Category: Foreign Affairs

Kosovo/Serbia swap

Former High Representatives to Bosnia call on Mogherini to abandon plans to transfer territory between Serbia and Kosovo

Three former High Representative’s for Bosnia and Herzegovina: Carl Bildt, Paddy Ashdown, and Christian Schwarz-Schilling have written an open letter to Federica Mogherini and the Foreign Ministers of EU Member States on the Correction of Borders between Serbia and Kosovo.

The letter underlines “deep concern” about suggestions made by EU officials that they may be willing to support agreement between Presidents Vucic and Thaci that involves the transfer of territory between Serbia and Kosovo through “border corrections”.

The three experts fear that moving borders in the region like this “will not solve divisions, it will deepen them”.

In the letter Paddy Ashdown, Carl Bildt, and Christian Schwarz-Schilling state:

“We know Bosnia and Herzegovina well enough to know that this will give comfort and support to those who would break up the country, who are already calling for a return to the status quo ante in Dayton, unravelling all we and our Bosnian partners have worked for over more than two decades.

“We know the EU and Europe well enough to know that our principles and our bloody history teach us that sustainable peace can only come when we learn to live in multi-ethnic communities, rather than re-drawing borders to create mono-ethnic ones;

“We can in short, think of no policy more likely to lead us back to division and conflict in the Balkans than the one which some are apparently now supporting.”

ENDS

For media contact:

Paddy Ashdown –  HYPERLINK “mailto:paddyashdown1@me.com” paddyashdown1@me.com – 01935 882000 – 07946-272173

Carl Bildt –  HYPERLINK “mailto:carlbildt@me.com” carlbildt@me.com

Christian Schwarz-Schilling  –  HYPERLINK “mailto:css@schwarz-schilling.de” css@schwarz-schilling.de –00496042964441 –
00493040006510

Notes to editor:

The letter was sent as defence ministers meet for an informal meeting to discuss the matter later today  HYPERLINK “https://foreignbrief.com/daily-news/eu-defence-ministers-convene-to-discuss-west-balkan-security-and-accession/” here

Letter in full:

Her Excellency Federica Mogherini
High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy;
cc: Secretariat of the Foreign Affairs Council of the European Union

August 29, 2018

An Open Letter to Federica Mogherini and the Foreign Ministers of EU Member States on the Correction of Borders between Serbia and Kosovo.

As former High Representatives for Bosnia and Herzegovina, we are deeply concerned by announcements made recently by high level officials of the European Union, suggesting that the EU may be willing to support an agreement between Presidents Vucic and Thaci that involves the transfer of territory between Serbia and Kosovo through “border corrections”.

We know the region well enough to know that moving borders like this will not solve divisions, it will deepen them;

And although there can be no comparison between the case of Kosovo and the situation in Bosnia and Herzegovina, we know the western Balkans well enough to know that such a policy would be misused by nationalist politicians to further challenge borders and destabilize other countries in the region.

We know Bosnia and Herzegovina well enough to know that this will give comfort and support to those who would break up the country, who are already calling for a return to the status quo ante in Dayton, unraveling all we and our Bosnian partners have worked for over more than two decades;

We know the EU and Europe well enough to know that our principles and our bloody history teach us that sustainable peace can only come when we learn to live in multi-ethnic communities, rather than re-drawing borders to create mono-ethnic ones;

We can in short, think of no policy more likely to lead us back to division and conflict in the Balkans than the one which some are apparently now supporting.

We have little doubt that this risks destabilising current agreements, such as in Macedonia, undermining the unity of states such as Bosnia, encouraging those who wish to see exchange of territory elsewhere, such as in Ukraine and is likely to lead to the exodus of minorities from their existing communities.

We therefore urge you to ensure that these proposals are dropped without delay.

Yours etc

Carl Bildt,
High Representative for Bosnia and Herzegovina 1995-1997

Paddy Ashdown,
High Representative for Bosnia and Herzegovina 2002-2006

Christian Schwarz-Schilling,
High Representative for Bosnia and Herzegovina 2006-2007

Britain’s shameful legacy in Hong Kong

Britain’s shameful legacy

Financial Times

14 June 2018

Increasingly, one of the most effective tools in the armoury of authoritarian regimes and the enemies of democracy are colonial-era laws. You only need to look at Singapore’s efforts to clamp down on gay rights, or Pakistan’s blasphemy laws that now carry the death penalty. Both are little more than cut and paste jobs from British colonial rule.

Nowhere is this more clearly seen than in Hong Kong, where democrats and activists are facing a crackdown based on an assortment of outdated colonial legislation.

This week Edward Leung, one of Hong Kong’s most talented young activists, was sentenced to six years in jail for “rioting” for his involvement in the Mong Kok protests of February 2016. This was more than a Hong Kong police officer received for raping a woman in a hotel room. Aged 27, Mr Leung neither has a prior criminal record, nor did he in any way join those who threw stones. Yet the British-designed Public Order Ordinance allowed the Hong Kong government to lock-up and shut-up one of their most powerful opponents for six of the most formative years of his life.

His case is not isolated. Since the Occupy Central movement of 2014, which was one of the biggest peaceful mass movements for democracy this century, more than 100 protesters have faced prosecution based on the same old British law. One of the most controversial cases saw two former lawmakers sentenced to jail for supposedly committing “illegal assembly” inside the Legislative Council. Imagine the outcry if an MP in the UK was jailed for staging a protest inside parliament.

