Britain in the USA

Briefing by the British Foreign Secretary, Robin Cook, the Bulgarian Foreign Ministers, Nadezhda Mihailova and the Chief of Joint Operations, Vice-Admiral Sir Ian Garnett. 13 May 1999

FOREIGN SECRETARY: Good Morning. Can I first say that I am delighted to welcome to our press conference the Foreign Minister of Bulgaria, Nadezhda Mihailova. Nadezhda will be having talks with me later, but she will this morning address the press conference. Her presence at our press conference sends a powerful signal of the solidarity and resolve of the countries of the region with NATO in making sure that we reverse the injustices and the atrocities that have taken place in Kosovo.

Serbia is surrounded by states who share NATO's determination to rid the region of the evil of ethnic cleansing. All Serbia's neighbours have been supportive of NATO's action. All of them look to us to show resolve and to maintain the pressure on President Milosevic. We will show that resolve and the pressure on President Milosevic will continue to go on intensifying.

I can report this morning that the last two days of action have been the most successful in Kosovo in the campaign to date. We have inflicted heavy damage on the killing machine in Kosovo, hitting the armour, the artillery, the vehicles and the command posts throughout Kosovo. This is doing real damage to the very forces directly responsible on the ground for the campaign of mass murder against the Kosovars. You will of course not see pictures of that damage on your television screens. President Milosevic does not dare let the world or his own people see the damage that we are doing. He cannot afford to let that damage be shown to the world, or be known to his people. But the fact is that NATO's pilots are making a big impact, and he knows it. Even Milosevic has now been forced to admit for the first time that NATO has inflicted casualties on his Serb forces.

I will now ask the Chief of Joint Operations to report to you on the latest military action.

CHIEF OF JOINT OPERATIONS: Good Morning, Ladies and Gentlemen. The intensification of the air campaign continues. The MUP and VJ troops in Kosovo show no signs of withdrawing and continue to engage the UCK who are tenaciously holding out in small pockets throughout Kosovo. In some cases they have retaken ground from the Serbs. For their part, Milosevic's troops are showing an increasing tendency to loot and burn their way around the country.

Yesterday and last night NATO succeeded in further diminishing the capability of Milosevic's political apparatus, his military and paramilitary forces and his support infrastructure. As part of UK's significant contribution to air operations, the Harrier GR7s were again active over Kosovo, flying 20 sorties and dropping in the order of 40 weapons.

This map you see to your left shows the distribution of around 20 tactical targets which were attacked within Kosovo by them and other NATO aircraft during yesterday and early last night. The attacks were focused particularly in the Prizren, Suva Reka and Junik areas, and as you can see were made against a wide range of armour, military vehicles and troop positions, an indication of the growing pressure NATO is applying to Serb forces in Kosovo and our increasing success rate.

A full range of other targets were also successfully attacked in the operational region as a whole, including airfields in Obrva, Batajnica, highway bridges in Orlate and Milosevo, and military communications sites in Kosovska, Novi Sad and Stara Pazova. All NATO aircraft returned safely.

In support of these attack missions, Royal Air Force Tristars flew air to air refuelling missions, and the E3D provided airborne early warning and aircraft control.

In the Adriatic, NATO maritime forces, including HMS Invincible and 5 other Royal Navy ships, and the submarine HMS Splendid supported NATO operations.

In the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, UK and other NATO ground forces remain ready to implement a peace agreement in Kosovo and meanwhile UK Army engineers and other NATO specialists continue to build new refugee camps in Albania.

Thank you Foreign Secretary, that concludes my military up-date.

FOREIGN SECRETARY: In a moment I will invite Mrs Mihailova to join us on the platform and to say a few words about the conflict from the perspective of a neighbour.

Can I first say that over the last decade Bulgaria has made remarkable progress, particularly in the last few years. It has joined the family of free democratic nations and has become a force for stability in the region, a valued friend and a candidate for the European Union and a partner in NATO.

Bulgaria's progress shows that there is nothing inevitable about tyranny. The world and a country can change for the better. Those two statements could hold true for Serbia. There is nothing inevitable about tyranny in Serbia, it can change for the better. Serbia too would be welcome to join the family of free nations, but it cannot do so under a leadership whose butchery has caused revulsion around the world.

