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Dáil Éireann debate -
Wednesday, 28 Nov 1990

Vol. 403 No. 2

Conference on Security and Co-operation in Europe: Statements.

It is proposed that in the case of the statements to be made now the following arrangements shall apply: spokespersons for the groups as defined in Standing Order 89 shall not exceed 30 minutes in each case; any other speakers called shall not exceed 20 minutes; and the statements shall conclude not later than 7 p.m.

Is that agreed? Agreed.

A Cheann Comhairle, I wish to report to the Dáil on the Summit Meeting in Paris of the Conference on Security and Co-operation in Europe (CSCE), which I attended, together with the Minister for Foreign Affairs, from 19 to 21 November.

At the outset, I should like to pay a richly deserved tribute to President Mitterrand and the French authorities for the warmth of their hospitality and to express my admiration for the flawless efficiency with which they organised this large, complex operation. Our thanks are due to them for the success of an occasion when the excellent arrangements fully matched its historic importance.

I have already arranged for the concluding document of the Summit, entitled "The Charter of Paris for a New Europe", which all CSCE participants signed at the meeting, together with the text of the agreement reached in the Vienna negotiations on Confidence — and Security-Building Measures, to be placed in the Library of the House. I am also making arrangements for the publication of the concluding document so that it can be made known as widely as possible in this country.

The Summit was attended by the 34 CSCE participating states, which included the US and Canada and all the countries of Europe, except Albania, with a combined population of about one billion people. President Mitterrand, in his introductory comments placed this conference in an historic context.

The Congress of Vienna in 1815 followed destructive wars which saw the overthrow of empires and a fundamental redrawing of boundaries in Europe. The Helsinki Conference in 1975, more than 100 years later, took place in an atmosphere of Super-Power rivalry against a background of strongly conflicting ideologies. This Paris Summit, on the other hand, represented a consensus unique in modern times, among many different countries, including the US, the USSR and the EC, on such basic issues as democracy, human rights, economic development, security and the environment. As such, it represents a major advance in international co-operation with the potential of great benefit for mankind throughout the world.

The Summit took place following an initiative taken by President Gorbachev a year ago. Deputies will recall that the CSCE is a process which has been seeking to achieve more stable and secure relations in a hitherto divided Europe. The previous CSCE Summit in 1975 adopted the Helsinki Final Act which set out ten principles to guide relations between the 35 participating States — now 34 following the recent unification of Germany — irrespective of their political, economic and social systems: it also contained a balanced and comprehensive programme of measures for co-operation in the areas of military security, economics, science, technology and the environment as well as in the humanitarian, cultural and information fields. The Helsinki provisions have been extended and amplified at a number of CSCE follow-up meetings, of which the most recent was concluded in Vienna in January 1989 as well as at additional "inter-sessional" meetings of the participating states.

Up to now, the CSCE remained just a "process" organised on a conference basis rather than functioning through established institutional structures. Meanwhile, as the CSCE process was under way, momentous changes have taken place in Central and Eastern Europe — influenced in part, at least, by that process. Regimes which formerly held power there have been swept away and replaced by democratic governments which are working to move their countries towards free market economies and respect for human rights. Negotiations between the two alliances and between the Super Powers have led to dramatic reductions in military forces in Europe. The atmosphere of threat and counter-threat, the pervasive tension which characterised these earlier years, has been replaced by a new climate of openness and increased confidence. Doctrines of security and defence based on the East/West confrontation must now be radically reassessed. The dramatically reduced military threat has posed fundamental questions for the military alliances about their role in the new situation.

On the morning of 19 November, immediately prior to the opening of the conference, I attended the ceremony for the signing of the Treaty on Conventional Forces in Europe. This, the first such treaty since World War II, which was the outcome of extended negotiations between the 22 nations of the two military alliances, contains agreement on significant reductions in the level of armaments in Europe. At the same time, the two alliances signed a joint declaration which has formally brought an end to the Cold War, with both alliances declaring they will never threaten each other or become adversaries again. Whatever about NATO, it is clear that the Warsaw Pact is coming to an end. In fact, the President of Czechoslovakia stated specifically that the Warsaw Pact countries are to meet shortly to definitively decide an ending its military structures while the Prime Minister of Hungary expressed his hope that the pact will be dissolved before the end of 1991.

Ireland, in common with the other neutral and non-aligned participating states was not, of course, a participant in these negotiations, and therefore not a signatory to this treaty. At the Summit meeting proper, I laid particular emphasis on our welcome for the progress which this treaty represents as an important step towards the mutual reduction of armaments and armed forces, one which will bring about a qualitative increase in the security of all. I expressed the hope that this treaty would also help to move us nearer to the attainment of what we regard as a key objective: the halting of the nuclear arms race and the elimination of all nuclear weapons.

The parameters of the security situation in Europe have therefore changed fundamentally and we must now, together with our partners in the European Community and the other CSCE participants, adapt our thinking in a number of areas to a completely changed situation. New thinking is called for to enable us to draw the maximum benefit from the progress already achieved, and from the advent of a peaceful, secure European order.

The major changes brought about in the CSCE also require us to examine the implications of this new situation for the current efforts of the Community to develop further its own identity in the international arena. As part of that process, 11 members states, including Ireland, agreed at the Rome European Council on the objective of a common foreign and security policy with the aim of giving greater coherence and effectiveness to the Community's international action. The Intergovernmental Conference on Political Union which begins in Rome on 15 December will examine this issue. This examination must now have special regard to the new Pan-European framework within which the security and stability of all the countries in Europe in future will be assured.

In the discussions to date some member states have argued it is important to distinguish between security, which is a broader concept, and military defence. I believe it is right to make this distinction. The Twelve are already committed under the Single European Act to seek to co-ordinate their positions on the political and economic aspects of security. The new commitment to a common foreign and security policy could now mean that this co-ordination would extend to other areas, such as disarmament and concerted action against international terrorism. However, there is as yet no meeting of minds among the member states of the Community. Some insist that European military defence should continue to be a matter for the NATO Alliance, which involves the USA and Canada, and not for the Community as such. Others see the Western European Union as the right forum for these questions. It seems clear therefore that a common EC foreign and security policy, when articulated, is unlikely to include specific military aspects at this stage.

The momentous developments in Europe over the last 18 months — the collapse of the communist or socialist regimes, their replacement by democratic and free market systems, the progressive disintegration of the Warsaw Treaty Organisation — underlines the need to develop new Pan-European institutions to accommodate the new security situation in a Europe which, since the end of World War II had been based on mutually antagonistic alliances and ideological confrontation. There was also the need to buttress the emerging democracies and to strengthen ties between the countries of Europe through increased co-operation. Furthermore, it was clearly necessary to establish institutions which would enable the participating states, in particular the countries of Central and Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union, to provide for their security after the demise of the Warsaw Pact.

There was a consensus at last week's Paris CSCE Summit that the necessary framework would be formed by development and enhancement of the CSCE process, which provides the only existing forum that spans all Europe and includes the US and Canada as equal partners, and also through the enlargement and revitalisation of other bodies such as the Council of Europe, the Economic Commission for Europe and the OECD. A number of decisions to achieve these ends were taken and these are contained in the Paris Charter.

Decisions in the CSCE are taken by consensus. The Helsinki Final Act, and other CSCE documents, are not legally binding on the participating states. However, they represent a solemn political commitment by them.

The first part of the Paris Charter sets out for the first time a common commitment by all CSCE participants to democracy and respect for specific human rights, including the right to own private property. The participating states have undertaken to build, consolidate and strengthen democracy as the only system of Government, and to recognise that the free will of the individual forms the necessary basis for successful economic and social development.

With the dawning of a new era in Europe, the section on friendly relations among participating states reaffirms the commitment to the Ten Principles of the Helsinki Final Act as the basis for relations among participating states. It renews the pledge to refrain from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state. The Charter does not single out any of the principles, and retains the possibility, set out in the Helsinki Final Act, of changing frontiers, in accordance with international law, by peaceful means and by agreement.

In the second part of the Charter, the CSCE participants agree to build on the provisions relating to the human dimension which were agreed earlier this year in Copenhagen. This is an area which has always been of particular interest to this country. We see the individual as central to the whole CSCE process. Unless individuals are guaranteed the effective enjoyment of their fundamental rights and democratic freedoms, there can be no lasting basis for stability and peace, nor can genuine security exist between the participating states. I am especially glad, therefore, that a decision was taken to convene a seminar of experts in Oslo in November 1991, and also that the mechanism to ensure the full implementation of commitments in this area is to be expanded. We look forward to the holding of a seminar on national minorities in Geneva next August, and to the Moscow Conference on the Human Dimension later in the year.

We see it as a matter of great importance that the Paris Charter recognises that security in Europe, in all its aspects, is the direct concern of all the participating states, irrespective of whether or not they belong to a military alliance. In this area, a number of important decisions were taken by the CSCE members. The meeting endorsed a series of innovative, confidence and security-building, measures — essentially these measures are intended to ensure that routine military activities do not themselves become a source of tension — and confirmed that the Vienna CSBM negotiations would continue until the Helsinki follow-up summit meeting which is to be held in 1992.