The Public Order Ordinance is one of Britain’s worst legacies in Hong Kong and has repeatedly been criticised by the UN for excessively curtailing freedom of expression. But it is not the only colonial era law that China is using to intimidate and silence the democracy movement. Benny Tai, the mild-mannered law professor who masterminded protests in 2014, is being charged with “public nuisance”.

In a bid to maximise his sentence, they have stacked absurd charges on him: not only accusing him of public nuisance, but also “incitement to public nuisance” and “incitement to incite public nuisance”. The punitive use of this outdated common law charge from the British colonial era does not reflect well on the Hong Kong government, which claims to be signed up to UN human rights standards. And it does not reflect well on the British government, which is largely silent about this.

I am not claiming that all of the figures who have been prosecuted are innocent, but the sentencing is disproportionate. It is possible that Mr Leung may have been guilty of a lesser crime. But he did not deserve such punitive sentencing. Sir Geoffrey Nice, who led the prosecution of Slobodan Milosevic at the international tribunal for the former Yugoslavia in The Hague, has commented that “sentencing politically troublesome young men to achieve collateral objective rarely works and often backfires — in the end”.

When I talk with young activists from Hong Kong, they are increasingly demoralised. They have taken to the streets to call for their democratic rights but have been met with repression; repression facilitated by colonial laws and by the near silence of Britain. We must recognise our responsibility. The last British governor of Hong Kong, Lord Patten, attempted to reform the Public Order Ordinance in the 1990s because “the vague definitions in the legislation are open to abuse and do not conform with United Nations human rights standards”.

The UK is obliged to promote human rights in Hong Kong. Given that laws written by the UK are facilitating the repression of young democrats, we should be advocating change. Instead we are quiescent. With the spread of tyranny and our history, it is unwise and shameful.”

Windrush and Hong Kong

Windrush highlights how the UK has failed Commonwealth citizens in her last colony – Hong Kong

Britain’s continued failure to her former colonial subjects, as exemplified by the Windrush scandal, is a national embarrassment. The last couple of weeks demonstrate that institutionalised racism is alive and kicking within government policy, and has been for decades. It reflects a history where citizens in the Commonwealth have been treated as second class citizens, to be used, not treated as equals.

The scandal initially focussed on the Windrush generation in the Caribbean, but it is increasingly clear that Britain has failed in its duty of care to Commonwealth citizens across the globe. Numerous cases involving non-Caribbean Commonwealth-born citizens from Kenya to Canada have now come into the open.

We are urgently in need of some soul-searching about our neglect of duty towards our former colonial subjects. A post-mortem is needed. These discussions should not only focus on the cases of sudden deportation or denial of rights which are only now coming to light, but must also consider the rights of British Nationals (Overseas) in Hong Kong.

Twenty one years ago Britain handed over her last colony, Hong Kong, to a burgeoning post-communist China. Although under British sovereignty for a century, the British and China decided that Hong Kongers would not be part of the Commonwealth or be given the right to self-determination, and therefore after 1997 Hong Kongers were given no special status in the eyes of the United Kingdom.

At that point, there were about 3 million British Dependent Territories Citizen (BDTC) passport holders (including people born before July 1, 1997 in Hong Kong, and naturalised British subjects) with right of abode in the UK. But against their wishes, Hong Kongers were stripped of their right of abode and many of the core rights which they desired and deserved, and given the option to apply for ‘British National (Overseas) Passports’ or the ‘BNO’ with their rights limited to holiday travel and the right to vote.

At the time, the Tiananmen Square massacre of 1989 was recent memory and many in Hong Kong felt their British citizenship was a vital lifeline in case China were not sincere in their handover commitment to give Hong Kong a ‘high degree of autonomy’ and uphold their ‘rights and freedoms’. I campaigned for Hong Kongers to be given the right to claim British citizenship, but the Conservative government decided it was not practicable. The BNO, sarcastically referred to by Hong Kongers as ‘Britain says no’, was viewed as a betrayal as the UK just cancelled the citizenship of her former colonial subjects.

In the immediate aftermath of the handover, those who thought this move was justified felt vindicated as Hong Kong’s autonomy was respected and ‘one-country, two-systems’ functioned well. But in recent years things have taken an ominous turn for the worse.

In November, I visited Hong Kong and met with people from across the political spectrum. They shared that over the past five years, the freedoms guaranteed to the people of Hong Kong in its mini-constitution, the Basic Law, have been increasingly eroded. Booksellers have been abducted, press freedom is under pressure and many political activists are being jailed. Judges are complaining that rule of law, although intact, is creaking as the objectivity of the Department for Justice is in doubt and the city appears no closer to democracy.

While on that trip, Emily Lau, the previous leader of Hong Kong’s Democratic Party, asked me if Britain would throw a lifeline to Hong Kong and give them the right of abode, “so that they can feel they have a home to go to, if things go desperately wrong here.”

Like we’ve failed those who travelled to the UK on the Windrush, we failed Hong Kong during the handover negotiations by stripping British citizens of their citizenship. The Windrush saga highlights that we have consistently neglected our former colonial subjects who have been used, abused and dumped. The government must make that right, and if the situation in Hong Kong continues to worsen, we should offer Hong Kongers a lifeline by converting BNO passports into full British citizenship.

Lord Ashdown of Norton Sub-Hamdon is the former leader of the Liberal Democrats and a patron of Hong Kong Watch

UK Foreign Policy after Trump

House of Lords debate on Foreign Affairs after President Trump

18 January 2017

I have been spending a lot of time recently researching the 1930s.

I am struck by the similarities between this suddenly turbulent and unpredictable age and those years.

