I welcome this opportunity to address the House on important issues of foreign policy. For understandable reasons there has been a great deal of focus recently on the terrible events in Kosovo and surrounding countries and the debate about our proposed membership of PfP. I will address both issues in my speech today. Important as they are, however, they constitute but part of the broad spectrum of our foreign policy. In well over 40 capitals where we have resident missions, in cities as diverse as Washington and Maputo, in the chambers of the United Nations and the Council rooms of Brussels I am proud that Ireland plays an active role in world affairs. We have a strong and effective foreign policy which is well positioned to meet the challenges of the new millennium.
Ireland is a militarily neutral country, but that does not mean that we have a neutral approach to the major issues confronting us in the world today, or that we are ineffective in our efforts to promote constructive solutions to the problems facing us. It is precisely because of the traditional values that have long inspired our foreign policy that we are better placed to promote positive developments than many larger countries, who are restricted by various constraints. We do not seek to emulate the larger countries. We have no aspirations to "force projection" in sensitive regions of the world. That is not for us. What we can do, and I believe we are doing, is to use our advantages to best effect in a number of key areas.
Before I turn to the issues of Kosovo and Partnership for Peace, it may be useful to set out the broad context in which the approach that we are taking on these two specific issues is situated. This will provide reassurance that the objectives of Irish foreign policy remain those that we have been following for many years and that there is no intention whatsoever of redefining these to serve any short-term needs.
Let me give some examples. Last week in the Hague, I gave one of the opening addresses to the Hague Peace Appeal and chaired a round table discussion involving three Nobel Laureates: Archbishop Tutu, Ramos Horta and Rigoberta Menchu. In my opening statement, I described the efforts which Ireland has been making, together with a small group of like-minded countries, to promote further our initiative for nuclear disarmament. Already, last year, our resolution in the United Nations General Assembly was adopted by an overwhelming majority. This year we are actively preparing for the Non-Proliferation Treaty Review Conference in 2000, and we look forward to even greater support at the General Assembly in the autumn. I cannot accept that on issues of such fundamental importance Ireland cannot or should not make its voice heard.
In that regard it is interesting to note in today's edition of the International Herald Tribune an article under the heading “The World Rejects Nuclear Arms”. It is a joint article by Swedish colleague, the Foreign Minister, Anna Lindh, and myself. It is interesting that it should receive significant prominence in a paper of the reputation of the International Herald Tribune. It is indicative of the fact that although we are a small neutral country people listen to us and read what we have to say.
I also described in the Hague the efforts we have been making to ensure the effective implementation of the Ottawa Treaty banning anti-personnel landmines. Earlier this month I attended in Maputo the first conference of state parties to the treaty. I witnessed at first hand the trauma and devastation that these inhumane weapons have caused in Mozambique. I saw the efforts that are being made, including those funded by Irish aid, to clear the land of these abominable devices. I challenge anyone who says that we do not have a foreign policy to go out and see for themselves what is being done.
When I was in Maputo, I had detailed discussions with President Chissano and, separately, with my Mozambican counterpart on a wide range of issues. We discussed the conflicts that are raging in Africa, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Angola as well as between Ethiopia and Eritrea and in the Sudan. Many thousands of people are dying in these conflicts and the fact that they are not European is no reason for spending fewer resources on efforts to settle them.
The issue, however, that my interlocutors were most interested in was what was happening in East Timor and my recent involvement when, following my visit to Dili last month, I sought to focus international attention on the urgent need for action. There have been some positive developments, but major threats remain. Following the recent signature of an agreement in New York, we will participate actively in activities under the auspices of the United Nations in support of the consultative process. I also took the opportunity at that conference to speak to the Foreign Ministers of many other countries in connection with our upcoming contest for the Security Council.
My last example relates to what I saw in Africa during my recent visit to Tanzania, which is a great country, and South Africa and also on earlier occasions in relation to our development co-operation programme. The Irish aid programme has grown, in the quarter century of its existence, from a budget of £1.5 million to over £159 million. It has also grown in spread and quality, focusing on people in some of the poorest countries in the world. We seek to make our development assistance activities sustainable. By tackling the basic problems of deprivation, whether in health, education or other basic needs, in a spirit of equal partnership and working with public and private bodies, including NGOs, we are making a tangible and meaningful contribution to building peace, justice and prosperity in the areas where it is most needed.