The Paris Summit also welcomed the decision of the countries participating in the negotiations on Conventional Forces in Europe to continue these negotiations with a view to their conclusion no later than the Helsinki meeting in 1992. We particularly welcome the summmit's decision that there should now be more structured co-operation among all participating states on security matters, and that discussions and consultations will take place among the 34 participants aimed at establishing by 1992 new negotiations on disarmament and confidence and security building open to all participating states. This represents an important departure from the previous practice, adopted at NATO insistence, of limiting disarmament negotiations, to the members of the two alliances. In my statement to the conference, I expressed the hope that this process would rapidly lead to further substantial reductions in all types of weapons. The Summit also agreed on co-operation to eradicate terrorism and to combat illicit drug-trafficking.

The Summit also decided that new forms of co-operation for resolving disputes should be sought. This co-operation would cover, in particular, a range of methods for the peaceful settlement of disputes. This question will be considered further at a meeting of legal experts to be held in Valletta early next year.

While co-operation in all of the fields of security which I have mentioned — disarmament, confidence building, and the peaceful settlement of disputes — is still at a relatively early stage of development, I am confident that, as it broadens and deepens, it will come to represent a satisfactory framework of security for all the countries of Europe.

With regard to economic-co-operation, the Charter underlines the need to build further on the results of the Bonn Conference held earlier this year, with its emphasis on democratic institutions and economic liberty as the basis for social and economic progress. It stresses that economic co-operation, based on market systems, constitutes an essential element for the construction of a prosperous and united Europe. It calls for further co-operation in the economic field, in science and technology, and also in the fields of energy, transport and tourism. It records our commitments to free enterprise, increased trade, social justice, effective policies to tackle unemployment and support for the countries concerned in their transition to the market economy.

The conference recognised the important role of the European Community in both the political and economic development of Europe. I stated that Ireland fully shares with our partners the intention that the Community should participate in the construction of a wider Europe and welcomed the fact that the Community, represented by Italy, which currently holds the Presidency, and by the Commission in the areas for which it has competence, would be signing the Paris Charter.

The Paris Charter pays particular attention to questions of the environment, and outlined the scope for further co-operation in this area within the CSCE framework, as well as in co-operation with other international bodies. Other areas also singled for special attention include culture, migrant workers, and the Mediterranean. The last part of the Paris Chapter sets out the following decisions of the Heads of State or Government on the establishment of new institutional structures intended to facilitate the achievement of the objectives set out in the first two parts of the document.

First, it was decided that there should be regular meetings of CSCE Heads of State or Government. The first of these will take place at the Helsinki follow-up meeting in 1992 and others will follow on the occasion of subsequent meetings, normally every two years. In addition, Foreign Ministers will meet as a council regularly and at least once a year. These meetings will provide the central forum for political consultations within the CSCE process. Meetings of other Ministers may also be convened.

To prepare the meetings of the Council and carry out its decisions, a committee of senior officials will be established. It will also review current issues and consider future work of the CSCE. Additional meetings of representatives of the CSCE participating states may be convened to discuss questions of urgent concern. A CSCE secretariat will be set up to provide administrative services for the various meetings. It will be small, and will consist of officials seconded by their Governments for a fixed period. It will be located in Prague.

A Conflict Prevention Centre will be established. Initially, this will deal largely with the exchange of information agreed under the provisions on confidence — and security-building measures. A particularly important aspect of its work will be to provide a forum for consultation and co-operation between the participating states in the event that unusual military activity in a neighbouring state might give rise to concern. It is intended that this will defuse a potentially serious situation: in the words of President Mitterrand, "preventing a spark from igniting a powder keg". Provision exists for its functions to be extended in the future by the Council of Ministers, and we would favour such extension. It will be located temporarily in Vienna.

An Office for Free Elections to facilitate contacts and to exchange information on elections within participating states will be established.

The Paris Summit has called for greater parliamentary involvement in the CSCE process, in particular through the creation of a CSCE parliamentary assembly, involving Members of Parliaments from all participating states. This is a development which we fully support.

The decisions which were taken at the Paris Summit meeting were historic in the truest sense and of world-wide relevance. Many speakers at the Summit echoed the President's view that a shot fired in Europe is heard in the Canadian woods and a wave which breaks in the Pacific is felt on the shores of Europe.

The Paris Summit has taken far-reaching decisions in establishing a new framework for relations among the nations of Europe, the US and Canada and, through the institutions it has established, will enable the CSCE to fulfil a new and strengthened role as a framework for peace, security, stability, co-operation and prosperity in a new Europe based on democratic principles, respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms and the market-oriented economic system.

This does not mean, however, that the door has been closed on any future evolution of the shape of Europe, or that legitimate aspirations will be suppressed. By no means; the Paris Charter envisages the possibility of changes through peaceful and democratic means. Similarly, the CSCE process fully acknowledges the value of the great diversity which has contributed so much to the European heritage and provides for its preservation.

During my time in Paris, I had brief discussions with Presidents Bush and Gorbachev and with Chancellor Kohl as well as with President Havel of Czechoslovakia.

I had more substantive meetings with the Prime Ministers of Canada, Czechoslovakia and Sweden. Prime Minister Brian Mulroney of Canada gladly accepted my invitation to visit Ireland next summer. The Prime Minister intends to bring a group of businessmen with him to look at trade and investment opportunities in Ireland.

In my talk with Prime Minister Calfa of Czechoslovakia we followed up on certain matters of interest between our two countries discussed initially in the meeting we had earlier this year in Dublin Castle.

Prime Minister Carlsson of Sweden and I discussed the recent EC-EFTA negotiations which are being conducted with a view to the establishment of a European Economic Space. We also considered certain aspects of Sweden's relations with the EC.

President Mitterrand in summing up made the important point that we had successfully combined to lay out the strategy, the concepts and the formulae but that it was now necessary to put our words into practice and to ensure the implementation of what we had enunciated.

I am convinced that the momentous steps which have been taken and enshrined in the Paris Charter have laid the foundations for a peaceful and secure Europe, in which rights and liberties will be fully protected by the rule of law, and with a market system oriented towards the wellbeing and prosperity of all. I have made it clear that the Government are fully committed to the attainment of these objectives.

The 1975 Helsinki Final Act of the CSCE states: "The participatiing states regard as inviolable all one another's frontiers" and "they consider that their frontiers can be changed in accordance with international law by peaceful means and by agreement". That declaration was signed in 1975 by Ireland and has implications for the Constitution of this country, in particular for Articles 2 and 3 thereof. Our Constitution should state, explicitly and clearly, that we envisage a change in the status of Northern Ireland only to bring it within the jurisdiction of this House by peaceful means and with the agreement of a majority in Northern Ireland. To say that in our Constitution would bring it fully and exactly into conformity with the Helsinki Final Act which we signed in 1975 and with the terms of the Anglo-Irish Agreement. For us to insert that in our Constitution would bring it fully in line with principles set out by the Conference on Security and Co-operation in Europe. It is something that we in this House could do immediately in practical terms to show that we are serious in our commitment to building a new Europe, based on the peaceful resolution of disputes and the creation of a structure for peace in Europe.

The best way to lead in matters of this kind is by example and this would set a very concrete and practical example as far as our commitment to peaceful means for solving disputes — and consent — is concerned. My party, Fine Gael, are currently working out detailed proposals on this matter which we will be placing before the other parties in Dáil Éireann soon.

The Charter of Paris, to which the Taoiseach referred, adopted by the CSCE Heads of Government last week states: "We affirm that ethnic, cultural, linguistic and religious identity of national minorities will be protected and that persons belonging to national minorities have the right to freely express, preserve and develop that identity without any discrimination and in full equality before the law".

This declaration is of great importance and of particular importance to Ireland. It provides clear European backing for the efforts that successive Irish Governments have made to ensure that there is a strong guaranteed position for the minority living in Northern Ireland. However, European thinking on the protection of minorities has not developed sufficiently. We want a guarantee, not only for the rights of individual members of minority communities throughout Europe, but also for the collective rights of those minorities in terms of practical participation and effective say in the political process.

In that context, the power sharing model pioneered under the Sunningdale Agreement is an example — perhaps the best example available anywhere in Europe — of a guaranteed form of practical political participation linking minority and majority communities in the process of joint decision making in their area of responsibility. The Sunningdale Agreement, and the power sharing model devised under it — and indeed the Anglo-Irish Agreement with its wider context involving bilateral relations — provide a model for the resolution of disputes and difficulties of this kind elsewhere in Europe. For example, it provides for a relationship that could be brought into being between Hungary and Romania in respect of the Hungarian minority community within Romania. It provides perhaps a model also for the arrangements that will have to be devised in the Baltic States to provide adequate rights for the Russian-speaking communities living within the Baltic States in the event that those states acquire a greater degree of independence in their operations.

The Sunningdale Agreement in terms of internal arrangements, and the Anglo-Irish Agreement in terms of, for example, relations between Great Russia and the individual Baltic States, provide a model for a guarantee of the protection of the rights of minorities in particular areas where they happen to live together. This is a very positive contribution that we can make to building a new Europe in terms of our concrete experience — our hard and difficult concrete experience — when we faced exactly those types of problems in our own history.

