HL Deb 07 June 1967 vol 283 cc495-516

7.43 p.m.

LORD GIFFORD rose to ask Her Majesty's Government whether they will take action within NATO, the Council of Europe, under the European Convention of Human Rights, or in any other way, to express their condemnation of the actions of the present military régime in Greece. The noble Lord said: My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question standing in my name on the Order Paper. In doing so, I apologise to your Lordships, and particularly to my noble friend Lord Chalfont, for keeping the House so late. I hope that the sparsity both of attenders and speakers in the debate will not make my noble friend or anybody else feel that this is not a subject of great seriousness and importance, on which many people in this country feel deeply. Many noble Lords have told me how sorry they are, because of the lateness of the hour and the shortness of notice, that they will be unable to come and speak to-night, and I hope that I may be allowed to quote at least the views of one such noble Lord.

I have asked this Question with the deliberate purpose of discovering what is the attitude of the Government to the military take-over in Greece, because up to now there has been almost complete silence. Outside Parliament the only reported Government statement has been an apology—indeed, a double apology—to the Greek ambassador for the demonstration outside the Embassy. Within Parliament the Foreign Secretary has promised to try to secure and has succeeded in securing the release and return of Mrs. Ambatielos. The Lord President of the Council has said that the Government are very shocked at the events in Greece but did not elaborate on what action, if any, they intended to take about it. In your Lordships' House there have been brief answers to Questions by my noble friends Lord Beswick and Lord Chalfont, the main import of which has been that we should wait and see what happens and that we should not be too hasty in preaching to another country. But that is all. So I make no apology for asking my noble friend to-night to state clearly the views of the Government. It will be a rather belated statement but at least it will be read with great interest by people in this country, and most of all by people in Greece.

The military coup in Greece took place six weeks ago, on April 21. Its purpose was expressed the same day by Mr. Kolras in the following words: We believe that the results of the pending elections would not bring relief and a beneficial administration to the country's interests. Therefore, we decided to intervene". More succinctly, Colonel Makarezos said on May 18 that: The revolution was carried out to prevent a Communist takeover.

The first thing that must be borne in mind and I hope will be recognised by every Member of your Lordships' House is that there was no foundation whatsoever for the pretext which the military régime has put forward. This has been recognised, for instance, by the Daily Telegraph, which said on April 22 that … the Papandreous are neither Communists nor fools. The New York Times wrote on the same day that No convincing case can be made out for the imposition of an army-backed dictatorship". It becomes transparently clear that this was the case when we remember that at the last election in 1964 only 12 per cent. of the Greek electors voted for a Left-wing Party. The rest voted for Centre Liberals and the Right wing.

Having seized power in this unjustifiable way, the military régime set up what can be seen by all to be the complete apparatus of a police State. By a proclamation on April 21 they gave unrestricted powers of arrest and search to the police, prohibited all meetings, banned trade unions, censored the Press and set up military tribunals. That proclamation is still in force. The number of people detained on the island of Yioura alone is conceded by the régime to be between 5,000 and 6,000. There may well be many more in other prisons and detention centres. These detainees have been called "dangerous Communists". They include four deputies of the Centre Liberal Party, the president of the Athenian Bar Association and many journalists, authors, artists and lawyers, including Mr. Christos Lambrakis.

I should like, if I may, to read a short note that my noble friend Lord Annan has sent me of what he would have said had he been here. My noble friend says: The arrest of Mr. Christos Lambrakis, editor and proprietor of To Vima, illustrates the extreme nature of the militarist régime. It is as if the editor of the Guardian were to be arrested in England. He has been arrested simply because he was a supporter of Mr. Papandreou—and it is worth while remembering that in 1945 British troops were supporting Mr. Papandreou against a Communist coup d'état … My noble friend goes on to say that all intellectuals in Greece are appalled at the extinction of human liberties in Greece. I need only add that the place in which these men are detained is a barren, waterless, steamy island, without birds and almost without vegetation. It has been declared unfit even for prisoners by three régimes in this century, including the Nazis.

