'IRAQ: A FINAL DIPLOMATIC PUSH'

INTERVIEW GIVEN BY THE FOREIGN SECRETARY, JACK STRAW, TO THE POLITICS SHOW, SUNDAY 16 MARCH 2003

QUESTION:
Can you tell us what's happening in the Azores and what the point of it is given that the pro war countries are the only countries there?

JACK STRAW:
Well the countries that are there are the three sponsors of the draft second resolution. It's fairly obvious why their heads of government have come together. The purpose of this meeting in the Azores later on today is to assess the diplomatic situation and to see whether it is possible for there to be a final diplomatic push for a peaceful solution. And it is possible for this crisis to have a peaceful resolution even at this late stage, first by Saddam Hussein finally agreeing to comply with the disarmament obligations on him and secondly by an international community who so clearly came together in November last year when they decided on Resolution 1441, agreeing now to follow through what they said should happen if Saddam was in non compliance. And it's a matter of great regret that some of our partners in the Security Council have failed to follow through the words.

QUESTION:
But it seems difficult to work out how to move forwards with all of that when you only gather the countries who want to attack Iraq.

JACK STRAW:
No that's not the case but of course it is the case that there are divisions on the Security Council. A matter of very, very great regret to me particularly as we all worked so very hard to get that tough, clear resolution passed in November of last year which said very clearly that Saddam Hussein has been and remains in material breach of resolutions which go back to 1991. That nonetheless he had a final opportunity to disarm but he had to take that final opportunity by active and immediate full co-operation with the inspectors. It also said if he failed to do that then he'd be in clear further material breach which plainly he is and if that happened then he'd have to take the serious consequences which would plainly follow. So that's the situation and that's what the leaders are looking at this afternoon and how we take it forward. Now the whole diplomatic process I have to say has been made very much more difficult by the fact that on Tuesday of this week President Chirac of France said and I quote directly 'that whatever the circumstances', think about those words, 'whatever the circumstances France would vote no'.

QUESTION:
He made the point on that day; you could change his mind perhaps?

JACK STRAW:
No if you read the transcript he made it very clear. He knew what he was saying and indeed the burden of what he is saying has been repeated subsequently by Dominique de Villepin the French Foreign Minister.

QUESTION:
Are you talking to the French off the air? I mean we see them speaking on television and we hear those quotes but what's happening when you speak to them privately?

JACK STRAW:
Well I've spoken twice at the end of the week to Dominique de Villepin who I may say that as a Foreign Minister colleague I have a great respect for and at a personal level I regard him as a friend but there is a difference between us and the difficulty's been how do you bridge this difference. I spoke to him on Thursday evening, I spoke to him again on Friday, perfectly cordial conversation with him but there is this difference because President Chirac has said as I quote 'whatever the circumstances France will vote no'. And just coming onto your poll and this speculation about whether if Parliament has to meet in order to approve a resolution agreeing to military action, whether there will be the same number or fewer or a larger number of people who voted against our position two or three weeks ago. The point I would make to them is that we have to think hard about why if we cannot get a second resolution that is so. What has changed since we had the debate three weeks ago? And bluntly the choice we are now faced with is whether the House of Commons determines our foreign policy or whether it's determined in the Elyses.

QUESTION:
Right but let's measure some of these decisions you're taking against the five tests that Tony Blair mentioned in the context of the Kosovo war and his first test was are we sure of our case. It must trouble you that as this goes on fewer and fewer of your own colleagues in the Labour Party are sure of it on the back benches.

JACK STRAW:
Oh I don't accept that at all. I do accept that there has been nervousness and disagreement about whether we should take military action if we cannot get a second resolution, that is obvious. But in terms of the strength of the case, one of the things that has struck me both in talking to my Parliamentary colleagues in the House of Commons in the Parliamentary Party and also in terms of talking to my own Party in Blackburn and to the public in Blackburn is how the case is shifting towards us. I did another of my open air meetings, impromptu open air meetings in the town centre in Blackburn yesterday and it was striking that of course there were disagreements, people are worried about the situation but there had been a significant shift of opinion the way of the Government compared with the meeting I'd done at a similar time two weeks ago.

QUESTION:
The second Blair test is whether we have exhausted all diplomatic options because this plays exactly into the area you're talking about. Gordon Brown the Chancellor said today there are still options available to us. Is that coming back to your six tests?

JACK STRAW:
Well that is true and I listened to what Gordon said. He's absolutely right and the diplomatic options will not be exhausted until we're absolutely certain they are over. And it remains the case that at any stage until military action is taken if that's the dismal decision we have to take, that Saddam can also ensure a peaceful solution to this crisis not least by leaving the country and going into exile. And he's very lucky we've already offered him exile and immunity from the kind of prosecution he should certainly suffer.

QUESTION:
The UN Chief Weapons Inspector Hans Blix will consult the Security Council this week about an invitation to visit Baghdad to talk further with Iraq about disarmament issues. Surely a good idea?