  • Then as now, nationalism and protectionism were on the rise, democracy seemed to have failed;
  • people hungered for the government of strong men;
  • those who suffered most from economic pain felt alienated and turned towards simplistic solutions and strident voices;
  • public institutions, conventional politics, the old establishments were everywhere mistrusted and disbelieved;
  • compromise was out of fashion;
  • the centre collapsed in favour of the extremes;
  • the normal order of things didn’t function;
  • change – even revolution – was more appealing than the status quo
  • and “fake news” built around the effective lie, carried more weight in the public discourse than rational arguments and provable facts.
  • Painting a lie on the side of a bus and driving it round the country, would have seemed very normal in those days.

Perhaps the last time we stood as close to war as we stand now was at the height of the cold war.

But then, we had a comfort we do not have today.

Then, the Western liberal democracies stood together in defence of our interests and our shared values.

Now, under President Trump, the most powerful of our number thinks standing together,

is less important than going it alone;

abdication is preferable to international leadership;

collective action takes second place to America First.

Throughout the long years of the American century, we have taken great comfort in the fact that our alliance with the United States and its Presidents has been built not just on shared interests, but also on shared values.

Today we have to face the wrenching reality that this US President does not share our values – as his recent racist comments have so shockingly illustrated.

The liberal principles that have underpinned every civilised society, every peaceful age and every prosperous society are under attack as never before.

But President Trump appears more aligned with those forces ranged against liberal values than those seeking to defend them.

Throughout the long years of the American century we have taken comfort in the fact that the “Leader of the Western world”, while flawed like the rest of us, was well informed, judicious and cautious about going to war.

Now we have an American President who is ignorant, unpredictable, foolhardy and reckless.

(Bang goes my invitation to the Sate Dinner…)

This is frightening stuff for those who, like me, place their faith in the Atlantic Alliance.

So what do we do about it?

The answer is, grin and bear it in the hope that the US will find its way back to sanity.

After all, we in Britain are not entirely free of this kind of lurch into stupidity, just at the moment.

When the battle between the America we know and Donald Trump ends, only one side will remain standing. Either Donald Trump will destroy American democracy, as we know it. Or American democracy will destroy Donald Trump.

Personally my money is still on the American democracy.

But even if, on both sides of the Atlantic, we can find our way back to saner and safer ground, is there something deeper going on here?

The slow divergence of interest between Europe and the US does not date from President Trump’s election, although this has accelerated the process.

Even under President Obama the US gaze was looking more west across the Pacific than east across the Atlantic.

NATO and the Atlantic axis will remain Europe’s most important alliance for as far ahead as we can see.

But it will not be the same Alliance as it has been for the last 50 years. To remain strong the Atlantic relationship will have to look far more like J.F. Kennedy’s 1962 vision of a twin pillar NATO, than the present conjunction of a giant on one side and 21 pygmies on the other.

We will need a NATO which is mature enough to cope with areas where our interests do not elide –we should not be shy for example of calling out Israel for its illegal occupations, just because Washington doesn’t. Or of strenuously supporting the Iran nuclear deal, just because Mr Trump wants to pull the plug.

The United Sates will remain the world’s most powerful nation for the next decade or more.

But the context in which she holds her power has changed. The American century was one of the few periods in history when the world was mono-polar and dominated by a single colossus.

When all compasses had to point to Washington to define their positions, for or against.

Now we are moving into a multi-polar world – more like Europe in the nineteenth century than the last decades of the twentieth.

A foreign policy for the next fifty years based on what we have done for the last fifty, will be a foreign policy clumsily out of tune with the times. Which is exactly where we currently are. Everything has changed in the world, except Britain’s policies towards it.

British foreign policy in the post Trump era will need to be much more flexible, much more subtle, much more capable of building relationships on shared interests – even with those outside the Atlantic club – and even with whom we do not share values – than the simplicities of the last decades where we only needed to snuggle close to our friendly neighbourhood super power to be safe.

In a world dominated by a single superpower, might is the determiner of outcomes, not diplomacy. Our present foreign policy is dominated, not by diplomacy, but by high explosive. See a problem in the world, drop a bomb on it. The string of Western defeats; Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya and most humiliating of all Syria should tell us that this age is over.

We have lost contact with the truth of Clausewitz, that war is an extension of diplomacy by other means. We have remembered the war but forgotten the diplomacy – and so we have failed.

In an age where building alliances, will protect and enhance Britain’s interests, better than using military capacity alone, high explosive will be less useful to us than diplomacy.

To be diminishing our diplomatic capacity, as we are currently doing, is folly of a very high order.

Perhaps the most dangerous aspect of the current slide towards isolationism, is that, in an increasingly interconnected and interdependent world, the only solutions to our problems are multinational ones.

Climate change, trade imbalance, resource depletion, population growth, nuclear proliferation, over-population, poverty, migration, suppressing conflict – these are the greatest problems we face – and not one can be solved by nations acting alone.

As a medium sized nation with global reach but diminishing weight, it is in our interests to see a rule based world order, rather than one shaped by might. So actively pursuing the strengthening of multilateral institutions, should be a cardinal principle of a sensible British foreign policy,

Lastly we have to deal with the consequences of our own folly.

I make no secret of it.

We Lib Dems seek to reverse Brexit, which has already resulted in a catastrophic shrinkage of our ability to protect our interests abroad.

I reject the notion that, in seeking to reverse Brexit we are acting either undemocratically or unpatriotically. Any more than, for instance, the noble Lord Lord Forsyth, who I know to be both a democrat and a patriot, was offending either principle by seeking to change the country’s mind after the 1975 referendum.

