Former Yugoslavia: War Crimes (Hansard, 16 July 2003)

§ Baroness Crawley
My Lords, Her Majesty's Government have no knowledge of a secret deal by President Chirac to protect Ratko Mladic. It is a matter for the French Government. The international community continues to exert pressure on Serbia to hand Mladic to the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia. We are working with international partners to trace indictees, particularly Karadzic. In April, the EU introduced a visa ban on individuals known to assist indictees, and the Office of 858 the High Representative on Bosnia-Herzegovina has also frozen assets of individuals suspected of supporting Karadzic.

§ Lord Russell-Johnston
My Lords, it is seven years to the day since the slaughter in Srebrenica ended. There were five days of slaughter which left 8,000 Muslim boys and men dead. Does the Minister agree that, irrespective of President Chirac's involvement, it is shameful that the international community, including, in particular, NATO members who have the capacity, has failed to do anything in seven years to apprehend those primarily responsible for that massacre? Does the Minister agree that Karadzic moves around freely, with quite a large protection entourage, in a small area and that it is nonsense to suggest that no one knows where he is? If the same energy had been directed towards the apprehension of Mladic as was directed towards the apprehension of Eichmann—and he is in the same class as Eichmann—he would have been in The Hague ages ago. Carla del Ponte said the other day that there is no will. I agree with her. But I do not know why and the Minister did not seem to explain why.

§ Baroness Crawley
My Lords, a great deal of commitment and energy is going into apprehending and detaining war crimes suspects. Of the 75 people indicted for war crimes, only 18 individuals remain at large. So work is going on. As the noble Lord indicated in his response to my Answer, he knows that there are difficulties in apprehending some of these individuals. The noble Lord, Lord Ashdown, noted earlier this year that in the region in which Karadzic operates, Tito managed to tie down six German divisions with only 15,000 partisan troops. There are problems but our international partners, including SFOR and the Office of the High Representative, are doing everything they can to apprehend these individuals.

§ Lord Howell of Guildford
My Lords, further to the Question of the noble Lord, Lord Russell-Johnston, it is odd—is it not?—that General Mladic who, after all, is considered to be one of the butcher-architects of Srebrenica, which was one of the worst atrocities committed on European soil since the Second World War, is around and about and his whereabouts are said to be known. It is true that the French Government totally deny the suggestion that there has been any deal and people are not quite so sure about what Mr Karadzic might be charged with, as I think he is in a slightly different category. Can the Minister assure us that enormous efforts will be put into nailing this particular individual and bringing him to justice in The Hague, where he surely should have been long ago?

§ Baroness Crawley
My Lords, I hope I can reassure the noble Lord that enormous efforts are being brought to bear to, as he said, nail this individual. Mladic is thought to be in Serbia, but since no NATO troops are based in Serbia, it is entirely the responsibility of the Serbian authorities to hand him over to the tribunal. The international community 859 continues to put great pressure on them to do so. My honourable friend in another place, the Minister for Europe, Denis MacShane, raised our strong concerns on this issue with the leadership of Serbia and Montenegro during his April visit to Belgrade.