Examination of Witness (Questions 80-98)
19 OCTOBER 2004
LORD ASHDOWN
OF NORTON-SUB-HAMDON
Q80 Mr Hamilton: Last month this Committee
visited the Hague and while we were there we met President Meron
who is in charge of the International Criminal Tribunal for the
former Yugoslavia. What struck many of us was that they are doing
a good job but justice is being dispensed a long way from the
scene of the crime and I wondered whether you could tell us what
progress is being made, if any, and what efforts perhaps to bring
that justice closer to the ground in Bosnia itself.
Lord Ashdown of Norton-sub-Hamdon:
We are setting up a domestic war crimes capacity. That has been
a very big and expensive project which we started this year. The
point you make is an excellent one. Bosnia and Herzegovina cannot
be a stable state and a functional state unless it has the capacity
to try its own war criminals. I give you a view: I do not think
that will ever include the capacity to try somebody like Karadzic
or Mladic, not in the foreseeable future. That is a job that in
my view will have to rest with the Hague for a bit. Some people
argue there are some 7,000, 4,000 or 3,000 war criminals of all
sorts in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The vast majority of those will
have to be tried, in the absence of a peace and reconciliation
process, which certainly is not on the cards and nor should it
be at the moment, in Bosnian courts. We have already indicted
our first war criminal from entirely BiH resources within the
new structures which we have been setting up over the last two
years. It took us six weeks. It took the Hague two years to do
an indictment. That person is almost certainly going to be the
first trial of domestic war criminal in domestic procedures and
we will have the ability to do that from January of next year.
Q81 Mr Hamilton: That is very encouraging
and I wish you well with that but how far do you think the safety
of witnesses is in question? That is the big question.
Lord Ashdown of Norton-sub-Hamdon:
These are issues we are wrestling with at the moment. It is the
big question. It is also the very expensive question with a grindingly
poor state. Alongside that, there is a penal institution. We do
not have proper procedures. We do not have a place yet for incarcerating
potential war criminals awaiting trial or indeed after trial.
We are now beginning to build that literally with bricks and mortar
so it is very fast to put that into place. The witness issue is
a big issue which we are seeking to solve as best we can. It is
not going to be tidy in the first instance. In my view, it is
very important that we get this process started of trying domestic
war criminals domestically as early as possible. I hope it will
start in January. That is our target date. Will it be done with
perfect grace immediately? Probably not but it will be started
properly and properly as early as possible.
Q82 Mr Hamilton: Are there frequent operations
still on the ground to try to capture Mladic and Karadzic?
Lord Ashdown of Norton-sub-Hamdon:
Yes.
Q83 Mr Hamilton: Why do you think they
are not yet in custody? I know it is very difficult and we could
ask the same question about other war criminals throughout the
world but do you think western intelligence services could do
more to help?
Lord Ashdown of Norton-sub-Hamdon:
I chased my first terrorist through the mangrove swamps of Borneo
40 years ago. His name was Yassim Offendi and we never caught
him. I was blown up against a wall on the Cromlin Road by the
first nail bomb ever thrown. It blew one of my marine's feet off.
We have not caught him either. We have not caught every person
who perpetrated outrages in Northern Ireland, though we control
every blade of grass that moves there, presumably. These guys
are wandering over the wildest mountain vastnesses in south eastern
Europe. I do not know whether Karadzic is there but let us presume
he might be somewhere between the Zelengora and Dornberg, which
is wildly mountainous. Tito hid 7,000 partisans from six German
divisions. They did not catch them in that area. This is not an
easy military task. If you have somebody moving amongst a population
which, wrongly of course, still regards them as a national hero,
this is not an easy task to do. I would advise people to recognise
how difficult a military task this is. In my view, there is an
absolute total commitment. That is all I have seen. I have heard
all sorts of rumours about what went on before. Since I have been
there, I can only say I have seen complete commitment on all sides
and full resources applied to this task. NATO it seems to me and
the western governments are utterly determined it will be completed.