But one thing is certain – in the EU or out, our foreign policy must continue to place its first emphasis on working intimately with our European neighbours. Because that is the best – indeed the only way – to pursue our nation’s interests in a dangerous, volatile and turbulent age.

It is too little recognised just how much the terms of our existence as Europeans have changed these last two decades.

Europe now faces an isolationist US President to our west, the most aggressive Russian President of recent times to our east and all around us, economic powers growing up, some already stronger than any single European nation.

The right reaction to this new context, is not to allow ourselves to broken up and scattered, but to deepen European co-operation and co-ordination.

So, inside the single market and customs union, or out – inside the EU or separated from it – our only sensible foreign policy is to proceed in lock step with our European neighbours.

I can put it no better than the Government’s own paper on post-Brexit foreign policy. Britain’s future relationship with the EU should be – and I quote – : “unprecedented in its breadth, taking in cooperation on foreign policy, defence and security, and development.”

Precisely My Lords.

The question we debate today is, does the Government mean it, or will the country’s interests once again be hi-jacked by the anti-European prejudices of the Tory Party?

My Lords, I beg to move.

UK Foreign Policy after Trump

Indy

18 January 2018

I have been spending a lot of time recently researching the 1930s. I am forcefully struck with the similarities between our current turbulent and unpredictable age and those bygone years.

Then as now, nationalism and protectionism were on the rise and democracy seemed to have failed. People hungered for a government of strong men. Those who suffered most from economic pain felt alienated and turned towards simplistic solutions and strident voices. Public institutions, conventional politics and the old establishments were everywhere mistrusted and disbelieved, and compromise was out of fashion. The centre collapsed in favour of the extremes and the normal order of things didn’t function. Change – even revolution – was more appealing than the status quo and “fake news”, built around the effective lie, carried more weight in the public discourse than rational arguments and provable facts.

Perhaps the last time when we stood as close to war as we stand now was at the height of the Cold War. But then, we had a comfort which we do not have today. Then, the Western liberal democracies stood together in defence of our interests and our shared values.

Now, under President Trump, the most powerful of our number thinks standing together is less important than going it alone – abdication is preferable to international leadership and collective action should take second place to “America First”.

Throughout the long years of the American century, we have taken great comfort in the fact that our alliance with the United States and its Presidents has been built not just on shared interests, but also on shared values. Today we have to face the wrenching reality that this US President does not share our values – his description of a good percentage of the world’s nations as “sh**holes” bluntly reveals just how far from our own ideals he is.

The liberal principles that have underpinned every civilised society, every peaceful age and every prosperous society are under attack as never before. President Trump appears more aligned with those forces that are raging against liberal values than those seeking to defend them.

We have, in the past, taken comfort too in the fact that the famous “leader of the Western world”, while flawed like the rest of us, was well informed, judicious and cautious about going to war. Now we have an American President who is ignorant, unpredictable, foolhardy and reckless.

We are witnessing a historic Gunfight at the O.K. Corral standoff in Washington right now – and only one side will remain standing. Either Donald Trump will destroy American democracy, or American democracy will destroy Donald Trump. Personally, my money is still on the latter.

But even if, on both sides of the Atlantic, we can find our way back to saner and safer ground, is there something deeper going on here?

The slow divergence of interest between Europe and the US does not date from President Trump’s election, although he may have accelerated the process. Even under President Obama the US gaze was looking more west across the Pacific than east across the Atlantic.

The United States will remain the world’s most powerful nation for the next decade or more. But the context in which she holds her power has changed. The American century was one of the few periods in history when the world was mono-polar, dominated by a single colossus. All compasses pointed to Washington to define their positions, for or against.

Now we are moving into a multi-polar world – more like Europe in the nineteenth century than the last decades of the twentieth.

A foreign policy for the next 50 years based on what we have done for the previous 50 years will be clumsily out of tune with the times. This is where we are right now. Everything has changed in the world, except Britain’s view of it.

British foreign policy in the post-Trump era will need to be much more flexible, much more subtle and much more capable of building relationships on shared interests even with those outside the Atlantic club – and even with whom we do not share values – than the simplicities of the mono-polar world where we only needed to snuggle to our friendly neighbourhood superpower to be safe.

To continue to diminish our diplomatic capacity, as we are currently doing, is folly of a very high order.

The most dangerous aspect of the current slide towards isolationism is that, in an increasingly interconnected and interdependent world, the only solutions to our problems are multinational ones. Climate change, trade imbalance, resource depletion, population growth, nuclear proliferation, over-population, poverty, migration, suppressing conflict – these are the greatest problems we face – and not one can be solved by nations who stand alone.

Lastly, we have to deal with the consequences of our own folly. I make no secret of it. We Liberal Democrats seek to reverse Brexit, which has already resulted in a serious shrinkage of our ability to protect our interests abroad.

In the EU or out, Liberal Democrat foreign policy will remain the same. To work as closely as we can with our European neighbours. Because that is the best – indeed the only way – to pursue our nation’s interests in this dangerous, volatile and turbulent age.

Europe is now facing an isolationist US President to our west, the most aggressive Russian President of recent times to the east and all around us economic powers are growing up – and some are already stronger than any single European nation. The right reaction to this new context is not to allow ourselves to broken up and scattered, but to deepen European co-operation and co-ordination.

China and Hong Kong 1 December 2017

Hong Kong and the new China

29 November

Peace in the Pacific, and the world, depends on two questions. How will the United States cope with decline? And how will China fulfil her potential as a super-power.

We live in a period of shifting power structures. These are turbulent and conflict-ridden times. The United States remains the most powerful nation on earth, but the context in which she holds that power has changed fundamentally. We live now in a multi polar-world, with China’s powerful position as a mercantile super-power already established. The question is how will China behave?