I now turn to certain statements of members of the régime to which my noble friend may well allude—namely, that they intend to promulgate a new Constitution and return to normal Parliamentary life. May I make two comments on that express intention? First, members of the régime have been saying other things as well. On May 19 General Patakos said (I quote from Le Monde): We will not yield to pressures for a return to Parliamentary Government, so long as we are not certain that the Communist menace has not disappeared. On May 11 this General had said that he would return to army life if he was young enough when democracy was restored.

The régime has lied openly and blatantly in a matter affecting this country already. On May 9 the New York Herald Tribune reported that the Greek radio had said that the British Ambassador, presenting his credentials to Mr. Kolras, had congratulated him on his accession to power and had expressed his understanding of the change which had occurred. Since then Mr. Richard Crossman has said publicly that this statement is completely untrue. I would urge the Government to treat pronouncements of the régime, made at a time when they are trying to secure Western help and friendship, with great reserve. Even if the Government were to believe them and to believe their sincerity, they should not be deterred from making known their views, particularly on what has happened and what is happening, because only in this way will the régime be persuaded and impelled to make good its promise.

This brings me to the very heart of this question. Assuming—and I hope I can—that the Government deplore what has happened and wish to see democracy restored, should they act? And how should they act? I should like to say at once that I disagree most profoundly with what the noble Lord, Lord Beswick, said in answer to a Question in this House: that we do not necessarily further our views by preaching. I felt that that was a rather cynical thing for a Socialist, a Minister of the Labour Government, to say. If this coup had taken place in some remote corner of the world, possibly there might be nothing we could do. But Greece is united and bound to this country in a whole web of alliances and organisations by which the Free World protects its freedom.

Are we saying that these high ideals and the Statutes of these organisations have no meaning for us? If we are—and this is what we imply if we do not use the opportunities and if we remain silent—we are doing no good to our reputation in uncommitted countries: because the impression is getting abroad, I am afraid, that the Governments of the Western world will certainly take action if they are threatened by a Left Wing coup, but if their rights and freedoms are just as brutally overthrown by a Right-Wing anti-Communist junta, then we are not so concerned and we do not really care.

There is a further point. If I were a Greek Liberal and I discovered that the Governments of the West had done nothing and said nothing to help my country, and I saw that the so-called democracies of the East had been vociferous in their condemnation of what had happened and of the struggle to restore democracy, I conceive that I might, however sadly and reluctantly, seek my help from the East. The Greeks know what international opinion is saying. The B.B.C. is listened to in Greece. It may be a crime to listen to it, but it is listened to. I cannot conceive of the disillusionment that the Greek Liberals must be feeling when they hear very little of condemnation or protest or action from the Governments of the West.

In my Question I have suggested a number of ways in which action might be taken. First of all, there is NATO, which, ironically enough, provided the master plan for the coup which the Generals used to take power, and in whose Statute are found these words: The parties are determined to safeguard the freedoms, common heritage and civilisation of their peoples, founded on the principles of democracy, individual liberty and the rule of law. My Lords, I was ashamed of my country when I read in La Monde of May 12 that Mr. Luns, the Dutch Foreign Secretary, had said this in the Dutch Parliament: The Dutch Government contacted their allies in the Atlantic Alliance with a view to common action. With the exception of Norway and Denmark. the NATO countries considered such an action to be without meaning. I hope that my noble friend, as a member of one of the Governments which must have said that action within NATO would have been without meaning, can say why this is so. To me, the meaning that such action would have had was well summed up by the Guardian on April 27, when it said: NATO might well consider whether Greece still meets the qualifications for membership—a line of attack to which a Government of colonels might be particularly vulnerable.

Secondly, there is the Council of Europe, by whose Statute: … every member must accept the principles of the rule of law and of the enjoyment by all persons within its jurisdiction of human rights and fundamental freedoms. I am glad to see that the Parliament of the Council of Europe has condemned almost unanimously what has happened in Greece. What is there to prevent the Government from taking the initiative within the Committee of Ministers to suspend the membership of Greece under Article 8 of the Statute until such time as the rule of law is restored? What risk is there? If the Greek régime does what it says and restores Parliamentary democracy, we can restore membership. The Article specifically uses the word "suspend". I suggest that it could be an embarrassing thing if we were to do this.