I am disappointed in some respects with the outcome of the Copenhagen meeting. For example, when it came to seeking to establish in the declaration of the Copenhagen meeting — this was a more detailed meeting dealing with specific human rights aspects of the CSCE process —"education, cultural and religious institutions for minorities which could seek voluntary contributions", which is important as people should have the right to run their own schools, it was necessary to add, in order to get countries to agree to that at Copenhagen the further words, "that this should be in conformity with national legislation". That took the whole meaning out of it because national legislation can provide almost anything. So there was no guarantee of the right of people to establish their own schools in conformity with their own religious or ethnic minorities. That is a deficiency in the protection of minorities given under the CSCE.

To some, the rights of minorities may seem to be a very esoteric subject but in fact the rights of minorities are at the very heart of the preservation of peace in the new Europe that has been created as a result of glasnost and perestroika, because the biggest threat to peace does not now come from the Warsaw Pact, no more than it comes from NATO; it comes in the potential release of destructive energies in Europe arising from the break up of states and republics in Eastern Europe on ethnic lines because of long standing minority disputes. In modern Europe different ethnic groups are inexplicably mixed. To preserve peace, it is essential that political and legal structures should exist to ensure that ethnic groups can live together and that there is a system of external monitoring and control of those political and legal structures to ensure that they work.

Because of our experience and because of our success in dealing with some of these problems, we should be in the forefront in developing European models of thinking in regard to this matter. That is perhaps the most important thing that can be done to preserve peace in Europe — putting in place structures that will guarantee, as far as any humanly devised stricture can, harmonious relations between minorities and majority ethnic communities who happen to be living together.

I know that the Council of Europe has already commenced some work on political rights for minorities and it is important that this work be actively encouraged. There is a danger that the Charter of Paris will raise unsustainable expectations in this or in other areas. For instance, the charter contains a reference to the establishment of a conflict prevention centre in Vienna but little information is given as to what this conflict prevention centre will do. As far as one can see from what the Taoiseach said and from what the charter tells us, all it will do is exchange information about conflicts. Is there any point in setting up a separate parallel conflict prevention centre in Vienna without real powers when the UN already exists, and all the member states are members of the UN, and the UN, through its Security Council, have powers to do something concrete about resolving conflicts? I am not drawing any conclusion but that is a question we should try to answer in this debate. Sometimes setting up new institutions can be a bad thing in the sense that they create confusion and lack focus even though they may be motivated by goodwill.

Likewise, the conference decided to establish an office for free elections in Warsaw. What practical powers will this body have? Surely the procedures for validating elections already established under the aegis of the Council of Europe, are sufficient to deal with this problem. To become and remain a member of the Council of Europe one must operate free and fair elections and, if one does not continue to do so, one can be expelled from the Council of Europe. Do we want a situation where, for example, the Council of Europe decide that an election is not fair but the office for fair elections in Warsaw comes to a different conclusion? That potential for confusion should not exist. It would make more sense if the Warsaw body were brought under the aegis of the Council of Europe rather than had a separate existence under the CSCE. That is another question that needs to be addressed in this debate.

I strongly support the declaration in the Charter of Paris that we unreservedly condemn as criminal all acts, methods and practices of terrorism, and express our determination to work for its eradication. The best way to work for the eradication of terrorism is through the extension and strengthening of the European Convention on the Suppression of Terrorism. This convention restricts the use of the political defence against extradition for offences of terrorism but is far too restrictive. The European Convention on the Suppression of Terrorism should be extended to ensure that all acts of violence are excluded from the political defence against extradition in contrast with the present provision in the convention which only allows that defence to be set aside in respect of a limited number of acts of violence. I have tabled a motion in the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe to change the European Convention on the Suppression of Terrorism, to make it a much stronger instrument by excluding political defence in respect of all acts of violence. I hope that the declaration in the Paris Charter in regard to this matter will give further momentum to moves in the direction of having a stronger European Convention on the Prevention of Terrorism along the lines of the motion I have tabled.

I hope that the fact that the CSCE are now involved in the subject will not be used as an excuse to delay action on the matter at the Council of Europe, because action is urgently required. Transboundary terrorism will become an even larger problem in the Europe of the future. If European peace is to be preserved, we must have strong and effective means of ensuring that those who engage in such activities cannot use borders within Europe as a means of avoiding justice.

One of the big question marks over the whole process of the CSCE is to establish what exactly is to be the relationship between the CSCE and the Council of Europe. The Council of Europe already — or will soon — represents virtually all the countries that are in the CSCE with the exception of Canada and the USA. The Council of Europe should speed up their work on European integration. One way in which they can do this would be by departing from the principle of absolute unanimity in their committees of Ministers, which is the current practice. In that way the Council of Europe could deal more expeditiously and in a concrete way with many of the matters now the responsibility of the CSCE. The Council of Europe have an existing administrative structure for making decisions and implementing them. That cannot be said of the CSCE which do not have an administrative structure at all and are simply talking about seconding civil servants from various national administrations. I hope that when the Taoiseach replies to this debate he will advert to that subject.

In the past the Taoiseach indicated that the CSCE was his preferred means of dealing with the military aspects of security in Europe. It is inevitable, in this hard and harsh world, that we acknowledge the fact that there are such things as military aspects of security. We can pretend that if we bury our heads in the sand and bury our weapons six feet under the ground, nobody will ever attack us. That would be a rather innocent view to take. The reality is that part of security must be defence. You cannot defend yourself unless you have the means to do so. If you sit there defenceless you may be attacked. That is the reality.

The Taoiseach has expressed the view that the best means of defending the new Europe we are building is through the CSCE. He seems to suggest that this is a preferable alternative to seeing the much tighter European Political Union to be created by the Twelve members of the European Community acquiring a defensive dimension. The Charter of Paris makes it quite clear that the Taoiseach's preferred option is simply closed because it states clearly: "it fully recognises the freedom of States to choose their own security arrangements". In other words, it is washing its hands of this matter. If there is to be a system of European defence it will not emerge in the CSCE. I do not believe the Taoiseach can use the CSCE as a shield against facing the issue that must be faced, that is, if we create a European Political Union — I underline the word "if"— with one currency, one economic policy, one social security system and one political entity, then there must be some means available in this hard old world of actually defending that new creation. I do not think that issue can be dodged. Neither the Taoiseach nor any of the other parites who genuinely believes in European unity can dodge that issue anymore. When such a union is created it will have to be defended. That does not mean it will happen tomorrow or that we must sketch out in detail how it is to be done, but we must be prepared to envisage the possibility that if we create something we must be prepared to defend it.

There are a few matters on which I would like to know the Taoiseach's view. I understand Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia, whose annexation to the Soviet Union this State has never accepted or recognised, sought representation at the CSCE in Paris. I would be interested to know what view the Taoiseach took on that matter. I understand that the Spanish Prime Minister, Felipe Gonzales, stated he believed that the CSCE process should be used as a means of dissolving the dispute that Spain has with Britain regarding Gibraltar. What view did the Taoiseach take on that matter? What is the Taoiseach's view on the proposed creation of a parliamentary assembly in Europe? This would be important and would provide a democratic dimension which is frequently lacking in international relations. I hope the Taoiseach will indicate strong support for early action on the creation of an assembly for Europe.

This may seem to be a rather practical and mundane point but it is important just the same: if you look at the geographical area covered by the CSCE stretching, as the Taoiseach stated much more poetically than I, from the shores of the Pacific in Vancouver on the one side right across to the shores of the North Pacific of Vladivostok and try to find the centre, that place is Ireland. There are proposals to establish offices, in Prague, Vienna and Warsaw. I am surprised there has not been a suggestion that this body might establish some offices in this country. It may be too late to raise this matter, but there will be other meetings and I hope some thought will be given to inviting one of the CSCE institutions to establish its headquarters in Ireland, a country which has much to teach other European countries with regard to the establishment of legal structures for the resolution of conflicts that may exist.

I am disappointed that the Charter of Paris does not contain any specific reference urging member states to accede to the UN and Council of Europe conventions on matters such as human rights, the rights of the child, the transfer of sentenced persons and conventions against torture. The great advantage of accession to these conventions is that the legal means exist for citizens who feel oppressed by their own State to take their State to the European Court and have their rights vindicated. There is no similar process within the CSCE. It contains a number of very good declarations about what should be the case, but contains no mechanism whereby an individual who is not obtaining the rights contained in the Preamble stated here, can go to court and get his Government to grant him those rights. Such an enforcement mechanism should exist under the CSCE or through a declaration that CSCE membership would be conditional on the accession of States to conventions under the aegis of bodies such as the UN or the Council of Europe. Otherwise how will we be able to guarantee no one will be subjected to arbitrary arrest or detention, that there will be freedom of thought, conscience, religion and belief, and that there will be a right to own property either individually or in association, and exercise individual enterprise?