JACK STRAW:
Well he's right to consult the Security Council because he's a senior civil servant of the Security Council and he has responsibilities to them. But my own view is that it would be inappropriate to go to Baghdad at the moment. I mean what the Security Council needs to apply itself to is that four months after agreeing to 1441 which said that Saddam had to comply immediately, we had this one hundred and seventy three page report published to the Security Council on Friday last the 7th of March entitled 'Unresolved Disarmament Issues' which listed twenty nine separate chapters of areas where Saddam had failed to comply. It also showed that there were seventeen occasions where Saddam has been shown by the inspectors to have lied through his teeth about whether or not he was complying and the simple fact is everybody must now notice this, is that after twelve years all the evidence is that he has no interest in complying but simply in playing games.

QUESTION:
But in terms of the Blair test, have we exhausted all diplomatic options and it does sound from what you're saying as if we haven't?

JACK STRAW:
Well we're getting close to that but I hope we have not. I mean I have to say senior officials in the Foreign Office, the Prime Minister and myself have we spent hours, days, weeks on the telephone, at meetings trying to find a diplomatic solution to this crisis and showing if I may say so huge flexibility and imagination to find a way through, the answer to that is yes and we shall go on doing it. But there will be a choice and the choice will be this, do we face up to this tyrant after twelve years of prevarication or do we avoid that choice and in doing so send out the most desperate message to tyrants and terrorists alike that the international community has no will to follow through its words and no will to disarm in the face of such weapons of mass destruction?

QUESTION:
The next Blair test is whether there are military options we can sensibly and prudently undertake. Now it's been pointed out that if the legality of this project is hazy and we've got Kofi Annan for example last week saying if the US and others were to go outside the Security Council and take military action it would not be in conformity with the UN Charter, British soldiers who go to war may feel vulnerable to prosecution?

JACK STRAW:
Well that's not the case, the legality of any military action in which the United Kingdom and its forces take part will be fully supported by international law and it would be completely improper were that not the case. There is no question but that there is a sound legal base for any military action that has to be taken on the basis of the existing resolutions 1441 going right back to 687 and 678 in 1991.

QUESTION:
So you're not concerned that in the International Criminal Court might rule that actually and one QC Stephen Solly has pointed it out there hasn't been a legal case made and it's in breach?

JACK STRAW:
No I'm not concerned about that at all. I'd also say that areas of international law are open to intense debate but I think that for many of those who are asserting from a liberal position that this is unlawful are actually offering a political view through the prism of what they suggest is a legal opinion but in fact is nothing of the kind. And the law is very clear. Resolution 1441 did not require there to be a second resolution to authorise further military action. I have virtually every line of 1441 imprinted on my brain, I know the negotiating history, the negotiating history was very straight forward that France and Russia sought to negotiate into the text of 1441 a lock so that further military action could not take place without a second resolution and they've backed away from that and agreed instead to what was set out in 1441.

QUESTION:
All right, two more Blair tests to get through. The fourth test is are we prepared for the long term having made a commitment he said we cannot simply walk away once the fight is over. How long will we stay and with how many troops?

JACK STRAW:
Well we are prepared for the long term and we have to be, just as if we do decide to take military action just as we have been in Afghanistan and in Kosovo and in Bosnia as well and that is essential. I cannot say how many troops it would take to ensure the reconstruction of the country. I am confident that if military action is necessary it will be aimed at the Saddam regime and certainly not at the people of Iraq and that people in Iraq will be pleased to see the back of a terrible tyrant who has impoverished what is a very talented and potentially very rich country.

QUESTION:
And you are preparing for the long term are you, for the administration, Iraqi administration after war?

JACK STRAW:
Yes of course, it's absolutely essential. And one announcement that has already been made and this was made by Secretary Powell of the United States' government as I have made too on behalf of the British Government is for example any oil revenues would be devoted wholly and exclusively to the people of Iraq and there is no suggestion whatever that they would be used by other countries. But this is a potentially very rich country. It actually had the same standard of living as Portugal before Saddam came to power. Now it's been impoverished sixty per cent of the population have to rely on the United Nations' food aid. Medicines are denied ill people by the Saddam regime not because of sanctions the medicines are available. It's in a desperate situation but it can in my view be rebuilt very quickly because of the talents of the people and the resources available to them.

QUESTION:
The final test Mr Blair set down during Kosovo, do we have national interests involved. Now you mentioned oil in the context of war there. People are suspicious about America's motives.

JACK STRAW:
Well they needn't be suspicious about the US. I mean I understand of course when you've got a country which is so overwhelmingly powerful people can invent all sorts of bad motives for the US. But I'm very, very clear from lengthy private conversations as well as what has been said publicly that this is being done by the United States to try and help secure the peace and security of the region and of the world.

QUESTION:
But the terror argument counts both ways doesn't it? We could become more of a target by getting into this?

JACK STRAW:
I don't believe that by the way because Saddam Hussein has been a sponsor certainly of Palestinian terrorism for very many years and one of the major difficulties faced by the security talks negotiations in Cairo under Omah in respect of Israel Palestine has been the intransigence of Hamas who are in turn funded and supported by the Iraqi regime. So you need to recognise the way in which the Iraqi regime has been sponsoring terrorism in the region. Let's bear in mind too that no tyrant has a worse record for the murder and torture of Muslim people than Saddam Hussein. He's murdered over a million Muslims, tortured very many more, launched attacks and invasions on two of his Muslim neighbours and is perhaps one of the worst Muslims or people who claims to uphold to the Muslim faith one could imagine.

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