Finally, there is the European Convention of Human Rights, which is widely regarded in the world as the model of free democratic principles. What place has Greece, whose rulers have trampled on almost every right in that Convention, to be a member? Again, there is scope for initiative by individual freedom-loving Governments. My noble friend will know that under Article 24 of that Convention any contracting party may refer to the Commission any alleged breach of the provisions of the Convention by another contracting party. I suggest that if the Greek Government had to defend allegations of violation of Statute brought against it, and had to defend them in public and in a court of law set up under the Statute, it would again find it very embarrassing, and might again be impelled to mend its ways, even if only to put a better face in front of the world.

If the Government feel that representations in any of these quarters would be, to use my noble friend's words, "counter-productive", I think the onus is on them to say why this is so. For the evidence is all to the contrary. The Greek Generals, particularly in these early days when their régime is not consolidated, and when they are seeking acceptance and recognition, particularly from the NATO countries, have shown themselves to be remarkably sensitive to foreign opinion. The release of Mrs. Ambatielos is very relevant. One may wonder why they should have released a woman who had spread very unfavourable propaganda about them. But they did. I think this was because they are prepared to concede to this Government one of the few specific requests which they seem to be making to them.

I think that in this way added pressures of Western opinion could still, if not bring about a change of Government in Greece, at any rate mitigate the harshness, and I may say the brutality, of their rule. I believe that this Government, a Labour Government in a democratic country, which has already pledged itself as a European country, has a great part to play in taking the initiative in this way. This is why I urge my noble friend to say to the House tonight that the oldest modern democracy will come to the aid of the oldest democracy of them all.

8.0 p.m.

LORD MILFORD

My Lords, first of all I should like to thank the noble Lord, Lord Gifford, for giving us the opportunity to debate the Greek situation, and I should like to congratulate him on his speech which I am sure will give great heart to the people in Greece when they hear about it and read it on the Record. It is true that the Middle East tragedy has for the moment overshadowed all deliberations on Greece. But Greece, too, is a danger to the world. It is the first rise since the war of a military Fascist dictatorship, and if it is not smothered quickly there is great danger in what can happen in Europe, the Eastern Mediterranean, and perhaps in the Middle East, from it. In view of Her Majesty's Government's Answer to Questions on May 4, the effect of which was that they were not prepared and that it was too early to pass judgment on what was happening in Greece, I would ask: Have they now had time? Surely the reasons for the coup, engineered by a military junta, supported by the Court, the ruling class and the C.I.A., is now sufficiently clear. Modern Greece has never known democracy.

I went to Greece in the 'thirties, when it was under the dictatorship of Metaxas, and what struck me then—I only went for a holiday—was that Greece was ruled and run by a small oligarchy, and the poverty in the countryside and of the ordinary people was absolutely appalling. An élite class at the top had not any contact with the people of Greece at all; they did not care about them, and had no thoughts of helping them. They were a cosmopolitan-minded crew who came from England, America and everywhere else, and they did nothing for their country at all. It was absolutely obvious then, in 1938, that the country was going to boil over some time.

Well, the war came, which did alter things for a time. But after the war, when the liberation came, that élite oligarchy was badly threatened because there were so many collaborators among them, and they were only saved by Churchill, Bevin and Truman, who put the Monarchy back on the throne. That is my answer to any Peer opposite who shouts, as some did the other day, that we must not interfere in Greece. We have interfered in Greece and made this situation and set-up in Greece by interfering there after the war. A ghastly civil war followed, as we all know, and everybody wants to forget the horrors of that war. But at last in 1964 a Liberal Government came in after General Elections in a democratic way—the Papandreou Government. He brought in free education for the first time in Greece, and he released most of the political prisoners who had been languishing in prison for 15, 16 or 17 years.

I went out there with my wife and friends at that period, and the people were thrilled that at last they had a democratic Liberal Government. We only went through as visitors, but we were swept up in a terrific benefit—the marathon peace march, where they marched from Marathon to Athens in one day, 24 miles. It was a glorious outing and the families, half a million people. were strolling along the road singing and dancing and buying food by the wayside. It was a glorious holiday. The people took over for that day and enjoyed life and hoped for peace, and it was wonderful. But behind it all there was still fear—fear because Papandreou had not in fact scratched out the Fascist laws. The Fascist laws were still on the Statute Book, under which the security police could demand certificates from everybody in Greece before they got a job, even the young people who wanted to start work. They had to have certificates from the security police, and that law still remains on the Statute Book.