These rights and others that were declared in Paris are simply words on paper and no more unless a means exists for the individual to vindicate those rights before some international body and have their Government put in the dock if they fail to vindicate them. I am disappointed that, to date, the CSCE has not taken any position in regard to requiring, as a condition of membership, the accession of states to well established conventions which protect those rights in practice. I hope that in the Taoiseach's future work on this subject he and the Government will take up this very practical point about how one can translate words on paper which read very well into reality on the ground enjoyed by the citizens of Europe.

I welcome the opportunity to respond to the Taoiseach's statement on the summit meeting in Paris of the Conference on Security and Co-operation. I welcome the general tenor of the speech made by the Taoiseach at the summit meeting, particularly its emphasis on peace and on the strategy of peace as opposed to the military strategies in relation to the present conflicts we face.

Listening to the two speeches, I was considering the context in which the Paris meeting took place. The immediate context in which it took place was one of a threat in the Gulf region. It was very interesting that the interviews conducted in the general ambience of the Paris meetings were ones that continually asked some of the major participants where they stood in relation to the two options — the one of peace and the other of military resolution in relation to the present conflict in the Gulf which led to President Gorbachev stating that a peace conference was hardly the place to give an answer to questions about troop deployment or his attitude to a military strategy which would be facilitated by a UN Security Council resolution.

I welcome the fact that it was clearly in the public mind, internationally, that Ireland stood unequivocally in favour of peace. At that meeting two views were canvassed. Both Mr. Baker and President Bush expressed impatience in their interviews with the strategy of sanctions, diplomacy and negotiations. At the same time it was very clear that the process being conducted by President Mitterrand, through Claude Cheysson, and President Gorbachev, through Mr. Primakov, was one of desperately seeking for an extension of the space of peace. In that choice, our clear moral duty as a non-military and neutral member of the European Community was enhanced by making a statement in favour of the option of peace.

In a few moments I will turn to the rather tedious discussion on whether or not we should be embarrassed by the fact that we are neutral or have not yet found an enemy. I find it rather curious that the response to the major meeting, which celebrated the most momentous events between Eastern and Western Europe and effectively declared the Cold War over, was that people should wonder why a country which is neutral was lesser equipped, because it is not militarily engaged or has not yet found an enemy. It was argued that it would be part of the proper equipment of an integrated Europe in any political sense that it would have to have an enemy. I find that kind of thinking curiously negative, arid, hopeless in philosophical terms, and very old fashioned as much as I do the old views on deterrent theory in international relations and international foreign policy. It argued that it was only through the possession of the capacity to kill, maim and wound that one was safe from killing, maiming and wounding. The departed Prime Minister of Britain was known to go in for such flourishes of speech. It is distressing to find the new leader of the largest party in Opposition following that bankrupt vein of thinking.

The truth is that there are other opportunities for those who are both generous and positive. Peace, to which the Paris Charter refers, can be positively expressed. That peace will in turn engage other elements of international relations. If there is an immediate element in that context it is the Gulf crisis but, perhaps, the most important one is the fact that the bi-polar structure of geopolitics is over. The events in Eastern Europe have shown that the Soviet Union, for example, has entirely changed the character of its participation in international affairs. All thinking people in foreign policy must ask themselves how that vacuum in what has been accepted as the traditional version of geopolitics will be filled.

A number of options are open. One which looked very promising in the last decade was the emergence of a series of regional initiatives to bring peace to different parts of the world. Certainly, the General-Secretaryship of Perez de Cueller seemed to promise the delivery of this option in Namibia, Southern Africa, Central America, parts of North Africa and the Middle East. This led to conferences taking place in these regions at which the possibility emerged of the vacuum about which I spoke, and the changed character of bi-polar politics which had disappeared, being filled by a new, elaborate and growing set of regional strategies aimed at the resolution of regional difficulties.

The regional initiatives are not as promising as they were a couple of years ago but another dimension of that vacuum is that the remaining super power will change its role. Certainly, that would give grounds for concern. One would hope that, given the general international atmosphere of a reduction in nuclear weapons, and a considerable extension beyond non-proliferation agreements and on towards a complete extinction of the testing of nuclear weapons as proposed by the Soviet union, this would bring a similar response.

It therefore behoves all of us to try to think in positive terms as to how we might build in a practical way the possibility for this space of peace. Practical problems arise and there is no point in dodging them. We are speaking in an atmosphere where, if the regional initiatives have declined in terms of their possibilities, there has been little less than an abandonment in international policy of the quest for a new international economic order. As one reflects on the Paris Summit, where the very fine rhetoric of President Mitterrand which I admire, and his impulse which I respect, was once delivered at the same time as the feeling of Willy Brandt and the Brandt report, it is perfectly clear that the basis for a new geopolitical order to succeed the bi-polar version of conflict in international relations, will require the negotiation of a new international economic order.

This will raise questions which impinge on the definition of security because no one who is serious about the meaning of security in international relations can think of security without addressing the issue of its definition. For many in the so-called developing world the issue of security is seen very differently from the way it would be defined in the First World. We are talking about countries which, unfortunately, have been used as a dumping ground and constructed as a market place for armaments produced in countries, the heads of which are signatories to the Charter of Paris. The security about which many of the leaders of these countries would speak is a security which would ensure their own sovereignty and, most important, the existence of their people, the prevention of famine and hunger and a security which would enable them develop their own structures.

In the language used at the Paris Conference, and occasionally in the Taoiseach's speech, there was a rather dangerous suggestion that human rights and a market oriented system go together. I am at pains not to misconstrue the speech and the suggestion is not there directly but, unfortunately, at several different parts of his speech words like "respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms and the market oriented economic system" appear much too regularly together. The market oriented system has in many parts of the world, with which I am too familiar, neither assisted human rights nor fundamental freedoms. Under this system weapons and instruments of death have been sold to the Third World; to those who have been responsible for the most appalling breaches of human rights. It has also been used as a mechanism to sustain the greatest travesties of the fundamental freedoms of different peoples. It is an appalling distortion of language, politics and philosophy to suggest that the market oriented economic system, as a philosophy, has been anything other than the motive of greed, aggression, destruction, war and anti-life. That is very different from saying that the market system can be an instrument for the achievement of different ethical purposes. To elevate the mechanism from the level of the instrumental to a philosophy and to link it with human rights and fundamental freedoms is an insult to the intelligence.

There are other realities with which I think we should deal following this speech. When we have stripped away the huff and puff we might deal with reality as we have been invited by the previous speaker. I could not make my mind up whether the speech that preceded mine was in favour of there being CSCE institutions. Taking this issue, it was asked why we need conflict resolutions when we have the United Nations Security Council. Let us be very clear about this. The United Nations Security Council has, as two of its five permanent members, Britain and France. When scholars studied the behaviour of the members of the European Community and the UN General Assembly they noticed something very interesting: Britain and France, for example, resent issues being discussed which are Security Council items. They see themselves, and describe themselves, as players on a world stage of politics. Let me locate this in the atmosphere of the Paris Conference we have just had.

As somebody who was involved in an initiative in the Middle East, I was being continually reminded of our UN obligations and European political co-operation. Britain was bound by the same obligations, so was France. France being perfectly consistent with its view that European political co-operation is an important but one dimension of its foreign policy, was busy constructing an option for peace through Claude Cheysson and Mr. Primakov under Gorbachev. The voice from Britain at the time was the surrogate voice of Mr. Bush who was busy throwing around the guff of war.

In relation to a responsible foreign policy in Ireland there is nothing to place the slightest inhibition on Ireland accepting its UN obligations, its European political co-operation obligations and, at the same time, being free to speak as a non-NATO neutral in a positive way in building and assisting the space of peace. I repeat, lest it be lost: there is not one whit of an obstacle stopping us from doing this. The only thing stopping us is not only a conservative ethos by those responsible for these speeches but a conservative approach towards reading the issues of the day, an absence of originality and of commitment towards being positive about our foreign policy.

I welcome the range of institutions suggested in the Taoiseach's speech arising from the Paris Summit — there will be meetings of the Heads of State and Foreign Ministers every year and additional meetings of representatives of the CSCE, CSCE Secretariat, an Office of Free Elections and a Conflict Prevention Centre. Good luck to them all, but the one thing we have not got in this House is a foreign Affairs Committee. The only people who are not qualified to discuss these issues are the elected representatives of the people. It is marvellous to know — and I have every confidence in the people we will send to the secretariat——

They do not trust us.

——they will be as good as the people we send to other secretarists. They have that qualification, unique in Ireland, that they are not elected which makes them superior, more informed, makes them expert and makes them trustworthy. We, unfortunately, are elected and, therefore, we are disqualified. We are people not even for motions; we are people for whom statements will do. We have had the Taoiseach's statement and the spokespersons' statements; we are told to make the best of our half hour, Question Time is coming, make the best of it because that is all you are getting. I view with hilarity the statement in the Taoiseach's contribution:

The Paris Summit has called for greater parliamentary involvement in the CSCE process, in particular through the creation of a CSCE parliamentary assembly, involving members of parliaments from all participating States. This is a development which we fully support.

