The Netherlands are at war with Yugoslavia. Our airforce participates in the air strikes on Yugoslavian targets in Serbia and Montenegro. Almost the entire Dutch Parliament, from the right wing liberals to the Green Left, supports the government's decision to participate in this war. SP is the only party against this armed adventure. Below we'll explain why we consider this NATO attack to Serbia and Montenegro illegal and irresponsible.

For the first time since its foundation NATO operates without any base in international law outside the treaty area of the 19 participating countries. Dutch minister Van Aartsen explained to the Second Chamber that UN Security Council's resolutions 1199 and 1203 allow armed intervention in Yugoslavia. UN Security Council secretary general Kofi Annan however immediately made an end to this misconception. He pointed out once again an explicit resolution of the Security Council being needed for the use of violence.

Two out of five permanent members of the Security Council immediately raised objections to the air strike and requested an urgent meeting of the Council. Both the Pope and the chairman of the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe regret the bombardments.

The Socialist Party considers the arbitrary action of NATO without the basis of a Security Councils resolution illegal. Arguing that the division in the Security Council permits unilateral action of any coalition of countries is a straight attack to the basis of the United Nations. The Security Council was formed to promote talks in stead of armed action in serious conflicts. NATO's attack on Yugoslavia is therefore also an attack to the fundamental principles of the UN. The NATO campaign turns back the clock for over 50 years, back to the time ruled by the right of the strongest power. Therefore NATO's action is a very dangerous precedent. It suits perfectly the new strategic concept of NATO, soon to be presented in Washington, in which the alliance gives itself the right to intervene with armed forces outside the alliance's treaty area. The current war sketches us the New World Order, in which only NATO decides if, when and how military intervention will take place.

Because of lack of legitimation by the Security Council, NATO introduces a totally new basis for its military activities. In case of humanitarian catastrophes, no other legitimation is needed than the mere seriousness of the situation. But who is to decide whether this situation occurs? Who is to decide the level of intervention, so that it fits the situation? The answer was given on March 24: an arbitrary coalition, properly armed, will decide if, when and how intervention takes place. The 'humanitarian' argument may seem reasonable at first sight, but eventually it turns out to be nothing more than allowing states to attack other states without legitimation by international law. Didn't the Soviet Union use exactly the same 'humanitarian' argument for its intervention in Afghanistan? And even if the 'humanitarian' argument was reasonable why does NATO not intervene in Sierra Leone or Tibet? And what about the hypocrisy of NATO ally Turkey, the state that has a similar conflict within its own borders with the Kurdish people? It is more than sad that the Netherlands, known as defender of international law, now agrees with this arbitrariness.

The ultimum remedium of military intervention requires at least a clear purpose. What we see and hear now is a variety of purposes of the armed attack on Yugoslavia. US president Clinton considers NATO's credibility a major reason for the air strikes, whereas Dutch minister of Defence De Grave explicitly denies this purpose. He talks about the protection of the refugees in Kosovo, an argument called ridiculous by De Grave's own Liberal Party. One government leader maintains that the air strikes should bring Yugoslavian president Milosevic to sign the Rambouillet treaty, the other states that decimation of the Serb army is the aim of the attack.

Whatever purpose we take serious, none of them came closer after the first ten days of war. President Milosevic does not express any willingness to sign "Rambouillet". His army is hardly prevented from misbehave in an absolutely brutal way in Kosovo. Albanian Kosovars are not protected at all. Instead they flee from Kosovo to Albania, Montenegro and Macedonia. Albanians in the rest of Yugoslavia fear revenge. Western journalists, the last remaining observers in the country, have been arrested, intimidated and expelled. Relief organisations are put in a situation in which they have no way to go. The last remaining opposition against the policy of president Milosevic disappears or is being finished. The intentions to separate Kosovo from Yugoslavia are being strengthened although the international community does not have that purpose at all. The possibility of the conflict escalating to Montenegro and Vojvodina (with its big Hungarian population) and to neighbouring countries like Macedonia, Albania and Bosnia, is growing day the day. Russia, being furious, suspended its co-operation with NATO in the Partnership for peace and promised to support the Serbs. This development too increases the risk of escalation of the conflict.

The Netherlands now take part in a NATO war that seems a fatal step in the dark. Not before the night the first bombs fell on Yugoslavia, Dutch government sended - only after a special request of the Socialist Party - its Minister of Foreign Affairs Van Aartsen into Parliament to explain the Dutch involvement in the war. One day earlier the government had refused to come and explain its position. Prime Minister Kok waited more than a week before explaining the government's decision to partake in a war to Parliament and the people.

After ten days of war nobody knows where it is leading to and how it ever can be ended. Just one thing is clear: The situation for the people in Yugoslavia is growing worse every day. Hundreds of thousands of Kosovars are fleeing from their country, the Serbian people are suffering from the bombardments, and sustainable peace is out of sight. If we're not able to change the situation, a terrible Balkan war is to break out.

Therefore the Socialist Party calls on the government and the citizens of the Netherlands to plead in favour of immediate ending of the air strikes and restarting negotiations between the Yugoslavian government and the Kosovars. Many representatives of culture, science and peace movements subscribe to the appeal of SP chairman Jan Marijnissen, published in the major Dutch newspapers at Easter Saturday.

April 8, 1999

Socialistische Partij The Netherlands
Tiny Kox,
General secretary