Papandreou was not to the Left; he was a Liberal. But he wanted to democratise the Army and bring it under the control of Parliament. This was too much for the Court and the upper classes. They were frightened of it. The King violated the Constitution, sacked the Prime Minister, refused to have elections, and foisted a minority Government on the country. Andreas Papandreou, the son of the Prime Minister, mentioned in the British Press before this last coup that the King—and he knew the King well personally—looked on the Left not as a Party but as a gang to be crushed by the Army and the police. He went on to say in an interview with a national newspaper that to the King the Army is a family legacy, safe under the NATO umbrella, and therefore safe with full American backing. That was the key of the situation. The King of Greece thought the Army was his own private property, and nothing to do with Parliament or democracy whatever, and he got rid of the Government on that. I say that by refusing to have a democratic Army and refusing to be answerable to Parliament, and foisting a minority government on the country without its approval, the King was fully responsible for this coup. He left the Army in the hands of Fascist-minded officers.

This year again I went to Greece for a holiday. The marathon march was banned. The elections were on. But the Right and the Court were terrified of the result of those elections, because it was obvious to everybody that the Papandreou Liberal Government would come in with a huge majority. Everywhere I went, talking to friends, I found they all cynically said: "if the elections take place …", and then, cynically: "There were going to be elections in Vietnam; there were going to be elections in British Guiana; there were going to be elections all over the place, but when the Left looks as if it is going to get in the elections are scrapped or the Constitution is altered". They were all prepared for the fact that the elections might not come off. The C.I.A. were boasting openly that they did not want the elections, and boasting of the enormous amount of money they had spent in Greece.

The chief weapon for stopping the elections was absolutely clear to us: police provocation, to get any excuse that it was not safe to have elections. For instance, to go into the university, the students every day had to walk over ranks and ranks of police sitting on the steps of the university right round the building. They had to thread their way through to get into the university. The police sat there all day, and the students had to thread their way out of the university. Of course they grumbled, and of course they wanted to kick those police, and of course there were scuffles because of that provocation. There were political meetings in the theatre. When one went into a political meeting in the theatre it was surrounded by bands of police armed with tommy-guns, and when one came out in the dark, they were still there, intimidating people.

There was a strike of building workers while we were there, and those workers were so badly beaten up by the police that their families were not allowed to go to see them in prison. This was because the Right Wing was afraid of the victory of the democratic Parties of the Centre Union and EDA. And, by the way, if there had been a victory of the Centre Union—a terrific victory—on May 28, the Government would certainly not have been more Left-Wing than Mr. Wilson's Government in this country to-day.

We discussed the political programmes of the Parties to find out what the election was about, because it was of interest to us. I will just tell your Lordships about the most Left-Wing Party—EDA, or the United Democratic Left. It is more Left than Papandreou's Liberal Party. They thought they might get 15 or, with luck, 20 seats. Their programme was that Greece was a backward satellite country, a colony, under a feudal rule and with a backward agriculture; that it had no industry whatsoever, and only foreign capital. Its only exports were raw materials, and it had no way of going forward into the modern world until the situation of being a colony was altered. Therefore, EDA, this Left Party, said: "Greece must be modernised before we can give the people a decent standard of living. We must be independent. There must be less privilege of wealth and a better shareout. The State Legislature must be democratised". Of course one point which the C.I.A. and the Americans did not like was that they wanted to come out of NATO. Well, de Gaulle wanted to come out of NATO, but the C.I.A. did not raise a putsch in France to get rid of de Gaulle. Finally, the foreign policy was to be based on friendship and co-operation.

This is an ordinary, civilised country's modern programme, but it was far too dangerous for the Greeks, and Andreas Papandreou said again in an article in a British national paper: "if we win, the King might try to knock us out by a militarily dictated coup". He was a very good prophet. We were there when the coup took place, and it was a terrible feeling, because we were sitting up all night waiting for the night plane to bring us back to England. At two o'clock in the morning the tanks moved in. We saw them moving in, and we realised that the Greek people were in their beds, still sleeping, and did not know what had happened. When the workers came on the streets at five and six o'clock the next morning they saw what had happened, and they were pushed and jostled by the troops with their tommy-guns. As one can imagine, their anger was terrific. I do not speak Greek, but many Greeks speak English; and we were in the B.E.A. offices, where they all speak English, and they told us what was being said. Some of them were saying: "This has happened twice in my lifetime. We are right back to square one again".