If we can discuss it abroad, as is welcomed here, would it not be nice to discuss it at home? I find this intriguing. I do not want to go over old ground because my position on this is very clear, but in November 1986 I made the proposal for the first time and it was defeated.

I want to come back to the main text of the Taoiseach's speech which I broadly welcome, although I find this part of it less than convincing. In his statement we have this curious, extraordinary development in international affairs and foreign policy something with which the journals in these areas have not yet come to terms. The Taoiseach said:

With regard to economic co-operation, the Charter underlines the need to build further on the results of the Bonn Conference held earlier this year, with its emphasis on democratic institutions and economic liberty as the basis for social and economic progress. It stresses that economic co-operation, based on market systems, constitutes an essential element for the construction of a prosperous and united Europe.

I would like to know where these ideas are coming from? Are they from the policy institute in London, the old resting house of the Tory hacks that throws out all this right-wing rubbish regularly, some of which permeates here — those who got an education in economics occasionally can be found reading it in the Library? Can the notion of democratic institutions being dependent on market systems be justified anywhere historically? Democracy in most enlightened systems has gone on to speak about democracy in the workplace, rights of workers, basic conditions, the rights of women and accountability, all matters rejected by the spokespersons of the so-called market oriented Europe.

I am chairman of the social affairs subcommittee of the Oireachtas Joint Committee on the Secondary Legislation of the European Communities. I have listened to people who say that social Europe must wait until the benefits of the integrated market are available. They do not want to hear about minimum wages nor do they want to hear about a typical work or translated from Eurospeak part-time workers until the benefits have begun to flow. They said the same in Europe. This is the Europe gathering apace without its social dimension or, more accurately, with word broken on its European social dimension for which Deputy Bruton wants an army. We are likely, in his thinking, to get a European army before we get a basic minimum wage or protection for workers. Why is he not speaking about that? It is just playing soldiers again.

There are fundamentals we have to deal with in relation to our thinking on this, but Deputy Bruton raised a very important point and I am afraid the Taoiseach's speech failed to address it, that is, that it is necessary to express the basis of one's preference for the mechanism of the CSCE over the Council of Europe.

The Council of Europe is a very interesting body. The states which joined in its formation believed, as they stated in their statement at its foundation, that "the pursuit of peace based upon justice and international co-operation is vital for the preservation of human society and civilisation." They also stated their devotion to the spiritual and moral values which are the common heritage of their peoples and the true source of individual freedom, political liberty and the rule of law principles which form the basis of all genuine democracies. In Article 1 (d) of the Statute of the Council of Europe they provided that "matters relating to national defence do not fall within the scope of the Council of Europe." Therefore, one must pose the question: is the unattractiveness of the Council of Europe based on its specific rejection of matters of defence and military matters and is the choice of the CSCE its amenability towards military and defence matters?

The Taoiseach's statement that some people who were at the Paris Summit were in favour of NATO being the major defence of Europe is, to put it mildly, rather coy. This would be bad news for Deputy Bruton who has said that CSCE is not on as a mechanism. This leaves him with NATO. I sit here waiting for these announcements to be made every week — neutrality is old-fashioned, it is gone and his party do not believe in it any longer. The next step is, I suppose, to join NATO. Let us hear about those issues because, I have said, we all welcome debate. We are now living in a time of great openness, and people who have had thoughts for the past 20 years can now feel free to express them. I welcome this development but I do not thank the marketplace for it.

I believe we could, unless we are very careful in terms of being positive about our foreign policy, find ourselves in the short term rather than the long term facing a horrific possibility. Let me give an example. It is possible that before we meet next week there will be a war in the Middle East region. I want to state this afternoon in response to what has been said here that any one who talks in a military way now about a conflict which would be confined, let us say, to a resolution of the Iran-Iraq war knows very little about the realities of that region. Such a conflict would quickly engulf the entire region and it would be neither quick, sharp nor short but would lead to a long conflict. Even if those who want the military conflict were to achieve all their aims it would lead to a confrontation between forces in that region, a more militant fundamentalism and a conflict between the West and Islam.

If people, through ignorance and the misreading of foreign policy, want to replace the cold war which the Paris Summit officially ended with a new enemy and a new confrontation, I must seriously warn them against going down the road of using dangerous language which will set up a conflict between the West and Islam. Such a conflict would not end for decades and it would not be fought out in the air or in any conventional way; I believe it would very quickly embrace all aspects of international terrorism. I believe the people who are showing impatience with the path of peace should think again about what they would be unleashing on the world.

I agree with Deputy Bruton that it is necessary to get beyond rhetoric and to take positive steps. I cannot but view with a little disdain the fact that many of those who signed the Paris Charter are the very people who were exporting the means of death into the conflict region about which they are now expressing concern. The chemical weapons which were built and the mustard gas supplied by West Germany were used against thousands of Kurds. Who complained? And the gas has continued to flow. This sudden recognition by the countries from the West, who supplied tanks and armaments, of the danger that different forms of leadership created in the Gulf region is not convincing.

I want to come back to the point with which I began my speech in many ways. There is a great moral bankruptcy in a view that sees foreign policy as some kind of outcrop or facilitation of economic realities. If there is a war which is motivated by energy costs and the politics of oil, are we to construct foreign policy around that? What was wrong with a foreign policy which spoke about the intangible of peace? It is sad that every line and paragraph of this speech is written on the assumption that the old social solidarities were all wrong. There are bits of trendy language used in the speech which rather remind me of that new non-speak corporate waffle, an alternative to language, which exists these days and in which people speak about "throwing out ideas,""running with them", "putting them in the works" and "coming on line". There is an equivalent foreign office kind of speech in which there is reference to "market-based", and "the market economy" in an imprecise way.

I hesitate to interrupt the Deputy but I merely want to remind him that his time is nearly exhausted.

Thank you, a Cheann Comhairle. Here is the evidence of what I was saying. The Minister stated: "We see the individual as central to the whole CSCE process". Does the usage mean personal rights within an atmosphere of social rights, with social solidarities respected, or does the word "individual" mean a theory of individualism which regards social responsibility as some kind of casual result of a series of individual actions? Where do the theories of individualism bring us in analysing international relations? Have they not been the core philosophical principle at the base of every conflict and every war, every act of aggression, every build-up of armaments and every attack on the concept of development?

It is time that we in this country watched our language when we make general speeches on peace. We in the Labour Party are in favour of peace and neutrality, of its positive usage, and in favour of the deflection of resources from tasks of armament to tasks of development. We have positively used this both inside this country and outside it by making the case for peace and being in favour of peace studies being on the curriculum of our schools. We do not find anything old-fashioned about that and we do not regard ourselves as dinosaurs. We see ourselves as humane people speaking about peace at a time when the world desperately needs voices in favour of peace rather than loose language about war with its catastrophic consequences.

There is no doubt that the summit of the 34 nation Conference on Security and Co-operation in Europe held in Paris last week was an occasion of unique importance and could mark an historic turning point in the history of Europe.

While the conference received relatively generous media coverage, I believe that the importance of the conference has not yet been fully appreciated by most members of the public, and I would hope that the Taoiseach's Department would now consider appropriate means to promote greater knowledge and understanding of the CSCE process in this country. I welcome his commitment today to publish the Paris Charter signed last week. Publication is not sufficent. We need some commitment by the Taoiseach's Department to ensure that it is distributed and disseminated and that the ideas in it are examined and discussed. The Department of Education should also consider in what way school children can be made aware of this historic development taking place.

Apart from the fine principles contained in the Charter of Paris, there were also a number of specific decisions made, such as the commitment to establish a Conflict Prevention Centre in Vienna, which can contribute to peace and stability throughout Europe. The treaty signed during the conference by NATO and Warsaw Pact leaders, which could lead to up to 100,000 pieces of military hardware, including tanks, armoured cars, helicopters, jet fighters and artillery being destroyed, will be welcomed by all those who want to see peace on this continent.

The statement by the 22 members of these military pacts that "they are no longer adversaries" could accurately be described as the final nail in the coffin of the cold war in Europe. The aim must now be to build on the progress made in Paris and secure the total scrapping of obsolete and outdated military organisations such as NATO and the Warsaw Pact. This should be a central objective of Irish foreign policy over the next decade.

The Workers' Party have argued for many years that the interests of peace, security and stability in Europe can best be served by the strengthening and development of the CSCE. A start was made in Paris. I welcome the establishment of a permanent secretariat to assist the implementation of the Helsinki Charter and to organise follow up conferences. A foundation has been laid which can be built upon. It would be foolish, however, to ignore the many problems which remain to be tackled in regard to the role, structure and organisation of CSCE and about the role of Ireland and our neutrality in that body.

In this context the Taoiseach's speech to the conference was as disappointing, as it was vague and lacking in specifics. The only concrete suggestion the Taoiseach had to make was that the disarmament talks should be broadened to take in not just the 22 countries of NATO and the Warsaw Pact but the full 34 member states of the CSCE. It is heartening that agreement has been reached to try to achieve that position by 1992.