And the more the people of Serbia see their neighbours moving towards a secure, prosperous future, in partnership with the European Union and NATO, the more they will realise the isolation that the Milosevic regime imposes on Serbia. That is why Britain is developing a comprehensive strategy for south eastern Europe, and I will be discussing this with Mrs Mihailova this afternoon. We and our allies want to design a practical programme for peace, prosperity and stability in the region.

I welcome the work of my German colleague, Joschka Fischer, who is leading on a stability pact for the region. We today are circulating to all our partners in Europe, Britain's proposals for discussion on Monday at the meeting of the European Union Foreign Ministers on Monday. We are proposing that we should build on that stability pact by providing for first a Balkan regeneration plan, providing both the financial help and the technical assistance that the countries of the region will need to overcome the effects of conflict, but also to undertake long term construction. Second, we want to see a European open trading area, setting up a network of trade agreements between the countries of the region and ourselves. We propose strengthened, enhanced trade preferences and closer economic cooperation with all the countries of the region. And third, we want special agreements for political dialogue between Ministers of the European Union members and Ministers from all the countries of south eastern Europe. The aim of the strategy for south eastern Europe is to bring lasting peace, to encourage economic development and to build a closer partnership for the longer term, with the Balkans in particular, on core democratic European values.

We recognise the burdens which Bulgaria and other countries of the region are bearing as a result of Milosevic's politics of ethnic hatred. We pledge ourselves to work with all the countries of the region to restore economic development and investor confidence once we achieve our objectives in Kosovo. As we build on this strategy we will seek close cooperation from other nations, including Russia, we will work towards this strategy through the different international bodies, not just the European Union and NATO, but also the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe, and through the international financial institutions.

Now our strategy for south eastern Europe is important in itself as a means of helping the countries of the region and Serbia's neighbours cope with the strains imposed by this conflict and as a way forward to a different future of stability and prosperity which we know our friends in the Balkans want to share. But as well as being important in itself, that strategy provides an important message to the people of Serbia that they are increasingly being left behind by their neighbours who are accelerating their integration with the modern Europe. And that provides an extra incentive for the people of Serbia to turn from the policies of repression and racial confrontation, policies that have brought them into their present conflict and policies that exclude them from our approach to the countries of the Balkans and bring those countries nearer to Europe.

May I thank Bulgaria for the support it is giving NATO in this conflict, including the important decision of the Bulgarian parliament to allow airspace to be used for NATO operations. I welcome Bulgaria's agreement to implement the economic measures adopted by the European Union and it is now my pleasure to invite their Foreign Minister, Nadezhda Mihailova to join us on this platform.

MRS MIHAILOVA: Thank you very much Foreign Secretary and I would like to thank you for giving me the chance to share some views as a neighbouring state about the conflict in Yugoslavia.

First of all I would like to say that Bulgaria was supporting, and is supporting, the efforts of the international community from the very beginning and was trying to avoid the possibility of starting bombings and trying to find a peaceful solution for the conflict. Unfortunately all the efforts of the international community, of the European Union, NATO, Russia and the neighbouring states failed and now we are supporting this operation of NATO in Yugoslavia.

And probably the simple question is, and I will start with this, why are we supporting this?

I would say that this is part of the Bulgarian national interest, keeping the stability of the region. Yugoslavia is passing through crisis and wars for almost ten years. You remember that it started with Slovenia, after that with Croatia, with Bosnia Herzegovina, now with Kosovo. This policy against the ethnic minorities might refer to other ethnic minorities, it might refer to other states of the region, and Bulgaria is very much interested in keeping the stability of the region and in keeping the borders unchanged in the Balkan peninsular.

