seeks to speak for all the British forces in Kosovo, as though he is some great guru of knowledge because of a visit there. He suggests that the troops have one clear, focused view of their deployment. I hear what he says, but there is no point in entering into that territory.
I indicated in an earlier answer that the Foreign and Commonwealth Office is, of course, very active in trying to work through solutions and in considering how the process can be moved forward. That is not easy. Competing, conflicting ethnic demands are involved. It is big scale and cannot be resolved at the flick of a switch. It is not a case of the FCO putting in another set of resources, thus resolving the situation. It has to be worked through with the international community and with the countries and ethnic groupings in that area. As I indicated, the eight strands of development are subject to review in the middle of next year, and I understand that the FCO has three teams working on developing the best way forward. The Government are committed to finding a solution, and I should have hoped that the hon. Gentleman would support us in that.
Mr. Michael Weir (Angus) (SNP): The Minister said that the UK troops were the ready battalion for the first six months of this year. Do I take it that he anticipates a reduction in the number of British troops at the end of that six-month period should the situation in Kosovo continue to be fluid? If not, is he satisfied that, given the commitments in other parts of the world, he has sufficient reserves to rotate troops out of the trouble spots?
Mr. Ingram: I am conscious that the leader of the hon. Gentleman's party said that it was an unpardonable folly to get involved in Kosovo in the first place, so I do not know whether the hon. Gentleman is now
supporting what we are seeking to do in Kosovo and understands that the scale of what we seek to achieve is important not just for the people of that region but for Europe and beyond. I explained that the lead battalion stands ready for a six-month period and that we were given that task for the first six months of this year and were to be followed by the United States. We alternate on that basis.Our commitment as lead battalion will be for six months, and that period will end in the middle of this year. The current deployment is initially for 30 days, but that will depend on circumstances on the ground and the request then made by the commander of KFOR. As I said in an earlier answer, I cannot predict far into the future. We have to deal with each situation as it arises and we have clearly been able to deliver when we have been called upon. However, I am conscious of the fact that the hon. Gentleman and his party have opposed probably every important international mission that we have sought to get engaged in. I do know what their motivation is in all that.
Mr. John Randall (Uxbridge) (Con): Does the Minister agree with the assessment of many people, including the spokesmen for United Nations Mission in Kosovo—UNMIK—and for NATO, that the violence was not spontaneous but was, in fact, co-ordinated? Does that have any implications for our troops?
Mr. Ingram: We do not yet have a mature understanding of what precipitated the violence, but the best information that I have is that it looked as though it was spontaneous and was built on the back of a particular grievance, but that it then became organised. That would not be unsurprising, but it does not mean that it is necessarily the case. Extremists can exploit any point of unrest and they are very quick to move in to maximise the potential for what they seek to achieve. We therefore have to get the best information on the ground and, importantly, to analyse it to make sure that we make the best response.
Bob Russell (Colchester) (LD): Can the Minister confirm that the British Army is between 3,000 and 4,000 soldiers under strength. With that in mind and given all the existing commitments, does he agree that overstretch is getting worse and that the additional commitments now being imposed on the Army are adding to the stresses and strains? Although he mentioned the European nations that have supported peacekeeping in Kosovo, does he agree that more effort should be made to encourage greater European support for what the British Army is doing?
The Minister will also be aware that 500 troops from Colchester garrison are serving in southern Iraq. Will he please keep me posted on the desperate situation reported in Basra today?
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