Although the Taoiseach has, in the past, spoken about the CSCE providing "a framework for peace, security and co-operation throughout Europe", he has also talked about the EC and its member states playing a leading role in all proceedings and discussions to establish new structures or agreements based on the principles of the Helsinki Final Act "while maintaining existing security arrangements which members have". This seems to imply acceptance of the inevitability of the continued existence of NATO and the Warsaw Pact.

In his speech today, however, the Taoiseach indicated that he has shifted his ground somewhat on that point. He said that whatever about NATO, it is clear that the Warsaw Pact is coming to an end. Why not indicate that he would also like to see NATO come to an end? Why the reticence on this issue? Why the reticence by the Taoiseach on the European Community's development of a security position and the fact that the negotiations which will take place in December at the inter-governmental conference will tackle this issue? The Taoiseach is still maintaining a very vague position on that issue. He stated:

New thinking is called for to enable us to draw the maximum benefit from the progress already achieved, and from the advent of a peaceful, secure European order.

He went on to say:

This examination must now have special regard to the new Pan-European framework within which the security and stability of all countries in Europe will in future be ensured.

He did not say anything about the Irish position on this new security framework. He does not indicate what Ireland's attitude is to the fact that there is no doubt members of the Community will raise the question of defence. It is not good enough to say, as he does in his speech, that the question of defence is a long way down the road because members of NATO will be anxious to retain that body as the primary defence mechanism in Europe. Simply to say that this matter is not one which needs to be addressed now because we do not have to make a choice about it now is not good enough. We should be establishing the parameters of our attitude to security in Europe.

There seems to be a conflict in the Taoiseach's position. On the one hand he welcomes the development of the CSCE as a security framework but then goes on to talk about the European Community developing its own security system. To say the least of it, he is coy about the defence commitments which may be involved in that development.

Although we can draw some comfort from the fact that those leaders who most vigorously promoted the cold war, such as Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher, have now moved off centre stage, there are many vested interests who wish to see the continuation of military spending at their current obscene levels. Thousands of billions of pounds are invested in industries manufacturing military equipment and nuclear weapons. The profits of war are far greater than the profits of peace. Those who have made such a financial killing out of making weapons to kill have no interest in diverting their investments to tackle the social problems of Europe or the even greater problems of hunger and deprivation facing the developing countries. Presumably to interfere with the arms industry or to insist on their diverting their investment to more peaceful pursuits would be seen as interfering with the free market system which seems to be beloved by our Taoiseach, Deputy Charles J. Haughey, and many others.

It is significant that in her last international speech, made to the CSCE conference in Paris only days before she was forced out of office, Mrs. Thatcher launched a vigorous defence of NATO and insisted that the alliance remain the core of western defence. She stated that "Security comes from knowing that you have a strong defence, including nuclear weapons, which have played such an important part in keeping the peace in Europe."

In a strange way what Deputy Bruton had to say today about security and defence echoes the words of Mrs. Thatcher. He made the point that one cannot have security without addressing the question of defence, that one cannot establish a European Community and not take on the question of defending it. What Deputy Bruton did not tell us is what enemy he imagines we will have to defend the European Community against. Against whom are we to use the military hardware which presumably he feels we should acquire to defend the European Community? Unless we address the question of enemies, the question of defence must be seen in a completely different context.

Against the background of such militaristic sentiments Irish neutrality remains relevant. Certainly there is a need to define what our neutrality is about, to take account of the changing conditions in Europe, but we should unequivocally reject the urgings of those, such as the new Fine Gael leader, Deputy John Bruton, who now claim that Irish neutrality is irrelevant.

The Workers' Party see the potential of our neutrality not as a negative or restrictive factor but as a positive and constructive national policy, which enabled us — free from the prejudices of military blocs — to adopt independent foreign policy positions, particularly to be a force for peace and against war. Irish neutrality should be used to promote disarmament and oppose military pacts and alliances. It should be supportive of dialogue between all countries and against confrontation. It should recognise the right of all states to defend themselves, while opposing aggression by any country against another. It should seek out areas of common interest and promote joint ventures with other neutral and non-aligned countries. Indeed in this context it is most disappointing that Ireland plays no part in the neutral and non-aligned group within the CSCE. On that issue might I draw the attention of the House to the fact that, in the Charter of Paris signed last week by the Taoiseach, representing the people of this country, the section therein relating to this question of security and peace reads:

Being aware that an essential complement to the duty of States to refrain from the threat or use of force is the peaceful settlement of disputes, both being essential factors for the maintenance and consolidation of international peace and security, we will not only seek effective ways of preventing, through political means, conflicts which may yet emerge, but also define, in conformity with international law, appropriate mechanisms for the peaceful resolution of any disputes which may arise.

That is a far more positive declaration with regard to how this country should address the question of security, whether it be within the narrow confines of the EC, the broader Pan-European security system or broader still, within the security system that may emerge under the auspices of the United Nations.

For too long Governments here have viewed neutrality as an excuse for opting out, for not taking positions. The world is changing. Circumstances in Europe are changing. Irish neutrality must change. If we do not adapt Irish neutrality, it will wither and die of irrelevance. The vast majority of Irish people support neutrality and want it to continue; all of the opinion polls have confirmed this. The best way to achieve this it to make it more positive and assertive.

Although it was not formally on the agenda, the other major issue to dominate the Paris Conference was the current crisis in the Gulf, arising from the illegal and unacceptable Iraqi invasion of Kuwait. Clearly, there are many behind-the-scenes discussions among national leaders. Unfortunately, there now seems to be a dangerous momentum for war in the Gulf. There appears to be a willingness once again on the part of some world leaders, such as President Bush, to fight to the last drop of other people's blood in order to achieve US objectives.

The Workers' Party condemned the Iraqi invasion on the day it took place but have said all along that military action could be considered only when all other options had been exhausted. I do not believe that all the options have been exhausted. I believe that war in the Gulf at this point is unnecessary and will lead to the deaths of tens, if not hundreds of thousands of people — both combatants and non-combatants. It should be noted that among the victims of any war will be those held hostage in Iraq and Kuwait, including several hundred Irish people. There is no guarantee that any war would be a short one. Conflict could drag on for many years.

The invasion took place less than four months ago. Sanctions have not yet been given the opportunity to bite fully. The net can be tightened. Sanctions can be intensified. According to today's The Irish Times, a former CIA director, Mr. James Schlesinger, described as a “hawk of the sixties and seventies”, told the US Senate Armed Services Committee yesterday that economic sanctions should be given at least 18 months to work. I believe that the preference of the vast majority of the people throughout the world would be to see Kuwait freed in 18 months by peaceful means, rather than in 18 weeks by a bloody war with the deaths of many thousands of people.

Again I might draw the attention of the House to the quotation I read from the Charter of Paris which obviously emphasised the need to seek peaceful means to bring about a solution to the conflict. That is not what is being sought by the United States at this time at the United Nations.

I welcome the suggestion made by the Taoiseach in Paris last week that sanctions should be given time to be effective. I would now urge him, on behalf of the Government and the Oireachtas, to make a clear, unequivocal and detailed statement to this effect. The UN Security Council will apparently be asked today or tomorrow to pass a resolution authorising states with forces in the Gulf to use "all necessary means" to eject Iraq from Kuwait. Ireland should oppose this resolution as being premature. We should make it clear that if, at some point in the future, military action has to be taken against Iraq, it should be done only on the basis of a mandate from the General Assembly of the United Nations under the direct control of the United Nations, not by the US-dominated international force now in the Gulf and that it cannot be allowed to happen that war would be launched in the Gulf on the basis of a resolution agreed within the Security Council which may receive the support of nine members only of the total membership of the United Nations.

Our Government must give a commitment that, if a motion sanctioning force is approved by the United Nations Security Council, a decision of the Dáil will be necessary before this country can act in support of it.

Article 28.3.1º of our Constitution states and I quote:

War shall not be declared and the State shall not participate in any war save with the assent of Dáil Éireann.

We are now faced with the prospect of a United Nations Security Council resolution which could commit this country to at least supporting a war in the Gulf. Our Government must reserve their position on this until the Dáil has been consulted and must be bound by the decision of the Dáil in this matter.

In the meantime we must continue to press for a peaceful solution to the Gulf crisis. At a time when there is so much hope, when progress has been made towards peace in so many other areas, the prospect of a war would be a tragedy not only for the people of the Gulf but for the people of the entire world.

In relation to a number of points Deputy John Bruton made in the course of his contribution, I have to say that I welcome his commitment that he will support the amendment of Articles 2 and 3 of the Irish Constitution. The Workers' Party hope shortly to afford the House on opportunity to debate this question. I look forward to Deputy Bruton's support for our initiative in that regard. I agree with him that a threat to peace in Europe is now much more likely to come from regional disputes, from inter-ethnic disputes, rather than on the old basis feared, that is between East and West. Indeed, the CSCE is a very appropriate forum at which such conflicts could be addressed. There is a need to strengthen the role and structures of the CSCE to enable that conference assist in the resolution of such conflicts.