The streets were cleared, troops were on the housetops, terror shots were fired in the streets to frighten people—although I admit not to injure them—and there was a curfew. Then we saw lorry loads of people being carried off—intellectuals: professors, architects, school-teachers, every kind of person being carted off; and the people who heard us talk English said to us, "Go back to England as quickly as possible. Tell the people of Britain what has happened and get public opinion to help us to break up this dictatorship".

Now Britain has had a traditional friendship with Greece for years and years. Therefore the responsibility of Britain to help the Greeks is absolutely paramount, especially to a Socialist Labour Government in Britain. So I urge Her Majesty's Government—the Labour Government—to condemn and dissociate itself from this Greek military junta as quickly as possible; not to go on saying that they have not made up their minds. This should be done on principle against such a Government, against military Fascism, and also because I should have thought that a Government like this could lead to tremendous instability in the Balkans, and it is an obvious return to the cold war atmosphere.

Will Her Majesty's Government demand the release of the political prisoners and really hold an inquiry about this "Devil's Island" of Europe which the noble Lord, Lord Gifford, has talked about? I had a document given to me to-day which was smuggled out of Yioura, and to read that document is absolutely horrifying. Anybody who wants a copy of it may have one. It was smuggled out in a tiny bit of paper in the top of somebody's shawl—and remember, this is the first time in history that there have been women on that ghastly island. Now there are women there, and I plead with Her Majesty's Government to approach every possible international organisation they can in order to get this island done away with.

One other point. Cannot the Government press for the restoration of civil liberties and for the restoration of the Constitution? Is it not the duty of the British Government, a member of NATO, of which Greece also is a member? I am quite sure that the present régime is highly vulnerable to public opinion, and in particular to foreign opinion. The whole of the Greek people are waiting for this expression of disapproval from the foreign democracies like Britain. Another thing on which the régime is very "touchy" is the tourist trade. People will go to Greece this summer and will see and hear about these horrors for themselves; and, as I say, the régime are very touchy on that subject.

It is true that an awful lot of whitewashing of this junta is going on. Articles have appeared in the Press, and statements have been made in this country, but surely our Labour Government do not believe this sort of statement, which we have all heard before from Fascist military juntas. As the noble Lord, Lord Gifford, said, they boast that they are going to have a Constitution. What kind of Constitution? What kind of Government? Who will be allowed to be candidates, and in what kind of election? What kind of a Government will such a Right-Wing military gang and its backers consider safe for themselves? They have declared that they have released some of the prisoners; but thousands remain, and more are still being arrested. And the ones who are released are made to swear that they will take no further part in politics.

A truly democratic elected Government must be restored, and Britain, by a quick decisive move now, could alter the whole situation. We know the power of British movement in the past, what it did for the Greek people, and how just recently it was the British Labour movement, and not the Government, that got Betty Ambatielos, that great Englishwoman, released. One of the things she got in prison was a letter from a Llanelly miners' lodge, and that told her what the British Labour movement were doing; since then resolutions from miners, electricians, "co-ops", engineers and trades councils have poured in to help her to get released, and 160 Members of Parliament in this country have condemned the Greek junta Government in spite of our Government here. But so far there has not been a squeak from Her Majesty's Labour Government. Our Prime Minister has often told us that he wants the East of Suez policy, the armaments and all these things, to build up British prestige so that she can take a leading part in the councils of the world, of humanity. As the noble Lord, Lord Gifford, said, we have not led. Norway and Denmark are the people leading us, while we sit in shame; and as long as our silence continues that means we are condoning evil.

8.22 p.m.