Until recently, the signs had been hopeful. China had seemed keen to be a good world citizen. She has engaged constructively in multilateral institutions – look at the WTO; look at her support for UN sanctions on North Korea; look at her engagement with international forces to tackle Somali pirates around the Horn of Africa; look at her involvement with UN peace keeping to which she has committed more troops than the United States and Europe combined.

Domestically too, until a few years ago, the China seemed to be moving steadily away from the old dictatorial structures of Communisml. The economic liberalisation of China’s markets have been awe-inspiring. Many of us had taken comfort in what we saw as the inevitable fact that economic reform must, over time, lead to political liberalisation too.

If these were our hopes they have now come up against a jolting reality.

Judging from the iconography of the recent People’s Congress it is difficult not to conclude that what we were looking at was less the emergence of a new China, as the return of the old. A Red Emperor, a cult of personality, the leader’s “thought” constitutionally enshrined, centralised power, suppression of dissent. These were all – perhaps – necessary for Mao Zedong, who had to build a unified state from ashes and a nation which was respected abroad after a century of humiliation. But the respect in which China is held is not in question today, nor is her unity and strength. To return to the ways of Mao sits uncomfortably with China’s ambition to be a modern state.

I do not believe that the Chinese people yearn for freedom and human rights any less than anyone else.  A state whose economy pioneers the future, but whose politics has reverted to the past, is a state founded on an irresolvable contradiction. I know of no instance in history where the sustainable greatness of a nation has been built on a market that is free and a public voice which is suppressed. It is just not in human nature to be content for long with glorious freedom in one aspect of your life and permanent voicelessness in the other. It is profoundly worrying to note the recent spate of examples of harsh repression – the abduction and disappearance of dissidents, the jailing of bloggers and activists, the use of so-called “black jails” outside the judicial system where torture is rampant, the repression of religious minorities, the crackdown on lawyers, the arrest of foreign NGO workers for expressing unwelcome views.

Maybe I had read the signals wrong. Foreigners, even those who have studied China for a long time, can easily do that. The proof of the pudding will come in the eating, and the first slices of that pudding will be eaten. It is in Hong Kong, perhaps more than anywhere else, where we will come to know the true nature of “Xi Jinping Thought”.

Over the past five years, the freedoms guaranteed to the people of Hong Kong in its mini-constitution, the Basic Law, the autonomy promised under “one country, two systems” and the way of life, which the United Kingdom has an obligation to monitor under the terms of the Sino-British Joint Declaration, have been increasingly eroded.

The heart of that Basic Law is the rule of law itself, and while the Hong Kong judiciary is still largely intact and independent, it is under real pressure from Beijing. The abduction of Hong Kong booksellers into the mainland simply for having published books critical of China’s leaders, undermines confidence both in the rule of law and in free speech. The right to protest within defined limits is part of that law. The right to due process by a judicial system independent of political interference is part of it too. The right to be free from the hazard of double jeopardy if you break the law is widely regarded as a fundamental principle of justice worldwide.

Of course those who break the law should be judged, though whether it was wise for the full might of a super-power to come down on three young enthusiastic student demonstrators, one of whom a directly elected legislator, is a different matter. But even the judged have rights that must be protected.

A year before the handover of Hong Kong, Prime Minister John Major promised Hong Kong that “if there were any suggestion of a breach of the Joint Declaration, we would have a duty to pursue every legal and other avenue available to us.” In words which would have reminded every Hong Konger of President John F Kennedy’s pledge that he would stand by Berlin, the British Prime Minister promised that Hong Kong “will never have to walk alone”. This is not a promise that can be lightly broken. As the last Governor Chris Patten has said, if Britain fails to live up to its responsibilities, legal and moral, it risks selling its honour.

The new mood places new responsibilities on the Hong Kong government, too. If things continue to regress further, then Hong Kong’s government has an even greater duty to defend Hong Kong’s autonomy and values.

What happens next in Hong Kong will be judged by a watching world, for it will tell us whether the rise of Xi Jinping leads to a new more modern China, or back to an old more repressive one.

China Speech 28 November 2017

China Speech

Foreign Correspondents Club, Hong Kong

28 November 2017

Peace in the Pacific Region, and very probably the wider world, will depend on two questions.

How will the United States cope with decline?

And how will China fulfil her potential as a super power.

Not long after I returned from Bosnia in 2006, in the middle of the era of small wars, I was asked if great wars were now a thing of the past. I replied no; unhappily the habit of war, large and small, seems inextricably locked into the human gene. But I did not believe that, once we were passed the fossil fuel era, the most likely place for a great conflagration would be the Middle East. If we wanted to see where future great wars might occur, we should look to those regions where mercantilism was leading to an increase in nationalist sentiment and imperialist attitudes, as it did in Europe in the nineteenth century. The only region in the world, I concluded, which matched this description, was the Pacific basin. Nothing I have seen in the intervening decade alters this judgement.

We live in one of those periods of history where the structures of power in the world shift. These are almost always turbulent times and all too often, conflict ridden ones too. How new powers rise and old powers fall, is one of the prime determinants of peace in times like this. The Pacific basin is about to be the cockpit in which this drama is about to be played out

The United States is the most powerful nation on earth and is likely to remain so for the foreseeable future. But the context in which she holds that power is completely different from what it was. Over the last hundred years or so – the American century – we have lived in a mono-polar world dominated by the American Colossus. This is no longer true. We live now in a multi polar-world – by the way very similar to Nineteenth century Europe where balance among the five powers – the so called Concert of Europe – meant peace and imbalance meant war.

