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Bosnia-Herzegovina

My Lords, it is my pleasure to congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Astor, on initiating this debate. I congratulate him, too, on its timeliness because it is the 10th anniversary of both the tragedy of Srebrenica and of the Dayton accords. It is also on the eve of the departure of the noble Lord, Lord Ashdown. Clearly he has done his job extremely well, using the Bonn powers available to him as the High Representative very effectively indeed. Certainly during the visit last November—exactly a year ago—of the Foreign Affairs Committee of the other place, which I had the pleasure to lead, there was almost universal admiration of his work—except of course for the most nationalist of politicians, some of whom were dismissed, quite properly, at his insistence. Both the noble Lord, Lord Ashdown, and Major General Leakey ensure that there is a substantial British contribution to Bosnia at the moment—General Leakey, of course, heading EUFOR, which took over from SFOR in December of last year. It is right to put this debate in the context of the western Balkans generally and the turbulence in the 1990s caused by the dissolution of the Yugoslav empire. Bitter ethnic conflict swept through the Balkans as the flaming baton touched all the relevant countries—except only partially Slovenia and Macedonia, with the flames of conflict reaching there in 2002, but, happily, they did not prevail. There are in the area still levels of ethnic hatred, high unemployment, the poorest education in Europe, smuggling, human trafficking and the arms trade—all of which form a lethal cocktail. The western Balkans have been variously described as a ““marginalised black hole””. More positively, when I met George Papandreou—the then Greek Foreign Minister—in his office he crossed to a large map of Europe on the wall; he pointed out the western Balkans and said, ““There is the missing piece of Europe’s jigsaw””—and it does indeed seem like that when one looks at the map. Yet even with this unpromising background there are now promising signs. Indeed, the past few months may be seen by historians as a tipping point in the relations of the western Balkans with the European Union. The noble Lord has already mentioned the decision in October that Croatia should be accepted as a candidate for the EU; on 7 November at Brussels, Foreign Ministers of the EU agreed to accelerate their commitments to the Balkans and to play an active part in the future of Kosovo as we now approach the decision on its final status, with Martii Ahtisaari charged by the United Nations with the responsibility for the negotiations. On the same day there was the official opening of discussions between the European Union and Serbia and Montenegro on a stability and association agreement, the first step to EU membership, and agreement then to open as soon as soon as practicable similar SAA negotiations with Bosnia-Herzegovina. I notice that a month ago the noble Lord, Lord Ashdown, referred to 12 December as the date for opening those negotiations, but now I understand that they are likely to open on 21 November. The presidents of several of the countries—Croatia, Serbia and Bosnia-Herzegovina—have met in Sarejevo. Nicholas Burns, the US Under-Secretary of State, has clarified the US position in relation to the conditional independence of Kosovo, with incentives for the Serbs, and no objection in principle if Montenegro were to vote for independence in its referendum next year. At the same time the EU Commission has declared Macedonia worthy of candidate status when only four years ago there was a real danger of civil war there. As to NATO, can the Minister say what progress has been made in the area? We know of the progress with the Adriatic three but, even though in Bosnia-Herzegovina there is still a NATO mission dealing with defence reform, and given the lack of co-operation with ICTY, what prospects are there for somehow circumventing that and moving the countries of the area closer to NATO? It is almost exactly a year ago that the Foreign Affairs Committee of the other place was in the Sarejevo. We saw that Dayton was a necessary framework to end the war but clearly not to build a nation. We saw many negative features, including the vast bureaucracy in Bosnia-Herzegovina, where the state spends up to 70 per cent of taxpayers’ money on governing itself and only 30 per cent on its people, with 14 Parliaments and 1,000 Ministers. We heard of the dependency factor whereby many politicians were unable to take necessary but controversial decisions and relied on the strong man at the top. There is widespread corruption, unemployment and a failure to deal with war crimes. Can the Minister say how Her Majesty’s Government view the extent of the co-operation from both Bosnia and Serbia? I understand that, over the past 11 months, 11 indictees—or ““PIFWCs””, as they are called; persons indicted for war crimes—have ““voluntary surrendered”” with seven remaining. How do we view the current degree of co-operation from both Bosnia and Serbia? When the committee was there it also saw signs of hope. We saw the first EU joint civil and military crisis management operation, with the transfer last December from SFOR to EUFOR, the first real test case for the ESDP. There has been a smooth transition; it has worked. Bosnia and Herzegovina have one currency, one passport, and more common institutions. A centrally administered VAT will be in operation from the beginning of next year. As the noble Lord mentioned, more than 90 per cent of property claims from the turbulence of the 1990s have been settled, and of the 2.2 million refugees only about 250,000 are still waiting to return. The key slogan ““From Dayton to Brussels”” is underlined by the report of the International Commission on the Balkans, The Balkans in Europe’s Future, and, of course by the important decision of Republika Srpska a month ago to join in the police integration, which may take many years to be implemented but is still a very significant step. The EU is the terminus. It is the key to promoting regional co-operation and internal restructuring. It is clear that the western Balkans are manageable and it is in our mutual interests to do so. Otherwise there will be instability on our doorstep, a constant flow of immigrants and increasing criminal and terrorist networks. What are HMG—including the World Service of the BBC—specifically doing in respect of Bosnia-Herzegovina? Is the European Union now considering a relaxation of the visa regime in respect of Bosnia? What lessons have we learnt from other accession countries—for example, Bulgaria—in terms of the scale and nature of financial assistance? Should there be a national development plan for Bosnia-Herzegovina to help integration? I end on this point about the symbolism of Sarejevo. In the summer of 1914 Sarejevo sparked the outbreak of the First World War. That war inspired the founding fathers of the European Union to dream of a united Europe. The Commission on the Balkans declared boldly:"““It is in Sarejevo in the summer of 2014 that Europe should demonstrate that a new European century has arrived””." That is the challenge—in my judgment it is attainable—and it is in our mutual interests that we grasp the opportunity.??