I have given these examples to show that we have wider horizons and ambitious goals not confined to Europe. However, the same principles and approach apply to what we aim to achieve in Europe and acting in concert with our EU partners, in the Union's common foreign and security policy. Earlier this month an important event, not only for Ireland but for all the countries of Europe, took place but it did not attract as much public attention as it deserved. This was the entry into force of the Treaty of Amsterdam. This treaty put into place the framework within which the European Union will seek to achieve its objectives of providing a peaceful and prosperous Europe, free of all tensions and dangers which overshadowed the history of our continent and the whole world in the first half of this century.
A year ago, however, we were engaged in a wide-ranging and lively debate on what the Treaty of Amsterdam meant for Ireland, what its implications for the future might be and how Ireland could play its full part in the construction of Europe while preserving the core values which have always inspired our foreign policy. I suggest the reason the entry into force of the Amsterdam Treaty has attracted relatively little attention is that we are comfortable with it. We can identify well with the provisions relating to conflict prevention and peacekeeping activities and we want to see them becoming effective. If any warning is needed of what happens when conflict prevention activities are not effective, we need look no further than the Western Balkans. The 1990s will be remembered for the appalling carnage and atrocities which took place first in Croatia and Bosnia and are now being replicated in Kosovo.
The overriding imperative is a moral one. A Europe which turns a blind eye to gross abuse of human rights is a Europe which allows the seeds of its own self-destruction to take root. That is why we in Ireland attach such enormous importance to upholding human rights and why we have been very active in this area internationally. Mrs. Mary Robinson's tireless efforts, including in Kosovo, on behalf of the whole international community have rightly received attention. We should also, however, recognise the efforts of all the non-governmental organisations which ensure that these issues cannot be swept under the carpet. I pay tribute to the efforts of the Irish delegation to the United Nations in Geneva, which last month chaired the annual session of the Commission on Human Rights.
However, it is not enough to increase awareness of human rights and ensure adequate means of protecting them, we must also ensure that the abusers of human rights are brought to justice. It is vital that those who have in the past committed atrocities, and who are doing so even as I speak, should be identified and brought to justice as soon as possible. Under no circumstances should they be rewarded. This applies in the case of Kosovo. Prevention is much better, and less expensive, than cure.
Apart from the moral imperative, there are very powerful arguments for ensuring that conflict prevention is successful. The costs of failure, in human and economic terms, vastly outweigh the costs of preventive action. If one looks, for example, at the annual budget of the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe, the regional organisation with wide-ranging responsibilities for maintaining peace in Europe, and contrast it with the cost of just one day's military activity related to Kosovo, one might question the priorities. If one looks at the chronic financing problems of the United Nations, and the effect this is having on its conflict prevention and peacekeeping operations, the short-sight edness of the current approach is even more apparent.
The greatest human costs are those being borne by the Kosovo Albanians themselves. Those whom we seek to protect are the main victims. Nearly one million have already lost their homes. What we are doing in Ireland to help refugees is very necessary, but represents only a small part of a much bigger international response. I know the refugees would like to return home as soon as circumstances permit but, tragically, there is little prospect of this in the immediate future.
My colleague, the Minister of State at the Department of Foreign Affairs, Deputy O'Donnell, will visit the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia next week in order to assess the situation and in particular the needs of refugees, including those who will be coming to Ireland. I reiterate that we will be generous. Ireland is committed to taking 1,000 refugees immediately, but if and when it becomes necessary to take more, we will not be found wanting. The Government will do its duty in the international community.
The economic costs of the conflict are also horrendous for the people of Kosovo and others in the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia and the neighbouring states. At the meeting of EU Foreign Ministers, which I attended in Brussels last Monday, we agreed on the broad content of a stability pact for the region and this is now being developed as a matter of urgency. We are participating actively in this work.
The greatest priority of all is to bring the conflict to an end in a way that will achieve the key objectives of the international community. At the General Affairs Council on Monday, I welcomed a role for President Ahtisaari of Finland whose country has not been involved in NATO's military actions and which will shortly assume the EU Presidency. Working with Mr. Chernomyrdin of Russia, the UN and the other permanent members of the Security Council and the G8, he can play a useful mediating role. I have made clear our willingness to assist these efforts in any practical way that is open to us.