We have seen this before. The end of the European empires after the Second World war led to great instability and much conflict, not least in this region. Britain, by and large, accepted her decline and, mostly, dealt with it in a measured and civilised fashion. We will come onto what that means for Hong Kong in a moment. France, by contrast lashed about soaking first Indo China and then North Africa in blood. The Belgians were even worse in the Belgian Congo.

How the United States copes with her relative decline from the world’s only super power, to primus inter pares in a multi-polar world, is one of the great questions which will decide what happens in this region in the next decade. President Obama seemed to understand this. President Trump, it seems does not. His policies of isolationism, protectionism and confrontation towards China are foolish and dangerous. It is foolish because he is abandoning American leadership of the multilateral space and that will not strengthen America as he suggests, but hasten her decline. Its is dangerous because US isolationism will weaken multilateral instruments which are the only means of resolving conflicts and tackling global problems, such as climate change.

China’s position as a mercantile super-power is already established. It was inevitable that she should now seek to consolidate her trading strength by becoming a political and military super power, too. This is a perfectly natural ambition. It’s the way super powers behave – indeed it’s the way they have to behave to protect their position. This therefore, should not, in and of itself, be a matter of alarm or criticism.

It is natural too – and good – that China should seek to fill the vacuum of leadership in regional and global multilateral institutions left by President Trumps’ retreat from this space. It is far better for us all to have an engaged China, than an isolated one.

The last great strategic opportunity faced by the West was the fall of the Soviet Union. We should then have reached out to engage Russia, to draw her in, to help her re-build and reform. Instead we foolishly treated Moscow with triumphalism and humiliation, orchestrated largely by Washington. The result was inevitable and he’s called Vladimir Vladimirovic Putin.

We are now faced with a second equivalent opportunity. Can we reach out to build constructive relationships with a rising China?

On the face of it, the signs have been hopeful.

China has seemed keen to be a good world citizen. She has engaged constructively in multilateral institutions – look at the WTO as an example; look at her support for the UN Security Council resolution on sanctions for North Korea; look at her engagement with international forces to tackle the scourge of the Somali pirates around the Horn of Africa; look at her participation in international disaster relief – for instance in north east Pakistan; look at her involvement with UN peace keeping to which she has committed more troops under multi-national command than the United States and Europe combined. Yes, they are mostly in Africa where she has good reasons to want to keep the peace. But there is nothing new in that. Western nations too only send troops to keep the peace, where it is in their interests to do so.

Almost all the signs we have seen over the last two decades seem to indicate that China sees it as in her mercantilist interest to have a more rule based world order – and that is something we in the West should agree with too. It looks as though there could be much which is constructive to work on here.

Domestically too, the movement in China seemed to be in a hopeful direction. The Deng Hsiao Ping initiated process of economic liberalisation has been awe inspiring to watch. Many of us have taken comfort in what we saw as the inevitable fact that economic liberalisation must over time, lead to political liberalisation too. Anyone who understands China and Chinese history understands why this could not be too hasty; understands why Beijing is nervous about loosening the bonds too quickly. But the direction of travel seemed clear. After modernising her economy China would, over time modernise her political and governmental structures in favour of greater democracy – albeit democracy with a Chinese face, rather than a western one.

It was comfortable for those who observe and have an affection for China to believe that in a world almost overwhelmed by conflict, fracture and repression, China would continue steadily moving in the opposite direction; steadily using her power for stability against turbulence and for partnership, rather than raw power and going it alone. We even imagined that, in her ascent to greatness China might chose a trajectory different from that followed by previous super-powers; using her strength to lead internationally rather than succumbing to imperialist temptation.

I do not think China’s true long term interest lies in responding to Donald Trump’s invitation to a dog fight, albeit one which appears to have been postponed after Mr Trump’s effusive glad handing with Chairman XI. China’s interest lies, rather in continuing to build her reputation as a good world citizen and in creating alliances – leading them if you like – in favour of the kind of rule based world which would benefit  both her and us.

Does this sound naive? A little I confess. Yet it remains probably the only hope for avoiding what will otherwise I fear be an inevitable long term progress towards some kind of Pacific confrontation between a declining old power and a rising new one.

Naïve or not, if these were our hopes they have now come up against a jolting reality.

Judging from the iconography of the recent People’s Congress it is difficult not to conclude that what we were looking at was less the emergence of a new China, as the return of the old. A Red Emperor, centralised power, suppression of dissent. These were all – perhaps – necessary for Mao Tse Tung, who had to build a unified state from ashes and a nation which was respected abroad after a century of humiliation.

But the respect in which China is held abroad is not in question today. Nor is her unity and strength. To return to the ways of Mao sits uncomfortably with China’s ambition to be a modern state and can only serve to diminish her reputation abroad.

As for unity, well I know of no instance in history where the sustainable greatness of a nation has been built on a market that is free and a public voice which is suppressed. It is just not in human nature, whether Chinese or otherwise, to be content for long with glorious freedom in one aspect of your life and permanent voicelessness in the other. It is sad – more it is worrying – to note the recent rise in the curtailment of freedoms in the name of national security; the arrest of foreign NGO workers for expressing unwelcome views, the rising number of detentions of human rights activists, including even lawyers.

All this sits very strangely with promises to develop “advanced, extensive, multi-level… institutionalised … consultative democracy” and enhance China’s “soft power”, in the 3,000 word amendment incorporating Xi Jin Ping’s “socialism with Chinese characteristics”, which was unanimously passed at the recent Congress

I do not believe that the Chinese people yearn for individual freedom and human rights any less than anyone else.