They are committing resources to it on a more than adequate scale,
I believe. We all recognised this is not going to be finished
until it is done. The straight answer to your question do I have
criticisms of either NATO or the intelligence services is I suppose
if you had them there they would not pretend that everything was
perfect. How could it be? On the other hand, I know of nothing
that I could recommend that we should be doing that we have not
already tried to do. What I think we have done in recent years
is expand this. We were following the policy in which you shook
the tree and you hoped the fruit would fall. Now we are beginning
to attack the tree, its branches and its network. I am using my
political powers to work against those who are supporting the
war criminal support networks, freezing bank accounts, European
Union visa bans, removals from time to time. We are not just going
after the individuals. We are going after the whole support structure
supporting them. I am not a great believer in saying, "By
Christmas, this will be done and that person will be in jail."
I have been in this game too long to make predictions like that
but I think it would be fair to say that the circle is diminishing
in which they are able to move. If we set ourselves the target
of doing this, I think it is now going to be done sooner rather
than later.
Q84 Mr Hamilton: Finally, you said something
very important earlier, Lord Ashdown. If I remember correctly,
you said that public opinion was changing and the people who supported
these war criminals were beginning to turn against them because
they recognised it was in their own economic interest. Do you
think in the end that will be the reason these people are captured?
Lord Ashdown of Norton-sub-Hamdon:
That is crucial. Mao Tse-Tung used to say the guerrilla swims
amongst its people like a fish in water and if you can change
the water in which they swim you make life much more difficult
for them. That precisely is the point but it is, it seems to me,
a classic example of how the political action has to back the
military action. Perhaps that is what we did not do terribly well
in the past. We relied on NATO to be able to do the job but unless
you deploy your political actions to change the mood of the public,
to close off the corrupt structures—let us recognise that
these guys are not "hajduks", the Balkan word for a
ragged, remote figure wandering in the hills. They are heads of
large scale criminal networks. It is the same criminal networks
that smuggle women into our cities, that smuggle drugs into our
cities, that generate the money, that support the corrupt structures
of the nationalist part when they exist—and they do—and
that fund the war criminal networks. You have to attack the crime
networks as well as the war criminal networks. You have to think
about public opinion and do what you can to change it which is
the importance of the Srebrenica Commission. Unless you combine
all these factors, in the end, you are not going to win this battle.
Q85 Chairman: And recognise that Karadzic
is one of the main factors preventing economic development.
Lord Ashdown of Norton-sub-Hamdon:
Absolutely.
Q86 Chairman: Turning to the military
side, in mid-December, the EU force will take over from SFor.
Do you see any potential problems in that transition?
Lord Ashdown of Norton-sub-Hamdon:
It is a very big operation. If you had asked me six weeks ago,
I would have said to you that I thought the on the ground planning
was behind the curve, but I can confidently say to you that I
do not think that is the case now. There has been a remarkable
job done by the EUFor.
Q87 Chairman: How will the mandate change?
How will SFor's differ from EUFor's?
Lord Ashdown of Norton-sub-Hamdon:
There will be a slightly expanded mandate, which I greatly welcome,
so that EUFor can get more easily involved in the whole business
of organised crime. The mandate change, which I hope to see and
which to a certain extent we have, is so that EUFor might look
much more like KFor[12]Its
mandate will include explicitly its IPU, its gendarmerie element
will be raised and it will have a greater capacity to get involved
in tackling organised crime for the reason we have just been touching
on. There will be a mandate change there. I honestly think that
bearing in mind that 90%, I think I am right, in current SFor
troops are from the EU anyway. They will continue to conduct their
operations insofar as the average citizens of Bosnia and Herzegovina
see them without much change
Q88 Chairman: That same transition happened
in Macedonia where effectively it was EU forces—
Lord Ashdown of Norton-sub-Hamdon:
Absolutely and I think the average refugee thinking of returning
to Srebrenica will not see much difference; there will be a different
shoulder flash and a different cap badge but, beyond that, not.
The question is how this loss together at the top level as between
General Leakey, the British Commander Designate, and General Schook,
the remaining SFor Commander/NATO Commander for the NATO Office
in BiH . . . There has to be very close liaison but I am very
confident that that has happened. These two guys get on very well
together; they have worked extremely closely together, including
with me, so I am pretty confident that this changeover, difficult
and important though it is, is going to go well.
Q89 Chairman: The transition is belatedly
welcome to the US; I guess in part because of overstretch, it
is welcome to the European Union because it allows them to walk
taller on the military side. Is it welcome to the Bosnians because
they presumably will think of the UNPROFOR[13]1991-95
and the EU position at that time. Is there a deep suspicion of
what will happen?