We are very much concerned about the situation in Albania and mostly in Macedonia because what he is doing, Milosevic, with the two states is a real aggression and this refugee stream, these people who have been sent, these refugees or deployed people, are a real refugee bomb which falls on the economies and politics of these two states - Albania and Macedonia. I will say that the war in Yugoslavia probably now is the most discussed issue everywhere. Probably the big question which is used by the media and by the opposition in different countries, who is pro-war and who is pro-peace? And I will ask pro- which war and how big we would like to be the peace, because I am sure there is not any person who is pro-war, but I am sure there are still people who are for stopping half of the war, let's say stopping just the bombings but leave the things with the ethnic cleansing continue, and I am sure that this may affect countries like mine and the stability of the whole region. With this understanding the Bulgarian leadership and the Bulgarian parliament, government and President, is supporting the efforts of the international community to find a long lasting solution for the crisis situation in our western border.

The Balkans have witnessed a lot of peace agreements which didn't bring a long term peace for the Balkans. That is why the main question for us is how the peace is going to look like and we are interested in this peace to be a long term peace and each one of the Balkan states to find its own place in this peace. We have been isolated and disconnected from central and western parts of Europe for ten years. The Bulgarian economy was affected by the UN embargoes and by the conflicts in Yugoslavia. Now we are committed to fulfil all the requirements and to cover all the conditions for becoming a member of the European Union and NATO and we do not want these efforts to fail because of a policy of non-tolerance and violence against human rights.

We think that this war is also a war for European integrity and by the way how we are going to solve and how we are going to oppose this policy of ethnic cleansing, it will depend how the 21st century is going to look like and whether Europe will have enough efforts to lead united in prosperity and democracy.

A few days ago in the Bulgarian national parliament there was a debate on whether the parliament should support the decision of government for giving the airspace or not. It was a difficult but I think very important debate for Bulgarian society because it is not only a matter for the future of Bulgaria in economic and political terms, it is a matter of choice, of choice for a system of values, because you cannot be neutral in a situation like this, you might be in favour or against this policy of non-tolerance.

I would like to say that my country is a model of co-existence of different ethnic groups. We solve our ethnic problems in a most civilised way and I am proud of my people and my country that we succeed to do so. And I would say that we are a success story in the Balkans in solving ethnic problems and I am sure that this might be inspiring for the people in Yugoslavia, because if there might be a success story in the Balkans of solving the ethnic problems, why the Yugoslav citizens could not find the same way of living together. And I believe in the European future of the Balkans and I would like to say that his pact of stability should be not a pact of compensations, not a pact of only reconstruction but a pact of development of the Balkans. Not any more we should live in two Europes, this one on the western or central part and the other one in the southern part, because the long term stability not only of my region, not only of my country, but Europe as a whole will pass through the integration of all countries of the European continent in the structures of a free market economy such as the European Union and be part of the common system of values and the common system of security which will bring peace and stability and will make all the dreams and all the projects be fulfilled.

FOREIGN SECRETARY: Very good. Thank you Nadezhda. Any questions?

QUESTION (Bulgarian National Television): Mr Cook, what should be the long term strategy of NATO to stabilise the Balkan region? In this case do you think that the Kosovo crisis will lead to a special review of Bulgaria's and Romania's application for NATO membership?

FOREIGN SECRETARY: At the Washington Summit we did make a number of very important statements about the commitment of NATO to developing and strengthening its links with the countries of the region, including Bulgaria. And many of these commitments reflected British input to the text, in particular the commitment to organising a security forum with the countries of the region and NATO. But we are also committed, as well as that regional approach, to intensifying our work with the countries of the region on a 19 plus 1 basis. That is why we set out membership action plans for the countries of the region and we very much look forward to Bulgaria strengthening the already strong claims it has for partnership with NATO through that membership action plan, though there is no doubt that the events of recent weeks have brought us closer and we must make sure that the momentum of that integration continues when the immediate crisis is resolved. QUESTION (German International Radio): I have a question for the Bulgarian Foreign Minister. What role does the government in Sofia see for Bulgaria in the post-Kosovo future of the Balkans?

MRS MIHAILOVA: Bulgaria wants to act as a de facto ally of NATO and a de facto member of the European Union, not only during the crisis situation but also afterwards. We think that we might be of help with the regional initiatives and the regional cooperation which we reached in the time before the crisis and we still continue to have unanimous position on the situation in Kosovo. I think that the result of this united effort is a long term investment in the stability, coming from the side of the neighbouring states of Yugoslavia, and we do believe that we might be part of this pact of development I would say of the region of south eastern Europe, but this pact of stability and development shouldn't be taken separately by the processes of European and Euro-Atlantic integration; on the contrary, we think that the process of European integration of Bulgaria has to be accelerated, has to be speeded up, and this will be the real support and the real message to send not only to the Bulgarian people, which has to be strongly motivated for working hard, but also for the foreign investors for which this will be also a very strong political signal that in Bulgaria there is enough level of political and economic stability.