I would question the point Deputy John Bruton made about the issue of education, when he argued that ethnic groups should be enabled not only to provide their own education but to seek subscriptions to assist them in so doing. I am sure there is a case to be made in certain circumstances for such a provision, but we cannot fail to have regard to the experience of Northern Ireland in this respect. We have there two systems of education, one a State system which in theory is available to all citizens of Northern Ireland, and the other a system of Catholic education which is provided by the institutions of the Roman Catholic Church on the basis of subscriptions from the people who subscribe to that Church.

The State also supports that system to some extent, nevertheless we have such a situation because the Roman Catholic people of Northern Ireland opted out of the State system. We have a system of sectarian education in Northern Ireland which in no small way has contributed to the conflict that exists there today. I can recall an interview being given by a leading member of the Provisional IRA in which he stated quite clearly that if it was not for the existence of Catholic schools in Northern Ireland the IRA would not exist as far as he was concerned. He said that the impetus for the maintenance of a separate identity, a separate understanding about what Northern Ireland was as a society, what rights they were entitled to and to whom they should offer allegiance, was maintained and developed by a separate education system.

I am not arguing for a situation where the ethos of the Roman Catholic Church would not have a place in an education system. Clearly people who are Roman Catholics have a right to expect that the religious beliefs they hold should in some way be conveyed to their children, nevertheless too simplistic an attitude is taken and conflict can arise from having separate education systems for people who see themselves differently from the rest of the population. I, and my party, have argued for many years that part of the solution for Northern Ireland is integrated education. We have made it quite clear on a number of occasions that we believe it to be a scandal that the only area of third-level education which is divided on religious grounds is teacher training, where there is Catholic teacher training and Protestant teacher training. All other areas of third-level education are integrated.

It is a disgrace that children in a community are separated at the age of three or four when they head off to school, not on the basis of their learning ability or where they live but on the basis of the religion of their parents. Until we address that matter and exert pressure on the institutions of State and Church to do so realistically there will be a fundamental reason for the continuation of the conflict that exists in Northern Ireland. On that point I differ from Deputy Bruton who has indicated a willingness to address the issue of Northern Ireland in relation to Articles 2 and 3 but he has not yet fully taken on board the reality of sectarian education in Northern Ireland and its role in the maintenance of the division there.

There is one point I want to address — Deputy Michael D. Higgins addressed it to some degree — and that is the constant reference in the Taoiseach's speech to this question of the free market and the free enterprise society. I have not seen a copy of the Charter signed in Paris but read extracts which were printed in The Irish Times on 22 November 1990. Nowhere in those excerpts does the Charter relate to the free market or the free enterprise society. It talks about transition to market economy, not to “the” market economy referred to by the Taoiseach. It refers to the establishment of market economy and the creation of the basis for self-sustained economic and social growth. Again, it does not refer to free market economy or free enterprise economy.

The Taoiseach knows, as I know, that the addition of the word "free" has a quite specific meaning, and it is not correct for the Taoiseach to stand up in this House and effectively mislead the House with regard to what the Charter of Paris relates. No one in this House and, I suspect, no one or very few outside the House would deny the importance of a market mechanism for the distribution of goods and so forth, but to attempt to indicate, as Deputy Michael D. Higgins has pointed out, that in some way there is a direct connection between a so-called free market economy or a free enterprise society and democracy and human and civil rights is a direct misleading and misreading of the Charter of Paris. There are more instances of states on the face of this earth which pursue a free market economy under dictatorships with no rights whatsoever for the citizens of those states than there are of states which do not pursue a free market economy. I suggest to the Taoiseach that, if he wants a debate on the difference between a free market economy and the idea of a socialist or socialised economy, then we will be happy to have that debate in this House, but it is not good enough for him to attempt to confuse the issue and confuse what is being agreed by the 34 members of the CSCE.

I thank the Chair for his patience in allowing me a few extra minutes to conclude my remarks.

I would like to begin on a non-contentious note on this side of the House by saying I agree entirely with Deputy Michael D. Higgins when he deplored the fact that, on an issue of this importance, we have a series of statements in the House. We do not have a debate, no reactions from the Government, no assessment of the issues that have been raised by the Taoiseach and by three other speakers but we simply have a series of statements. It is all the more annoying because the Taoiseach in this House only a few weeks ago seemed to be taking credit for the fact that this House debates foreign affairs issues, he thinks, very frequently. There is not much point in having a series of statements in this House if they lead to no conclusion, no meeting of minds here and no concrete action on behalf of the House by the Government. I deplore the fact that we are having simply statements and on that issue I agree with Deputy Michael D. Higgins.

There is another issue on which I agree with him in that connection, that is when he deplores the fact that we do not have a foreign affairs committee. I will not go on at any length about this because that ground has been travelled before but it is an issue that will be taken up again and again. I hope before too long we will put ourselves in the same boat as parliaments in the rest of the EC and have a foreign affairs committee where these issues can be debated. I wanted to make the point for the record that we could have had a foreign affairs committee here some time between 1982 and 1987 if Deputy Michael D. Higgins, and his colleagues in the Labour Party, did not make the absurd attempt they made to enshrine a principle in foreign policy, that is their notions of neutrality, in the terms of reference of a committee of the House. That was not acceptable then. It would not be acceptable now. I am glad to see that the Labour Party have at last come to that view. I hope now we will be able to get on with the real business of setting up a foreign affairs committee in this House with proper terms of reference so that these debates can have more point than today's debate will have.

The Paris Summit of CSCE was undoubtedly a success and represented a very substantial further step towards peace. A number of important decisions were made that were designed to maintain the momentum generated up to now. My colleague, Deputy John Bruton, has rightly insisted this afternoon on the need to ensure that these decisions are given effect in structures and in fora that have executive powers to take real action. These decisions, the annual meetings of Foreign Ministers, the institution of a secretariat in Prague, follow-up meetings every two years, the conflict prevention centre in Vienna, the office for free elections in Warsaw and, indeed, the idea of a parliamentary assembly, if they are to mean anything, must be followed up vigorously in institutions and in bodies that can actually take decisons and make things happen.

With 34 participating states and with the firm political will that has been shown so far, the CSCE clearly provides an irreplaceable framework for progress towards peace, freedom, human liberties and democracy. There is a great deal more to be done. There has been some reference in this House this afternoon to one specific area that was addressed by the Paris Summit, the problem of ethnic minorities. I think that is putting it in a wrong context to talk about the problem of ethnic minorities as if these were somehow small groups of people in remote corners of Europe who have problems. It is much more a problem than that. There is a real problem of ethnic mixtures and indeed of ethnic collisions in Europe. That will have to be dealt with and the sooner the better.

I have had a number of meetings and discussions with Christian Democratic collegues, Slovanians, Croats and Hungarians, all of them living in areas where these ethnic tensions are very difficult to deal with. We have the problems of Hungarian minorities in countries bordering on Hungary and in each case — and it is the one common thread that runs through them all — what we see is a people who feel themselves to be a distinct people and who want, first, to have their separateness recognised so that they can then feel free, so they can then feel self-confident, to move forward and to work out a way of living politically, socially and culturally with their neighbours. If our experience counts for anything, if we could get even as far as the situation of the talks now going on in Northern Ireland, if we could help those ethnic groups to get that far without the kind of bloodshed we have seen in Northern Ireland, and without the kind of bloodshed that now seems to be threatening in some of those areas of Europe, then indeed we would have made a very substantial contribution to establishing peace in Europe and to bringing about a step towards the notion of the common European home that has become so much a part of the currency of international debate in the last year.

The CSCE, however, cannot be the only forum in which we participate in that work. It is not the only tool available to us — I will come back to that in a moment. That work demands very careful consideration, among other things, of security requirements and, let us not avoid the issue, it requires a totally new evaluation of defence needs and of doctrines on defence policy. We face a totally new situation. We have gone from the situation rightly characterised by Deputy Michael D. Higgins as bi-polarity to a situation where we can see in front of us the prospect of Soviet troops being gone from East Germany, from Poland and from Hungary, and I know that everyone in this House hopes to see the day when Soviet troops will have gone from Latvia and Estonia, from the Baltic States. Indeed, we are seeing some of the immediate consequences of that just now.

I was reading just the other day that the integration of East German forces into the armed forces of a united Germany is causing major problems because people have not yet worked out who actually owns the tanks, who actually owns the missiles. We must hope, of course, that the great majority of them will be destroyed following on the treaty signed recently, that we can see the day when everything we thought of, all the old habits of thought, all the old customs of international relations that were fixed and directed by this bi-polarity, will have gone, will have changed utterly. It is clear that we will need to look again at what that means in terms of the European Community's own security and defence interests.

I was very sad to hear Deputy Michael D. Higgins and Deputy De Rossa coming out with the newest bogeyman which Deputy Michael D. Higgins invented just the other day on the radio. He asked "where is the enemy?". He accuses Deputy Bruton and others, myself included I suppose, of looking for a new enemy. That, Sir, is absolute nonsense and it is made all the more nonsensical when we listen to Deputies Michael D. Higgins, Michael Bell, De Rossa and McCartan expressing their concern about our Permanent Defence Forces. They seem to be utterly convinced that we need a permanent defence force. I agree with them. They seem to be utterly convinced that we need to ensure that our Permanent Defence Forces are manned by people who are properly treated. I totally agree with them. Might I ask them where they think the enemy is against whom this defence force is needed to protect us? If they are convinced of the need for a defence force, against whom is it going to defend us? Their answer will be neat and glib and they will accept the single, central, fundamental doctrine of sovereignty, that the maintenance of an independent way of running our own society which says that in order to make that credible one has to show other people that one is prepared to defend it, even if there is nobody immediately around who seems to be threatening it.