LORD INGLEWOOD

My Lords, I had not intended to make a long speech this evening, and I intervene now not to differ by any means from all the noble Lord, Lord Gifford, has said, even though I think the Question he has put on the Paper is not as happily or hopefully worded as it might have been. It is restricted to condemnation and gives no indication how he thinks the future should develop. I cannot say I agree very much with what the noble Lord, Lord Milford, said except one sentence, in which he said, "Behind it all there is still fear"; and that is something we must not forget. One of my sons, aged 15, was in Athens at the same time as he was and told me about what happended. The account is somewhat different; but, on the other hand, in a town the size of Athens there is no reason why all visitors should see the same things. The noble Lord was very confused in his speech, if I may say so without offence, between what is Liberalism, what is Socialism and what is Communism.

No Parliamentarian can be other than deeply distressed when a Parliament, however inept, finds itself suspended and passes from the scene, particularly the European scene, even for a very short time, and I must say again here that it seems strange to hear from the lips of a member of the Communist Party so much criticism of recent Parliaments in Greece when one knows what shams most of the Parliaments in the Communist countries of Eastern Europe are. I think I am the first of the three speakers here to-night who has sat for some years as a member of an elected Chamber, and so I naturally have a very special feeling for what has happened. I am also vice-chairman of the Anglo Greek group in our Parliament here and have had continuing contacts with the Greek Parliamentarians and the Greek army since the war years.

I would ask your Lordships to view what has happened against events in Greece over the last few years and to remember, too, that Greece is a country not of North-West Europe but of South-East Europe, where quite different standards of administration exist—and I say this next without any offence to the Greek people or country. There is, too, a history of coups d'état one after another, over our lifetime and beyond. I do not make this as an excuse for recent happenings, but we must not overlook it. I was sorry to hear the noble Lord, Lord Milford, completely misunderstand the position of the Greek sovereign under the Greek Constitution, but I know it is an almost irresistible temptation among some people of the Left in this country to criticise and sneer at the Greek Royal Family.

We must not forget two factors—and I am sure the noble Lord who is to reply will agree. They are factors we have not, we should be thankful, experienced in this country. The first is the recent civil war and appalling story of Communist excesses. The second is the inept Parliament, a Parliament working with outmoded standing orders which have given members unlimited scope for filibustering. Under their standing orders every member may make two speeches on every motion, and I am sure the noble Lord, Lord Sorensen, will agree that in those circumstances it is all too easy not merely to bring business to a stop but to a permanent stop.

LORD MILFORD

My Lords, they have brought it to a stop by dictatorship.

LORD INGLEWOOD

So the noble Lord said earlier on. I did not interrupt him and I hope he is not going to interrupt me because I do not want to take up a lot of time. I have spent days, not just hours, in the committee rooms and gallery of the Greek Parliament during recent visits. There were weaknesses in the system which we, as Parliamentarians, must not overlook. There is lack of interest, too. in good government and administration. There is, on the other hand, immense interest in the theory of government. There has grown up in Greece a boredom with some of the old faces. There is the very high cost of elections, and when you find that in a country in Europe you find also a suspicion of corruption. Noble Lords opposite will like what I am going to say next. There is no solid Socialist Party with substantial trade union membership, and the floating vote in Greece is to the left of their existing Socialist Party, rather than, as we assume in this country, more to the centre.

There is the underlying feeling throughout Greece that over the last few years Parliament became a great deal less effective than it ought to have been and that it was slow to reform its procedures and shy of taking the responsibilities which a Parliament ought to take. People feared that given time and opportunity this could lead to favourable occasion for the Communists and their associates once again to stir up trouble in the country and snatch power. Although I do not want to bring Greek personalities into this debate, we must remember that Andreas Papandreou some time ago had a Party card, although I believe he no longer holds it.

LORD MILFORD

My Lords, can the noble Lord tell me where he gets that information from?

LORD INGLEWOOD

It is widely believed in Greece. Furthermore, for accuracy, M. George Papandreou once told me he was a Socialist, whereas the noble Lord told us he is a Liberal. Many people in Greece believed it would be possible to see the end of democracy in their country, because once the Communist Party really seizes hold of power in any country, as Eastern Europe offers all too many examples, it does not easily let it go. This may have become an exaggerated phobia for many, but there is no exaggeration when I quote the figure of 70,000 men, women and children who died in the civil war between 1946 and 1949, a civil war fostered by the Communists and their allies in the neighbouring countries. I am not in any way excusing the officers who have carried through this coup, but they are men who fought in that civil war and one imagines that the marks and feelings of these experiences will be with them for the rest of their lives.