KEN PETRIE (GRAPHIC NEWS): For the Bulgarian Foreign Minister: you did mention that air space is going to be used for air operations. Does that air space extend to the provision of Bulgarian airfields?

MRS. MIHAILOVA: The air space of Bulgaria is going to be used by NATO aircraft. We have been asked for permission for giving air space for transit passing of NATO aircraft and it has been given a positive answer from the Bulgarian government; because of the Bulgarian constitution, the problem went to the Bulgarian Assembly and it voted in favour by an overwhelming majority.

QUESTION (BULGARIAN SECTION, BBC): Mr. Cook, could the British Government offer guarantees for foreign investment in Bulgaria after the Kosovo crisis?

FOREIGN SECRETARY: I wish I could offer guarantees. I am not in a position to guarantee it but what I can undertake and what I can assure you of is the commitment of Britain to work for the confidence of investors in Bulgaria and to work also with the government to Bulgaria to make sure in particular that those British investments take place and can succeed within Bulgaria.

Now we have a government in Bulgaria which, as you have heard, is committed to economic reform, to democratic progress, to integration with the European Union, that is a firm and a solid basis for companies to approach Bulgaria as a future partner in the modern Europe and a partner with whom we are determined to develop an open trading area in which there will be full access to Europe. I hope that together we can therefore help to encourage, stimulate and sustain investment from the private sector in Bulgaria.

QUESTION (THE SCOTSMAN): Mr. Cook, do you share fears about the role of the Russians now that Yeltsin has sacked significant parts of his cabinet, that the Russian role will be destabilised and secondly, do you share the concerns or the calls from Paddy Ashdown and William Hague that there needs to be a decision on ground troops taken in the next two weeks for Kosovo?

FOREIGN SECRETARY: We are committed to ground troops in Kosovo and that has never been in question, indeed we have been committed to it ever since the negotiations in Rambouillet. We have now invited Javier Solana to update those plans and to prepare for all options as to when it might be appropriate for ground troops to enter Kosovo to escort the refugees back in security.

On the question of Russia, I am pleased to say that the signs from Moscow are that the present political developments in Russia are not diverting Russia from its commitment to working with us to find a solution along the lines of the agreement that we made in the G8. Chirnomyrdin remains President Yeltsin's special envoy and we believe that the policy and the commitment of Russia remains as strong as it was before, indeed talks continue even today between Russia and the countries of the G8 on how we can take that forward. I hope myself this afternoon to speak to Igor Ivanov who for the time being at least and perhaps for the long term is still the Foreign Minister of Russia and I will be having a useful discussion with him today about our co-operation.

ROBERT MORE (ITN): I just wonder how you assess the diplomatic progress at the moment given that in terms of mediators we now have a Slovac, a Swede, a Finn and a Russian. Obviously, there are accusations out there that this is a pretty unfocused diplomatic effort and that more than a week after the Bonn G8 summit no sign whatsoever of a United Nations Security Council resolution.

FOREIGN SECRETARY: I think you are wrong about that, Robert. We have had very successful discussions among the Western members of the G8 on a draft and we hope to take those discussions forward with Russia on a draft text hopefully within the next few days. We will be looking forward to the report of Mr. Talbott, the US Deputy Secretary of State, when he returns from Moscow very shortly but there is a text now being discussed with close allies and it is a text on which I have to say Britain has taken the leadership in drafting so progress is proceeding on that.

On the question of the diplomatic effort, I would rebut the claim that this is unfocused. On the contrary, the envoys are frequently in contact with each other and are frequently with the major players in the present crisis over Kosovo and so there is a lot of common thinking and much dialogue going on but it is worth stressing of course that this is a very major task. There is not only the question of securing an agreement on our objectives, a withdrawal of Serb forces, return of all refugees and an international presence to provide their security. Not only is that in itself a major challenge but there is also the very big job of preparing for success and making sure that we have plans in place on how we can help to reconstruct Kosovo when we secure that settlement and therefore there are a number of tasks that need to be done which cannot all be done by any one envoy.