Lord Ashdown of Norton-sub-Hamdon:
I think they are watching closely and I think they are right to
do so. Let us just remember that dreadful period that you will
remember as I do when we sat aside and 250,000 were killed in
this country and half the country were driven with blood and brutality
from their homes. I think history will deal very, very hard indeed
with the European nations who sat aside and did so little and
in the end relied on Uncle Sam to come along and bail them out.
So, it is hardly surprising that many in BiH, especially Bosnjaks,
will regard Americans as the people who saved them and Europe
as the people who let them down. Now, that is not in accordance
with the historical facts but it is a very understandable position.
So, yes, they will watch this with considerable care but I think
increasingly, as they have seen the two operations work together,
visibly work together, when delegations come out from NATO and
delegations with the EU are integrated into it, I think they have
been considerably reassured but they will be watching closely
to see that this is a success, which is why my recommendation
to Brussels is that when this handover take place, try and invest
it with as little politics as possible and try and invest it with
as much military reality. It is all about capability and capacity
and if this looks a serious military takeover, which it ought
to because I think it will be, then I think that will go a long
way to reassure people.
Q90 Chairman: There will be a great temptation
to have fanfares blazing then.
Lord Ashdown of Norton-sub-Hamdon:
I think we should blow raspberries to anybody who says words like,
"The hour of Europe has arrived." We do not want to
hear that kind of language again.
Q91 Chairman: In terms of cooperation
with the ICTY, there are some who would express a double standard.
In respect of Croatia, for example, when the bar was removed,
it was removed when the ICTY said they were cooperating in respect
of Gotovina. That was cooperation, that was the inprimatur of
Carlo del Ponti. In respect of war criminals in Bosnia, they are
actually saying that they must be handed over which may or may
not be within the capacity of the new Government. Do you feel
that there is a legitimate ground for unhappiness on this?
Lord Ashdown of Norton-sub-Hamdon:
That is well beyond my pay grade, Chairman!
Q92 Andrew Mackinlay: In any event, the
way I understood your evidence earlier was that you said they
have not handed one.
Lord Ashdown of Norton-sub-Hamdon:
That is correct.
Q93 Andrew Mackinlay: Surely the thrust
of what you are saying is, if we came back to you some time in
the future you might have a different view, but there has not
been a gesture, any genuflection at all.
Lord Ashdown of Norton-sub-Hamdon:
I think that is perfectly fair. This is not about Karadzic and
Mladic, as Mr Mackinlay says, although let us remember that the
Republic of Srbska authorities had no cooperation with NATO. If
somebody wants to understand why SFor has not arrested Karadzic
and Mladic, one of the reasons is that the Republic of Srbska
has provided zero cooperation. Perhaps some would argue that this
is a job which has to be undertaken by NATO with its military
capabilities that local authorities do not have but, if that is
a reason, then it is no reason to explain why, as Mr Mackinlay
has said, no war criminals have been arrested. Twenty war criminals
have been arrested on the Territory Republic of Srbska, all of
them by SFor troops, none of them by Republic of Srbska authorities.
By the by, some of those SFor troops have been injured in the
process and I take the greatest offence to the idea that our young
men and women serving in our armed forces have to put themselves
in harm's way in order to fulfil functions that the Republic of
Srbska Government has failed to fulfil. So, I think Mr Mackinlay
is right in saying that there is quantum difference but, further
than this, I would prefer not to go.
Q94 Mr Chidgey: Staying, if I may, with
law and order in a more general sense rather than the specific
war criminal sense, just a short time after you arrived in BiH,
the International Crisis Group said in a paper in 2002 when commenting
on the rule of law, "The law does not yet rule in Bosnia
& Herzegovina. What prevail instead are nationally defined
politics, inconsistency in the application of law, corrupt and
incompetent courts, a fragmented judicial space, half-baked or
half-implemented reforms, and sheer negligence."
Lord Ashdown of Norton-sub-Hamdon:
That is very accurate.
Q95 Mr Chidgey: "Bosnia is, in short,
a land where respect of and confidence in the law and its defenders
is weak." That was some two years ago. It is well established
that it is one of your priorities; how are you doing in that regard?
