=================================================================================== .................................................................................... ON THE RECORD PADDY ASHDOWN FIRST INTERVIEW RECORDED FROM TRANSMISSION: BBC ONE DATE: 21.2.99 .................................................................................... JOHN HUMPHRYS: But first the two sides in the Kosovo peace talks have been moving closer to an agreement. One vital sticking point is the Serbs refusal to accept NATO peacekeeping troops and Western governments still insisting that that is a non negotiable element in any agreement. So, the threat to use military force against the Serbs remains, but the Kosovo Albanian delegation have also not yet fully accepted the agreement. The Liberal Democrat leader Paddy Ashdown has made a number of visits to the former Yugoslavia and he joins me now from his home in Yeovil. Mr Ashdown, good afternoon, ASHDOWN: Good afternoon, John... HUMPHRYS: If Milosevic does not give way, and the signs at the moment are that he won't, should we bomb him? ASHDOWN: We should be prepared to back up the threats that we have made which have supported our diplomatic efforts in Rombouillet and elsewhere, if we don't then we will simply have no leverage left, we know perfectly well that Milosevic is only prepared to act diplomatically where there is a credible use, a credible threat of the use of force and if it comes to that then we should be prepared to do it but it must be done with a clear political aim and I notice today that Robin Cook quite rightly in my view said that if we can't reach a solution, a settlement with the Kosovo Albanians then there won't be a political aim to use military force in order to be able to support. HUMPHRYS: So what happens then, let's assume that the Kosovo's say no, we don't like this deal because we don't see independence at the end of the road. Milosevic says we wont let NATO peacekeeping troops in to Kosovo what then! Where do we go from there. ASHDOWN: Well that's exactly the point John and that's when Hardy comes to Hardy and I notice today that Robin Cook said that he actually thought they'd got rather further than he imagined they would get. That must mean that the government went into these talks quite rightly rather pessimistic about the possibility of getting an outcome, it's right to have pursued it but pessimistic about the possibilities. That means that they must have an idea what will happen if these talks do not succeed. And I remain pretty pessimistic about it I must confess. I mean a balance of probabilities I'd say forty-sixty against, although there are good signs about what might happen over the next two or three days. Now you are then brought hard up against the question which I and others have been trying to pose to the Western nations for some time, because you are left then with only two options. Option One, pull the verifiers, pull the monitors out, Option Two, put the troops in. Now on the face of it, Option One would seem easier, pull the monitors out, but what happens then is this, that President Milosevic sees that as a green light to attempt a final solution and I use the word in all its twentieth century connotations in Kosovo, and the West will then stand by and watch Kosovo descend into terrifying bloodshed and the almost inevitability of spreading war in the southern Balkans. I rather doubt that, so I think there are some very hard issues to be resolved if these talks do fail. And I said yesterday and I mean it, that I think Europe now stands closer to war on the Continent of Europe than we have at any time since the Berlin crisis in the late forties and early fifties, it's that dangerous a moment. HUMPHRYS: But if we take your option two and put the troops in, that would of course include a large number of British troops, we will inevitably end up with British troops being killed, would the people of this country say well that's OK or would they say, we're not involved and we should not be involved in what is a dispute in a sovereign country. ASHDOWN: That was the constant question I was asked when I was recommending actions we finally took in Bosnia which if we'd taken earlier would have resolved the matter much more simply with much less danger and vastly less bloodshed. My view is that the British people are far more robust than many of their politicians and perhaps even many of their press commentators too, John, but the question ....... HUMPHRYS: Even when the troops are coming home in body bags? ASHDOWN: No let's wait and see, the question is this, those who argue that this is not in Britain's interests ought to reflect on the fact that a war in the southern Balkans at the end of this century, above all any other century, with the lessons that we have learnt with a spreading of that war into Macedonia, Albania, Romania, and then perhaps involving Greece and Turkey is a terrifying consequence, so the question is not what is the price of action, the question you have to address yourself to as so often in the Balkans, what would be the price of inaction and my judgement is that would be immeasurably greater. Now I hope it won't come to that, I hope reason will prevail, I have good reason to think that Milosevic may need a bout of bombing, what a shocking phrase to use, in order to, for him to be able to explain to the Serb nations why he must back down on Kosovo all I am saying is that this is a very dangerous moment, I think the Western nations have followed the right policy, albeit too late to do it at lesser risk, but the consequences of what happens for Rambouillet and the consequences of what happens after that are immense. Immense of Kosovo, immense for the peace of the southern Balkans and immense as we shall discuss no doubt later on for the concept of Europe beginning to have control of its own defence around its own borders, rather than always relying on Uncle Sam to come in and bale us out in our own backyard. HUMPHRYS: So it is possible yet that we will bomb Milosevic, bomb the Serbs, it is also possible that we will, should, send troops in to Kosovo if the Kosovo Albanians themselves do not agree to this peace deal. Both of those are possibilities. ASHDOWN: John, there are some literally horrifying, literally terrifying decisions that have to be taken in the near future, all I will say is this, we know a number of things we know that diplomacy which is not backed by the credible threat by the use of force does not work with the Serbs. We know that we have made that threat, we know now that we may have to carry it out, we also know Bosnia's taught us if we hadn't learned elsewhere that you can never use political force unless it is to achieve a, you can never use military force unless it is to achieve a political aim, and we also know, or at least we ought to that the actions of the Serbs in Kosovo has now diminished if not removed their moral authority to govern the province of Kosovo on the basis of five per cent of the population. The status of Kosovo therefore cannot go back to being a part of Serbia in the same way as it was in the past. Now to move from there to where we might want to be in ten years time I think we have to pass through a transitional period and that transitional period must involve some kind of quasi dei facto protectorate of Kosovo in order to be able to stabilise, not only Kosovo but the region, now those are the ingredients. The decisions we have to take in the next week or two weeks as to whether and if so how force is going to have to be used are decisions of the greatest magnitude, not just for Kosovo and the peace of the southern Balkans but also for the developing idea of Europe having a foreign policy. HUMPHRYS: Well let's leave it there for the moment because I want to come back to you. ...oooOOOooo... 3 FoLdEd