I very much hope that we will be able to secure the settlement and I welcome the appointment by the Secretary General of two envoys who can helpfully prepare for the UN's role and the international community's role when we secure a settlement and as you know, I had a very constructive and useful discussion with Carl Bildt earlier this week.

QUESTION (DAILY TELEGRAPH): The main point that still needs to be sorted out between G7 and the Russians remains the composition of an international peace-keeping force, how it would be constructed and what the role of the different countries would be, which countries would be able to participate in it. It has been suggested that one possible fix is a de facto partition of Kosovo whereby the Russians would patrol the north, the mineral-rich areas, and NATO would patrol the south. Can you deny that there is going to be a partition of this kind which many people would see as a betrayal of the Kosovo people?

FOREIGN SECRETARY: I not only can deny it, I am very happy and enthusiastic to deny it. Our commitment is to make sure that all refugees can return to whatever part of Kosovo they fled from, not to any enclave within Kosovo. Therefore we are not contemplating partition of Kosovo nor I think would it be acceptable to the countries of the region if we were to introduce a new partition within the Balkans. Therefore, our commitment remains as before, the return of all refugees to all parts of Kosovo under international protection.

On the issue of the international force, we are committed that there should be a NATO core to such an international presence. At the G8 meeting, Britain was successful in getting words into the statement which made it clear that the international security presence must be capable of delivering on our objectives. Frankly, I don't think any force will be credible or capable if it does not have a NATO core to it and I rather doubt whether many of the refugees would necessarily have the confidence in their security to return if it did not know that the major NATO allies would be present.

QUESTION (ALBANIAN SERVICE): The Bulgarian prime minister spoke about ten years of conflict in the former Yugoslavia starting with Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and now Kosovo. My question is do you think that lasting peace and stability in the Balkans - both the Foreign Secretary and Mrs. Mihailova - is possible while still recognising the full sovereignty of Serbia over Kosovo?

MRS. MIHAILOVA: Recognising? I did not -- I think that we shouldn't ?????? the Balkans, we should keep the borders unchanged, on the contrary we should work for the integrity of the Balkans in a prosperous and democratic Europe. We should educate democracy and educate people how to live together because I think that dividing or ???? the Balkans would not provide stability and security, it will always remain a source of sensibility and that is why the position of the region is in favour of the stability and in favour of non-changing borders from the beginning, including the borders of Yugoslavia.

SAME QUESTIONER: Yugoslavia, before this ten years of conflict, used to be proud of having solved the question of national identity and things have changed so I am asking is it still possible by not maybe changing strategy and still recognising things and hoping that peace is possible?

FOREIGN SECRETARY: Nobody in their right mind is going to deny that the events of the last few weeks and the events in the past year make it more difficult to fashion an accommodation between the Kosovar Albanian community and the government in Belgrade.

Our commitment at Rambouillet was to create provisions for an autonomous, self-governing Kosovo and the longer-term status of Kosovo was an issue that could be revisited after that interim period. That remains very much the position of the international community except that we are now proposing that for the interim period the international community will have to have a much more hands-on role for the administration of Kosovo through an international authority endorsed by the United Nations and those would be our plans.

For the longer-term, I think that the future of Kosovo depends also on what may happen in the politics of Belgrade and I would hope that that also may evolve over a period of time.

GEORGE PASCOE-WATSON (THE SUN): Can I trouble you on a slightly-related issue, the issue of the MI6 agents who were named on the internet? Can you tell us if any of those have been working in places like the Balkans or Iraq and if their security in those operations has been obviously hugely bothered by that and also can you give us an indication of what you think should happen to those people who release to the public that kind of information?

FOREIGN SECRETARY: First of all, I am not going to provide any details that would compromise our intelligence services or the people who have bravely and loyally worked for them, therefore I will not respond to your specific question but let me make some general observations: First of all, the list that has been produced is a list riddled with inaccuracies and I can assure the world that not all the names on that list by any means have ever had any connection with SIS. Nevertheless, the release of any such list, however inaccurate it may be, is a deeply irresponsible and dangerous act.