Lord Ashdown of Norton-sub-Hamdon:
I think somebody else had better comment on how I am doing! I
am not very good at that! Can I make two brief points to you and
I am conscious of the time. The first is corruption, crime and
criminality follows war like a dark shadow. I often say to people
if they are coming out to work in Bosnia who ask me, "What
should I do?", "Read a book and watch a film."
The book is Ivo Andric's great book Bridge on the Drina
for which he won the Nobel Prize but the film is The Third
Man. Why The Third Man? Because it was done in Vienna
in 1953. Look at Vienna today and look at Vienna in 1953. Look
at the two pictures. Look at what Rome looked like for the 10
years after the war in terms of criminality and look how long
it took to get that out of the system. Look at France. Look at
our country. Criminality and the Black Market were dominant features
in the 1950s. This is what happens after war. It is hardly surprising
that, in a war in which 250,000 were killed and half the population
driven from their homes, criminality should be there. So, second
point: this therefore needs to be priority number one when you
move in after a war. The very first thing you need to do is tackle
the rule of law issue, I mean from hour one after the midnight
hour in which peace arrives. If necessary, creating martial law.
If you do not make it priority number one, everything else you
do will be subverted by the process. You want to hold elections,
the criminals will get elected. You want to have investment into
the country, no one will provide it. You want to provide international
aid, huge sums of it in Bosnia and Herzegovina, vast amounts will
go straight through the system and into the hands of the criminals,
which is exactly what happened. We took seven years to make rule
of law priority number one, so it is hardly surprising that corruption
is endemic into the system. It only started to be made priority
number one when I arrived here and, since then, we invested vast
amounts of money, well and rightly invested, into the police force.
There is no point in having a good police force if you have a
rotten judiciary. You have to look at the rule of law synoptically
from end to end. So, when we arrived there we made it a first
priority to reform the judicial system. So, we have examined and
removed large numbers of corrupt judges, reduced the number of
the judiciary, reduced the number of courts by 30% and rewritten
the laws of Bosnia and Herzegovina written by Bosnians in order
to create a framework of law consistent with European practice
and make it easier to capture criminals. We have bought in an
EU mission to deal with the police, we have created a State Court
in which there are now some international judges enabling us to
try some of the most high-level corrupt cases in the country.
We have just tried successfully the largest human trafficking
case ever tired in BiH and, at this moment, a former president
of BiH, a Croat President, Ante Jelavic, is before the court on
corruption charges, something nobody thought would ever happen.
So, we are making progress on this. Is BiH yet a law-abiding state?
No, but it is getting there.
Q96 Mr Chidgey: It is very interesting
to hear what you have to say on this. Is it possible to introduce
the rule of law without effective democratic accountability within
BiH or anywhere else for that matter?
Lord Ashdown of Norton-sub-Hamdon:
It is possible, yes, absolutely; I think we have to. I think the
more difficult question is, is it possible to introduce the rule
of law without falling back on the old communist theory that you
can interfere in the actions of judges? That is much more difficult
for us, much more difficult. Arguably, one of the problems about
Bosnia and Herzegovina is that there was never a revolution against
communism: (a) communism was Titoism which is slightly different,
communism with a human face, and (b) before the Tito experiment
failed, which everybody realised it was, the war intervened. So,
people blame the war, they do not blame communism. So, the old
socialist chip in people's head, unlike in Hungary or Poland,
has not gone through that thought-chance process. It is happening
now but it is quite a long process. I am sure you can introduce
proper rule of law functions without affecting democracy providing
democracy understands well and we have had to fight tough battles
on this, especially with the Bosnjaks, that it does not really
like to interfere with the judiciary.
Q97 Chairman: Two things: one, perhaps
to give a historical perspective, the problems with the rule of
law did not begin in the 1990s.
Lord Ashdown of Norton-sub-Hamdon:
No.
Q98 Chairman: There has been smuggling
in that part of the world for a long time when there was law and
order in Vienna.
Lord Ashdown of Norton-sub-Hamdon:
I am sure that is true. I do not think we should blame everything
on the corrupt nature of the Balkans. I do not think it is any
more corrupt than . . .
Chairman: Just to have a certain historical
perspective. Secondly, on behalf of the Committee, we thank you
most warmly for the way in which you have dealt with such a range
of questions. It was most impressive.
12 Kosovo Peacekeeping Force. Back
13
United Nations Protection Force. Back
|