A state whose economy pioneers the future, but whose politics has reverted to the past, is a state founded on an irresolvable contradiction.

Maybe I have read the signals wrong. Foreigners, even those who have studied China for a long time, can easily do that. The proof of the pudding will come in the eating, as we say in English.

And the first slices of that pudding will be eaten – maybe have already been eaten – here in Hong Kong.

It is here, perhaps more than anywhere else, where we will come to know the true nature of Hsi Jin Ping’s vision of “Socialism with a Chinese face”.

At this stage I must do a little mea culpa.

When Beijing says there is a degree of hypocrisy beneath British calls for more democracy in Hong Kong, they are right. Our hundred and more years of rule of Hong Kong as a colony was not notable for its democratic reforms. Learning Chinese here between 1967 and 1970 – a time of considerable public disturbance and bomb attacks, as some will remember – I did not find it easy to defend the British Administration here, let alone be proud of it. Of course we know now that Chou en Lai threatened to re-possess the Colony by force if Britain introduced universal suffrage. Is it unworthy to think that this Beijing “prohibition” on full democracy was not very inconvenient to a British administration which didn’t have much enthusiasm for such things anyway? It would have been possible, even within the constraints set by Chou, for the British to at least to set a direction of travel for Hong Kong by taking small steps towards democracy, even if they couldn’t take big ones. Is it fanciful to suggest that if they had done this, the democratic culture in Hong Kong would have had time to develop into something deeper, more embedded and more mature?

British rule in Hong Kong was economically successful. But politically it was shameful. Chris Patten tried to ensure that the last page of the history book covering British rule in Hong Kong would be different, so that the legacy we left would be truer to our values, than the record of our administration of the colony. Is there hypocrisy in that? yes – some. But to do the right thing in the end, is better than not to do it at all. As Rousseau said “Hypocrasie est le hommage que la vice rend a la virtue” – hypocrisy is the service that vice gives to virtue.

Whatever the motives however, the fact is that the Patten democratic reforms were locked into the Anglo-Chinese International Treaty which enables and protects the Basic Law.

And the heart of that Basic law, is the rule of law itself.

The Hong Kong judiciary is still intact and still independent. But it is coming under pressure. Justice must not only be done, it must also, to gain confidence among the people, to be seen to be done.

The abduction of Hong Kong booksellers into the mainland, simply for having published books critical of China’s leaders, undermines confidence both in the rule of law and in the principle of free speech.

The right to protest within defined limits is part of that law. The right to due process by a judicial system independent of political interference is part of it too. The right to be free from the hazard of double jeopardy if you choose to break the law is widely regarded as a fundamental principle of justice world-wide.

Of course it is the case that those who break the law should be judged. Though whether it was wise for the full might and majesty of a global super-power to come down on three young enthusiastic student demonstrators, one of whom a directly elected legislator who may have overstepped the limit, is a different matter.

But even the judged have rights and these must be protected too.

The effective, just, wise and legal administration of Hong Kong is not an easy matter for Beijing to deal with. One country two systems is far easier to have as a slogan, than it is to put into practice. We should appreciate that.

Nevertheless this is what Beijing has, formally – and by international treaty – put its hand to.

One country two systems is the slogan under which Beijing may want to draw others back to the fold. Honouring scrupulously the Anglo-Chinese deal in both letter and spirit will enhance that possibility. Any perceived failure to do so, will weaken it

Britain, too laid its hand to that treaty. And with some fanfare.

At the time, Prime Minster John Major undertook that “If there were any suggestion of a breach of the Joint Declaration, we would have a duty to pursue every legal and other avenue available to us.” In words which would have reminded every Hong Konger of the famous declaration of President Kennedy that he would always stand by the endangered city of Berlin the British Prime Minister promised that Hong Kong  “will never have to walk alone”. This is not a promise that can be lightly broken because it proves inconvenient to a British Government obsessed with finding trade deals because it wishes to be outside Europe. As Chris Patten has said, Britain risks selling its honour here.

The new mood places new responsibilities on the SAR government, too. If things are to move in a more regressive direction on the mainland then SAR government has an even greater duty to show that it will stand up and defend Hong Kong’s special status and its core values; that it will be an effective voice-piece for your genuine concerns, for example over the co-location of the high-speed rail link.

What happens next here in Hong Kong will be judged by a watching world.

For it will tell us whether the rise and rise of Xi Jin Ping is taking us forwards to a new more modern China, or back to an old one.

2596

Article 50 – Prospect Magazine 15 March 2017

Prospect Magazine 15 march 2017

Oscar Wilde said “In a democracy, the minority is always right”. This thought has given me much comfort during nearly half a century fighting for liberalism.

But the post-Brexit debate has been different. A minority we still remain – but only slimly so and that has been wonderfully comforting.

I am fairly certain (Liberals don’t do certainties) that history will marvel at Brexit as the most bewildering act of national self-harm knowingly and willingly committed by an advanced nation in full possession of its faculties. And yet that is the decision we took and we must now enact – at least for the foreseeable future – unless and until the worm turns.

But the Brexit decision is only one of the puzzles we have had to deal with these last few months.

The other is why did Mrs May – again willingly and knowingly – choose to make a difficult path much, much more difficult?