I regret the fact that Deputy Michael D. Higgins tried to suggest that anybody in this House is suggesting that the new enemy is Islam. That is an outrageous and indeed a very stupid comment to make. The enemy is not Islam. There is no new enemy. What the enemy will always be, whether it is an Islamic State, a Christian State or a state with no religion at all, is a state that decides to descend to aggression or indeed a state that decides to descend to depriving people of liberty, detaining them against their will or to any of the other acts that the whole international community, represented in the UN, rightly deplores.

So let us not have a new bogeyman invented by the Labour Party and The Workers' Party because they do not want to face the consequences of what is happening in Europe, because they do not want to accept the logic that all the changes we have seen and the explosion, the destruction of bi-polarity mean that we have to rethink all the way through, all of the old habits of thought that we had ourselves or that we objected to so strongly when we saw them in other people.

The Taoiseach indeed seems to have some inkling that this is what is required because this afternoon he said:

Doctrines of security and defence based on the East-West confrontation must now be radically reassessed. The dramatically reduced military threat has posed fundamental questions for the military alliances about their role in the new situation.

I agree with that but, of course, the Taoiseach does not come to any conclusion about that. He has sought rather to evade the issue by suggesting that the CSCE must be the privileged forum for discussion on these issues.

I will quote an extract from an interview with The Irish Times in which the Taoiseach said: “We would be looking very much to the CSCE as providing a framework covering all of Europe which would create a whole new structure of relationships between the countries of Europe, East and West.” I agree entirely with that, but it is interesting to see the very conditional way in which it was put, “we would be looking very much to the CSCE”. In what conditions, and under what circumstances, would we be looking that way? Is the Taoiseach afraid to say that he is looking in that direction? Is he afraid to go even that far? He expressed the view this afternoon that “a common EC foreign and security policy, when articulated, is unlikely to include specific military aspects at this stage”. Yet he seems to see the need to address this part of the problem because he said also this afternoon:

The major changes brought about in the CSCE also require us to examine the implications of this new situation for the current efforts of the Community to develop further its own identity in the international arena. As part of that process 11 member states, including Ireland, agreed at the Rome European Council on the objective of a common foreign and security policy with the aim of giving greater coherence and effectiveness to the Community's international action.

He then went on to talk about the Inter-governmental Conference on Political Union which he says must have special regard to the new Pan-European framework within which the security and stability of all the countries in Europe will in future be ensured. That again is very wise and I agree with it but the Taoiseach fails to come to any conclusion about it.

What I ask now and what we have been asking in this House for a good six months or more is what will the Taoiseach be saying in the context of that new reassessment. What will our Government be saying? Will they have any point of view to put forward? What will the Government be saying on our behalf in debating the shape and the content of future political union in the European Community? What will the Government be saying about how that European Community is going to relate in future in the security field, the defence field and the foreign policy field to the newly emerging democracies in Eastern Europe? The answer we get from the Taoiseach is nothing at all. He has no view to give us. He, and the Government, seem to have made no decision about the approach we should adopt.

Yet again we see uncertainty. Further in the Taoiseach's speech — I do not intend to read it all — there is a long passage about the Paris Summit welcoming the decision on the reduction in conventional forces. He said he particularly welcomes the Summit's decision that there should now be more structured co-operation among all participating states on security matters, and that discussions and consultations will take place among the 34 participants aimed at establishing by 1992 new negotiations on disarmament and confidence and security building open to all participating states. I assume by that that the Taoiseach means that by 1992, if this process goes well, all the 34 participating states, including Ireland, will be involved in negotiations on disarmament and confidence and security building. This afternoon the Taoiseach made the old-fashioned, typically Fianna Fáil virtue of the fact that — as he said in his usual smug fashion — we stand aside from all these discussions on military matters. Yet suddenly the CSCE presents a new framework and the Taoiseach is apparently now hoping that by 1992, all going well, we will be involved with all the participating States in talking about this.

What has changed? What suddenly has made the Taoiseach seem to indicate that he has a view on this now that he did not have before? That is all very confusing, vague and indefinite. Frankly, I regard it all as just so much window dressing. The Taoiseach has shown consistently an unwillingness to express any view, to commit himself to any opinion, and that has been typical of his approach to foreign policy issues and particularly to questions of European integration throughout the course of this year, in the fact of everything that has been happening both outside and inside the Community.

The Taoiseach pointed out this afternoon that the European Community, represented by the Presidency and the Commission, would be signing the Paris Charter. It is clear, therefore, that as a signatory to the Charter the Community will have to work out its own approach to all the issues dealt with in that Charter, including questions of defence. I hope that approach will be forward-looking, constructive and will make a real contribution to the development of peace and the expansion of freedom and liberty, but it will require all member states of the Community, including Ireland, to participate in defining the Community's position on all these issues, including security and defence. That is the central thought in what Deputy John Bruton said this afternoon. It is time we got off the fence, stopped prevaricating and decided that we are involved in this. We have a view about other countries' military activities and we have a right to have such a view because we are just as much threatened by the consequences of what they do as they are themselves. It is time we had the confidence to express that view on behalf of the people who elect us to this House. It will be only if we do that that we can make our full contribution to pushing forward the cause of peace.

I know why the Taoiseach will not give an opinion on any of these matters. I know why he is presenting the CSCE as being the privileged forum. It is a bolt-hole for him. It prevents him having to make up his mind. It does away with the need for the Government to take a position on this issue. Yet the full nonsense of the Taoiseach's, and the Government's position can be seen when you look back and reflect on the words the Taoiseach used this afternoon — it was he who pointed it out — that decisions made by the CSCE are not binding on any of the member states. Each state has to decide for itself how much it is going to implement, how far it is going to go and how it is going to do it. This is the bolt-hole that is being chosen for us by our Government, and I find that totally unsatisfactory. It is a total abdication of the responsibility of Government here and I consider it to be a betrayal not only of our people but also of all the people in Central and Eastern Europe who are looking now to the West, to the European Community in particular, and to each of its member states to be the engine that drives the process of pushing out the borders of parliamentary democracy.

A great deal more could be said about all of this but, unfortunately, time prevents me from going into the issues that have been raised in relation to our participation in this process and in UN decisions about the Gulf. On that subject I will say only this, we must support United Nations action. We cannot have it both ways, as the Labour Party and The Workers' Party seem to want, of supporting the UN when it suits us and not going along with the UN when it requires us to do something new, to do something that goes against the old traditionalism which, for all their radical thoughts, the Labour Party and The Workers' Party represent on these issues we are now discussing.

(Carlow-Kilkenny): Cé nach raibh se ar intinn agam labhairt ar an ábhar seo ar chor ar bith, caithfidh mé a admháil gur bhain mé sult as an díospóireacht agus as na ráitis a deineadh. Ba shórt cúrsa oideachais é bheith ag éisteacht leis na tuairimí éagsúla agus na tuairimí láidre atá ag na Teachtaí ó gach páirtí anseo.

It would have been very enjoyable if we had had the right to interrupt speakers, because when you cannot comment or ask a question about something with which you disagree it kills debate and statements. Unfortunately, if a Member interrupts he or she is asked to leave the House as a result of disorderly behaviour.

In this debate there was plenty of gobbledegook in talking about free markets, market economies and so on. However, I hope that there will be enough food for everyone in Eastern Europe and indeed it is now obvious that the system in those countries did not work.

I welcome the Taoiseach's speech on the CSCE. Clearly we are now getting to the stage where sanity seems to prevail, where peace is more important than war. A few days ago I spoke on the Third World where one of the figures I read from a document was that 30,000 children were dying daily from hunger or curable diseases. That is a massive figure but, as the document was produced by one of the people involved in that field, I take it at its face value. Now that we have shifted from the idea of war to peace, will we be able to spend money in helping those in need? A speaker mentioned the money spent on armaments, and said if that money was used properly the world would be happier.

I am sure that Deputy De Rossa would like to interrupt me now and again. He used a lovely phrase when he was talking about neutrality but he did not develop it. I was fascinated to hear him say that we should make neutrality more positive and relevant. I know we can describe things as "positive", "negative" and "neutral" but I should like the Deputy to expand on how neutrality could be made more positive and relevant.

CSCE participants have given a commitment to democracy and respect for human life. However, Deputy Dukes pointed out that these documents are not legally binding on the participating states although they represent a solemn political commitment to them. What have we achieved if there is nothing binding in these statements? Are they pious platitudes? Will anything happen? If they live up to the recommendations in the CSCE document I will be very happy. I welcome anything that prevents war or waste of money which provides the means of war. I hope that this will lead to a better and safer world.

Sitting suspended at 6.5 p.m. and resumed at 7 p.m.
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