I regret that Mr. Tomlinson appears to nurse an irrational, deep-seated sense of grievance. I can report that when Mr. Tomlinson left the service he was assisted to find employment and did himself say it was the job of his dreams, he did also receive appropriate resettlement from the service. What he is doing now is irresponsible, it is damaging and potentially dangerous to people who worked with him in the service and it is also illegal. I very much hope, therefore, that Mr. Tomlinson will desist from these activities and that also the media will continue to exercise the responsibility they have shown in not giving any further currency to the damaging information and also to the damaging inaccuracies that he has already published.

BRIDGET KENDAL (BBC): I wondered if you could comment on the fighting strength of the KLA in Kosovo. There has been a report in the last day that a new chief of staff has been appointed possibly to regroup a battered force that has suffered heavy losses and I wondered if you could comment on its presence and its capabilities.

FOREIGN SECRETARY: First of all, President Milosevic has now twice in three weeks announced the end of the KLA, the fact that he has done it a second time does cast doubt on the accuracy of the first time he did it and I am bound to say it is no nearer the truth this time round than it was the first time round.

When I spoke to you on Tuesday, I said then that we had evidence of heavy fighting over the previous twelve hours despite the commitment by President Milosevic to withdraw troops and I can confirm that we have again had evidence of continuing fighting within Kosovo and that would most certainly seem to suggest that the Kosovo Liberation Army is still active and the harsh reality which I have said personally to President Milosevic and have repeatedly addressed to him through the public media, is that the more he continues with his brutal repression, the more he will recruit young and determined recruits to the Kosovo Liberation Army. He will never break the will of the Kosovo Liberation Army by a policy of repression, the only way forward to peace and security in Kosovo is through a settlement that allows the refugees to return, enables us to do so providing them with protection and builds a democratic, self-governing Kosovo. That can be the only way forward, there is not a military solution which Belgrade can achieve and every attempt to do it fails.

JAMES HARDY (THE MIRROR): If I may just follow up George's question about Tomlinson, are you now confident, given that this has shown the difficulties of trying to control somebody using the Internet, that there won't be a repetition of the unfortunate incident yesterday and in previous weeks?

FOREIGN SECRETARY: I don't wish to add to what I have already said and I think I have gone as far as it is possible or prudent to do in intelligence matters. It is certainly the case that Mr. Tomlinson has repeatedly tried to use the Internet over the past few weeks, has so far been repeatedly frustrated and I have no doubt that Mr. Tomlinson may be minded to try again and we will continue to do all we can to frustrate his efforts to damage our service and to behave in a way that is at once irresponsible and illegal.

DAVID THOMSON (DAILY RECORD): A quick question to the Bulgarian Foreign Minister. I didn't quite catch whether you said that NATO planes would be allowed to use your airfields. I just wanted to ask whether if there was a question in the future for NATO troops to pass through your territory, whether that would be granted or looked at unfavourably?

MRS. MIHAILOVA: First of all, I would like to say that there was a lot of talk about whether the strikes had been effective yesterday in your House of Commons, I heard the questioning of the Prime Minister on whether the strikes are effective. In the neighbouring states, we think that the strikes are effective and also that the effect will come even afterwards because these people who are living there first of all have to understand and figure out that if everything does not stop till the summer that will mean that they will not know with what to feed their animals, with what to feed their families, how to travel and how to move because everything will be destroyed and this will create another public opinion in Yugoslavia and a question about the responsibility and who is going to pay the price of such a policy will be probably the main question in public opinion in Serbia. That is why, as a neighbour, I think that the bombings will bring success.

FOREIGN SECRETARY: Before we break up, can I just say one last word on Tomlinson which is to express a word of appreciation to many of the papers who wrote about it this morning. I think the responsible tone that has been taken by the papers today is absolutely right. We deeply regret what has happened, it is a difficult situation for us to act on but I think we are all clear there can be no justification for trying to put into the public domain the damaging information that he sought to do whether or not it is accurate and however many of them are accurate.