Balkans (Hansard, 10 February 1993)

§ 13. Mr. Jacques Arnold
To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will make a statement on the prospects for peace in the Balkans.

§ Mr. Douglas Hogg
We are our EC partners have made clear our unequivocal support for the work of the international conference for the former Yugoslavia. Its success would be a significant step towards securing stability throughout the Balkans. We are also working to prevent the conflict spilling over into Kosovo or Macedonia and to provide humanitarian relief to those caught up in the fighting.

§ Mr. Arnold
Is not it precisely because both Kosovo and Macedonia have all the characteristics of a tinder box that the Owen-Vance peace process must be successful and, above all, complied with by the warring parties? Should not we and other countries do our damnest to put pressure on those parties to comply?

§ Mr. Hogg
To use my hon. Friend's phrase, we are doing our damnest. However, he is right to draw attention to the special problem of the minorities in the former Yugoslavia. We have rightly focused on the question of Bosnia, but we must also pay special regard to the issues of minorities in Serbia, including Kosovo, and also in Croatia. Their rights must be secured as part of any overall settlement.

§ Mr. Winnick
Could Ministers be a little stronger about what steps will be taken by the international community to bring to justice those who, as my hon. Friend the Member for Hamilton (Mr. Robertson) said, are undoubtedly involved in terrible crimes? People who have read the articles by Robert Fisk in The Independent have been horrified by the systematic torture and rape of Muslim women. Those responsible should face an international tribunal, and that should not be years away.

§ Mr. Hogg
It is an extraordinarily difficult and important point, because there is no doubt that the most ghastly crimes have been committed in the former Yugoslavia. We assert, and will continue to assert, that those who commit such crimes, either directly or indirectly, should be held personally accountable. However, there is another problem, which the hon. Gentleman will wish to bear in mind. If the authority—the responsibility—for those crimes goes as high as the hon. Gentleman and I expect, we must ask ourselves what is the priority: is it to bring people to trial or is it to make peace? That is the sort of tension with which we must deal.