The International Situation

Part of the debate – in the House of Lords at 5:26 pm on 12 January 2000.

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Photo of Lord Biffen Lord Biffen Conservative 5:26, 12 January 2000

My Lords, the Chamber has been privileged to hear a most compelling maiden speech by the noble Lord, Lord Fellowes. I am certain that his topic--namely, the future of the Commonwealth--should be entertained again and again in the future.

Perhaps I may express a few words of thanks to my noble friend Lord Carrington. Almost all noble Lords have paid tribute to his political work, his preparation for this debate, and his contribution to it. I want to add even more to his embarrassment. In politics one often gains as much inspiration and entertainment from individuals as from political ideas. The noble Lord, Lord Carrington, comes top of the list. At the time of the Falklands and his resignation, I admired so much the dignified and selfless way in which he carried out that act of public service. I have since admired the reticence and loyalty to party leadership which has been the hallmark of his later political belief. That is a great inspiration to Tories operating in not always the happiest of circumstances.

Having discussed that, perhaps I may turn to ethical foreign policy. There is little I can add to what my noble friend Lord Lamont said. It was a most fascinating argument delivered in a compelling fashion without emotion. It is a challenge--I do not say this in a controversial sense--in particular to the Government Front Bench because it sets out what will be the guidelines of British foreign policy in this important field. It cannot be left for fractious debates on the "Today" programme. It has to be resolved in the calmer and more measured circumstances of this Chamber.

I shall return to an ethical foreign policy, but I should like to make one point which concerns a developing major world danger. The noble Lord, Lord Hurd, spoke of the Foreign Office being beset by the unexpected. I want to be so arrogant as to say that that is thoroughly expectable. I refer to the dangers inherent in the situation in Indonesia. Already we have in Timor all the evidence of a trip wire of descent and eventually disintegration. We have in Irian Jaya, in Sulawesi, in Maluku and in North Sumatra situations in which there is now open conflict. Some of that, particularly in the spice islands, is of a particularly fierce character. No one can be at all optimistic about the ability of the Indonesian Government to hold the present position.

Furthermore, we in this country have become used to Indonesia being the product of colonial boundaries; just as for years we were used to Africa being the product of colonial boundaries. They provided a degree of security against tribalism and other forces which would dislocate the social and political background. Now all that is disappearing. In Africa, the situation is miserably confused and conflict is proceeding in horrific terms. It would be a brave person who would say that Indonesia would not fall into a situation in which the boundaries secured by Dutch colonialism are replaced by the splitting of the archipelago into a shoal of islands.

Another consequence which flows from that is that the dispute and conflict will be horrific. That is the message from Africa. The break-up of boundaries, the reassertion of old former loyalties, has not been secured by reasonable agreement. It is the consequence of the most fierce and sustained fighting. One might say, as did Neville Chamberlain of Czechoslovakia, that Indonesia is a faraway country of which we know little. That is right, but in today's world we have trading interests in Indonesia and anxieties to see its peaceful evolution.

One has only to reflect on the events of the past few days--how straitened are our forces in the Balkans and how uncertain is the quality of our armaments on any great scale--to realise that there is no possibility of any British involvement as part of a peacekeeping force in Indonesia, even if peacekeeping lay within the keep of the western European countries, which I very much doubt. We may have to learn a disagreeable lesson and witness the dislocation of an area which is vital to world peace and interests because of its strategic identity. None the less, it would be a situation in which there was precious little we could do.

Against that background, I trace the so-called "ethical foreign policy". I do not believe that it is as strong a runner today as it was a few weeks ago. I believe that the Foreign Secretary is a man of great elasticity and will no doubt be able to cope with the situation. Indeed, I can remember when as a lad he was a Eurosceptic and a devotee of green politics. He has moved on from that and I am sure that he can move on from an ethical foreign policy. However, naturally, there is a concern about certain standards which guide our relationships with other countries.

The great danger is that because we are reluctant to be realistic about the situation, we shall become in favour not of an ethical foreign policy but of an ethical foreign noise. In some senses, that is the worst of all. I am sure that we all like to believe that there is a pebble of principle in our foreign policy and in our conduct with our neighbours, but the chances are that if we are not careful that pebble of principle will become encased in the slime of hypocrisy. That is not something which this nation deserves.