Bosnia and Herzegovina: Stability and Peace

Ruth Cadbury Excerpts

Thursday 2nd December 2021 Commons Chamber

[Ruth Cadbury (Brentford and Isleworth) (Lab)]

I, too, thank the hon. Member for Rutland and Melton (Alicia Kearns) for opening this debate so powerfully. I also thank those Members who have spoken today who have direct experience of the conflict and of the subsequent peacebuilding in Bosnia and Herzegovina. For me, the conflict then was a horror unfolding on the nightly news, and has seldom been mentioned since in the news. However, in the past week, I have received a number of personal and moving messages from constituents who came from Bosnia and Herzegovina, telling me just how worried they are about the current situation.

The Dayton agreement was a key diplomatic achievement in post-war Europe; it was not a perfect agreement, but it stopped the bloodshed and provided nearly 30 years of peace. It showed that peace was possible and that the international community, including the US and the UK, could be a force for justice, a force for good and a force for peace. It sent a powerful message, while also bringing peace for so many families.

The 1995 horrors of Srebrenica are a painful reminder that genocide and crimes against humanity are not merely something from the distant past. The legendary writer and holocaust survivor Elie Wiesel said that, after the holocaust, the words, “Never again” became more than a slogan; they became “a prayer, a promise, a vow.” That vow should underpin the work of our Government—and indeed of all Governments—on the world stage.

One constituent who lived through the conflict wrote to me of

“the large number of concentration camps where people were tortured in many inhumane ways, subjected to torture, hunger and thirst.”

He told me that these horrors had a particular impact on children, as they had

“their carefree childhood interrupted, and many were left without one or both parents and lived in orphanages or in foster care.”

Those in Bosnia and Herzegovina and in the diaspora across the world are really worried about the situation. A constituent told me that citizens of Bosnia and Herzegovina

“want to enjoy peace, freedom and democracy, and to preserve their integrity and sovereignty. They want to progress and have a better future...They deserve happiness and prosperity as any other human being.”

Those words echo the central point of this debate: they deserve happiness.

My hon. Friend the Member for Hornsey and Wood Green (Catherine West) has written to the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office and rightly called on the Government to take urgent action, as others have done today. The UK has a special role to play and should be leading on this situation. We hear much from the Government about global Britain. Surely this is the type of issue where we need to see the whole Government playing a larger role, not only as a signatory to the Dayton agreement, which underpins peace, but because of our duty to the memory of the 57 members of the UK forces who died while securing peace.

We have heard serious concerns about the current situation from the UN High Representative, Christian Schmidt, and from the EU and NATO. Our Government need to work with our European partners in France and Germany, along with the US, to ensure that the EU’s peacekeeping operation has the necessary support. We have a moral duty to find a solution to this crisis, to work with our allies and to lead. I hope that we will hear from the Government about just what they are doing.