One hopes that at the earliest possible moment a way will be found for them to give way to another Government and to restore Parliament in Greece. There is a constitutional commission now sitting. What I earnestly hope is that our Government, while properly condemning what has taken place, will use its best offices and give all the help it can, political help and maybe economic help too, to see a speedy return of a Parliamentary system in Greece, a country with which we have such long-standing and friendly connections, and to build it on strong foundations which will endure.

8.30 p.m.

LORD CHALFONT

My Lords, may I begin by thanking the noble Lord, Lord Gifford, for the moving and eloquent way in which he introduced his Motion this evening. It was impossible not to be impressed by what he said and the manner in which he said it. But let me make it clear at once that we, Her Majesty's Government, greatly regret what has happened in Greece. Apart from the fact, as has already been said, that Greece is a friend and an ally, she is also the spring from which, through the ages, has flowed much that is best in the heritage of Western civilisation. I do not know whether the noble Lord who introduced the Motion, when he was at Winchester suffered from the paralysing disadvantage of a classical education, but if he did he may recall that Thucydides said of the Greeks that they are lovers of the beautiful, simple in their tastes, cultivating the mind without loss of manliness. This is the nation that we are talking about, and no one can be other than moved and distressed by what has happened so recently.

My right honourable friend the Foreign Secretary, speaking in another place three days after the military coup of April 21, expressed the Government's concern, and I myself reiterated it in your Lordships' House on May 1. Her Majesty's Ambassador in Athens, on returning to his post from consultations in London with my right honourable friend the Foreign Secretary in the first week of May, made clear to the Greek Government the strength of public opinion in this country on the recent events in Greece. At the same time the Ambassador told Greek Ministers that Her Majesty's Government had taken note of the statements of intent by the new régime regarding political evolution towards democratic and Parliamentary institutions. He added that my right honourable friend the Foreign Secretary had particularly instructed him to say that he hoped that further advances in this direction would make relations between our two countries easier in the future. So I do not think that the Greek régime can be in any doubt at all that this Government and this country look forward to an early return to constitutional government and to the lifting of the present restrictions on civil liberties.

Mention was made of the numbers of people arrested and the numbers of people released. Of course there are differing and conflicting figures that come out of Greece about this; but so far as Her Majesty's Government are aware, the most accurate estimates we can make are that at the time of the coup about 6,000 people were in fact arrested. Since then, at least 1,200 people, and perhaps even more than double that number, have been released, and the Greek Government have themselves put a new Constitution among their foremost objectives. As I have said, they have already released many of the people to whom we have heard reference made to-night who were placed in detention at the time of the coup.

We in the Government welcome these developments, and I think that noble Lords will agree that we should encourage them. I believe that we shall not encourage them by using the sort of phrases used from time to time by the noble Lord, Lord Milford. I appreciate the deep sincerity of his feelings and the emotion with which he spoke, but phrases like "military Fascist dictatorship" and "a military junta assisted by the C.I.A." are loaded words; they are tendentious phrases, and they do not do justice to the noble Lord's case. They do not really help us to analyse the problem with any sort of intellectual precision: still less do they help us prescribe solutions to it. I would remind the noble Lord, as he was reminded by the noble Lord opposite, that it is not only against so-called Right-Wing régimes that it is possible to level accusations of oppression or police brutality. Let us not in this sort of case, with all its important implications, adopt these extreme positions of moral asymmetry.

The real question here, and the question to which I should like to address myself, is whether we should make any of our real objectives easier to achieve by action of the kind suggested constructively and thoughtfully, by the noble Lord, Lord Gifford. I am bound to say that I do not think so. The noble Lord referred to the statement of my noble friend Lord Beswick on May 4, when he remarked in your Lordships' House (col. 1076): … it is one thing to hold views about the virtues or otherwise of a foreign Government but … we do not necessarily further our views simply by publicly preaching to that Government. My noble friend criticised that statement, but I think in criticising it he quoted it rather selectively. The important point about that statement was that Lord Beswick made the point that we do not further our views by publicly preaching. Of course a Socialist Government must preach the gospel of its political philosophy to those who will listen. But to do it publicly is another matter. There is much that we can do, and much that we are doing privately, to achieve our objectives in Greece; and I believe that in this, as in many other cases of international affairs, it is often best to do these things quietly and discreetly, and not to shout one's views from the housetops.