Any good Prime Minister inheriting a country so at war with itself as we were after the Referendum would have placed healing national division as their first priority. But from her first unwise Conservative Conference speech with its demonization of the “liberal elite” and the assertion that those who see themselves as citizens of the world, are citizens of nowhere, Mrs May has, quite again deliberately, sought to widen the divisions between the 52% who said YES and the 48% who said NO. She followed this divisive rhetoric with divisive action, choosing a Brexit that puts the country as far away from Europe as it is possible to get (for which she has no mandate whatsoever), moving her Party onto policies indistinguishable from UKIP and attempting to bully her way to her chosen destination by steam-rollering a by-pass around Parliament – until the Supreme Court gave her a lesson in what it is to govern in a democratic country.

And so, our country launches itself down Mrs May’s Article 50 path to exit more divided even than it was during the Referendum. The public discourse is uglier, the entrenched positions are deeper, the level of vitriol is higher and the hate crimes grow and grow. For these divisions at such a difficult time, there will be a price to pay – including in the end, by Mrs May’s Government itself.

So what now?

As an exercise in whistling in the dark, the recent budget was about as good as you get. The Chancellor’s sepulchral style is not given to optimism. His speciality is calm. But even he could not hide the fact that this was a budget focussed, not on the sunlit uplands ahead, but on the monster of Brexit hard-times stirring beneath our feet. That’s why he’s not spending windfalls, but hoarding them. Big business, also awash with money, is doing the same thing for the same reasons. They both know that true pain of Brexit will increasingly be felt the further down Mrs May’s Article 50 track we go. If public opinion is to turn, watch what happens after inflation begins to bite around the turn of the year.

But the ambushes along Mrs May’s way are not just economic ones.

We are now facing the real possibility of the break up of the United Kingdom. Viewed from the moment, it does not seem likely that a Scottish referendum would succeed. But Mrs Sturgeon knows what most modern politicians have forgotten, that politics is dynamic. Snap-shot opinion polls tell you where things are, but not the direction in which they are heading. Status quo was yesterday’s dynamic. Fissipariousness is today’s.

For evidence, see Northern Ireland. Observers have long predicted that the time would come when the demographic balance in the Province would tip away from the Unionists, towards the Nationalists. Northern Ireland now teeters on this historic knife-edge after the recent Stormont elections. In part this is because some Unionist middle class voters now see a united Ireland inside the EU, less terrifying than a Northern Ireland forced to be outside it and isolated from its neighbours by a hard border. By the way, whisper it softly, some in Gibraltar are also beginning to view the competing claims of British and Spanish sovereignty through the same prism.

Mrs May’s ridiculous attempt to persuade us she is Mrs Thatcher reincarnated in kitten shoes has brought the country to the edge of a disastrous rift with the EU and given the nationalists in Scotland and Ireland cause and space to play fast and lose with our unity.

The problem with breaking things up, is that it’s easier to start than to stop.

Finally there is, as always, the famous devil in the detail. The complexities of the Brexit negotiations are as nothing to the whole roiling devil-fest waiting to break out when the Government launches the Great Repeal Act repatriating tens of thousand of EU laws to Westminster.

What does all this add up to? It may not be in Mrs May’s mind, or in her programme, or her agenda, or her intentions. But my guess is that as the next months tick by, the temptations of an early election will become almost irresistible.

The Daily Mirror 4 March 2014

The Daily Mirror 4 March 2014

The Ukraine crisis is one of those rare occasions when the West should follow the immortal advice of Corporal Jones in Dad’s Army: “Don’t panic!”.

 

We so love to frighten ourselves rigid by the Russian bear that we are missing the key point.

 

Russia is not a strong state it is a weak one. Its population is plummeting – the life expectancy of the average Russian is just a little over 60. They cannot to populate their own space let alone undertake sustained military adventures outside it. Their system of Government depends upon corruption, not the rule of law. They failed to invest their oil wealth in modernising their industry, and now have a rust bucket economy. If a Chinese businessman makes a million he invests it in China. If a Russian oligarch makes a million he gets it out of Russia as fast as he can – usually into property in London. When Mr Putin invaded Georgia it looked as though he had won. But in the end that was a catastrophe for Russia. They lost massive international support and, as Western intelligence knows, exposed their army as inefficient and out of date both in technology and tactics.

 

At the heart of the Ukraine crisis lies a clash of cultures. We in the West understand that today the destiny of nations depends on the will of their people. But Mr Putin thinks he is still in the nineteenth century when big-powers subjugated small ones if they were considered within their “sphere of influence”. That was what got us into the mess of 1914 – and again 1939. When Mr Putin threatens to invade Ukraine if Ukrainians of Russian origin are in danger, he is precisely repeating Hitler’s Sudetenland argument for invading Czechoslovakia.

 

So, we used military force then, should we use it now?

 

No. This time there is a better way

 

Yesterday the Russian stock market collapsed. The economic, diplomatic and political pain which Russia would suffer if the West now acts decisively, strongly and with unity, could be unbearable.

 

I remember negotiating with the Russians in Bosnia – the plainer they get the message, the better they understand it.

 

So here’s what should happen.

 

Firstly, the West must speak with a single voice. Mr Hague was in Kiev yesterday. But the key voice Russia has to hear is that of Chancellor Merkel – for Germany has always been closest to Russia.

 

Secondly if diplomacy is our game, then it must be muscular diplomacy aimed at isolating Russia until she changes course – starting with boycotting the coming G8 meeting in Socchi.

 

Thirdly we should have a sliding scale of economic sanctions – starting with Western investment and moving on to targeted individual sanctions on travel and assets. Freezing the foreign assets of Putin supporting oligarchs would be a good place to start.

 

Russia failed to win the argument with the Ukrainian people. Now it’s trying to win the argument with force. That is not a measure of strength, but of weakness. There has to be a cost for this illegality. But it is better exacted through economic and diplomatic means than military ones.