Of course it would have been open to us, when the coup took place, to denounce the new régime and to break off relations with it. What would that have achieved? We should have made, I suppose, what would no doubt have been a popular gesture in some quarters. But I suggest to your Lordships that the effect in Athens would have been the effect that we are seeking to avoid. It would have undermined the moderate influences there and would have encouraged the extremists; and, of course, we should then have been in no position to make the sort of private representations to which I have referred. Still less should we have been able directly to protect British subjects such as Mrs. Ambatielos, to whom the British Ambassador and his staff did in fact, as the noble Lord has said, render notable assistance. I wonder whether the noble Lord, Lord Milford, really believes that Mrs. Ambatielos would have been in the position that she is, happily, now in if we had taken the quick and decisive action that he spoke about, whatever that might mean?

For these reasons, I believe that we were right to take the course that we took, of assuming an official relationship with the new Government of Greece. Most of our friends and allies agreed that this was the right course. Of course this in no way implies approval by Her Majesty's Government of the coup, or of any of the policies followed by the new Government. Recognition of a régime does not imply approval of the régime or of its policies. Nevertheless, suggestions of the kind made by the noble Lord, Lord Gifford, and reflected in his Motion, have been put forward, and should like briefly to deal with them in turn.

First, he refers to the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation. Past experience in NATO does not suggest that it would be helpful in any way to raise in this forum the internal affairs of one of the Member States. On the contrary, I think that to do so would not tell the Greek Government anything which they did not already know. The preamble to the North Atlantic Treaty, again quoted by my noble friend, does not give that Organisation a right to interfere in the internal affairs of its members, and Greek resentment at what they would have regarded as interference of this kind might well serve to disrupt the proper functioning of the Alliance and to do great and unimaginable harm to all that it exists to defend.

Secondly, he refers to the Council of Europe. As we know, the Consultative Assembly have already considered this matter. As I told my noble friend Lord Brockway, in answer to a Question on May 1, the Consultative Assembly of the Council of Europe adopted an order on April 26. What was said on that occasion reflected the widespread concern of Greece's friends and allies over the recent events in that country, and the particular concern of European Parliaments and Parliamentarians over the future of Parliamentary democracy in Greece. Again, I do not think there is anything that can usefully or profitably be added at this stage.

Thirdly, the noble Lord refers to the European Convention on Human Rights. We accept the importance of maintaining the authority of this Convention, but we are not convinced that in present circumstances it would be helpful to refer alleged breaches of the Convention by Greece to the European Commission on Human Rights. The legal position is complex, the processes there are slow, and the prolonged dispute which such a reference would entail might very well retard, rather than advance, our objectives so far as they concern the present Greek régime.

My Lords, I am conscious that in saying all this I may invite the comment from some of your Lordships that this is all very well, but that if we do not publicly and formally condemn what has happened in Greece we shall be taken to approve it, and our stand will discourage all those, inside Greece and outside, who are pressing for a return to constitutional and democratic institutions. This was the burden of the speech of the noble Lord, Lord Milford. But I suggest that the circumstances do not in any way warrant such a conclusion, for a number of very simple reasons.

The first is that I think we have already made our feelings, the feelings of Her Majesty's Government about this matter, quite plain enough. Secondly, whatever the noble Lord, Lord Milford, may think about these protestations, the régime in Greece has stated its intention to return to constitutional paths. It has already set up a committee for the reform of the Constitution. This is expected to complete its work in six months and to submit a new draft Constitution to the Government. This new Constitution would later be submitted to a referendum. It seems to me, and to the Government, that so long as intentions of this kind are upheld, public condemnation would do more harm than good. As my noble friend Lady Phillips said only a few moments ago in an earlier debate in this House, there is a time to speak and a time to be silent. I think it is possible to argue that this is a time to be silent, or at least to be discreet, and to let the fruits of our private diplomacy make their appearance. But as my final word I would say that if the Government of Greece should swerve from the path which it has chosen, then it may be that Her Majesty's Government will be ready to think again.