Arthur Eyffinger: Bush Should Have Brought Saddam to The Hague Court

Novinite Insider » INTERVIEW | October 17, 2003, Friday // 00:00
Arthur Eyffinger: Bush Should Have Brought Saddam to The Hague Court Photo by Yuliana Nikolova (novinite.com)

Dr. Arthur Eyffinger, a prominent Dutch legal historian, is the curator of an exhibition entitled The Hague - International Centre of Justice and Peace, which opened in Sofia early October. Bulgarian public is the first non-specialized audience that has the opportunity to see the exhibition before it starts a lengthy tour across Europe.

Dr. Eyffinger is known in academic circles for his research on Hugo Grotius as well as for his books on history of war and peace. He is co-founder and board member of the Grotiana Foundation and Dutch Seventeenth Century Society.

Dr. Eyffinger spoke to novinite.com Editor Milena Dinkova.

Q: At a press conference in Sofia you cited a forecast made by observers back at the end of the 19th century about the Balkans being the major threat to Europe and the whole world. Do you think this region is still dangerous?

A: At the end of the 19th century it was obvious there was a major threat to war because the great powers such as France and Germany were opposed to each other and would never resolve their problems. You need something to trigger the conflict and the tension in the Balkans was obvious. Balkan peoples wanted to have their own new national states. This was a threat to Austria-Hungary which was a multinational state. It also ran counter the ideas of Russia because some people there thought of the pan-Slavic movement.

And what the authors of this book you mentioned - "The Great War of 189-" - said is that if something would go wrong, it is very likely to go wrong in the Balkans. That is where the major powers would clash and that is where the clash of races and nations would be. And actually they were right because this is what happened. Such was the situation at the end of the 19th century and now we turn to the end of the 20th century.

Over the last decade we have seen that in the Balkans there are still problems related to nations. It has proved very hard, on the one hand, to have a multicultural society. And it is also very difficult to establish all sorts of states that are all pure in race: there will always be minorities. And even if we have many national states, this would be dramatic in economic terms.

So our idea about the future is that for nations like Bulgaria it will be a major asset to be linked to the political and especially economical unity of Europe. The stronger Europe is, the better it can compete with the Asian and American market.

And my idea is - a very personal idea - that once we have obtained a political and economical unity, we will have more room for cultural diversification.

Q: How do you explain the fact that Bulgaria remained peaceful in spite the havoc in former Yugoslavia?

A: It's hard for me to evaluate this. But it must have been quite an achievement on the part of Bulgaria: not to panic and not to be involved. But this is part of your tradition like all relatively small nations. You get a kind of instinct to survive by keeping neutral, negotiate, and use diplomacy.

Q: What will be the main difficulties Bulgaria might face once it is in the European Union?

A: I think that now we have passed the more extreme difficulties. However, there will still be the economic problems. I hope that the companies from the other EU member countries would not try to exploit and profit from Bulgaria and the nations like it. They might think: the wages here are lower so we'll make big profits. What we really need now, perhaps more than ever, is international solidarity.

Look at the problems in Germany for the past decade. As the Berlin Wall collapsed, they thought this would be beneficial to both the West and the East. But this has brought problems mainly because the West wanted to profit. It is also because we [people in the West and East] have different mentalities and this takes time to change. We have been isolated for fifty years at least and now we have to get used to each other.

Here in Bulgaria I met with Prof Pantev - the great historian. We had a dinner and a wonderful talk. I admit we differed on various things though. Finally he lit his pipe. I am a pipe smoker too so I told him: "Whatever you say about Europe, I would never take you serious before I know which kind of tobacco brand you use!" You know, it turned out we have smoked the same tobacco for twenty years. So we can't be that different after all.

Then I told him one thing that will be good for Europe is to have the Union sponsor the translation of the ten best Bulgarian books into English. For instance, Prof. Pantev wrote a book on the 100 most prominent Bulgarians and we would like to have this book in English so that we can understand Bulgaria better.

Q: Do you think Milosevic's trial in The Hague is a fair one? What is his behaviour in the courtroom like?

A: I'm not involved in the trial so I must say I have no personal impression. But it is obvious the Yugoslav tribunal has been by far the best attempt ever for a fair trial. It's far better than anything before, it's far better than the trials of the 20s in New York, Tokyo, and Leipzig.

The world has benefited from the experience with the Yugoslav and Rwanda tribunals so in 1998 it went to the next stage willing to create a proper international tribunal court [the International Criminal Court in The Hague].

This new structure will have the advantage to have seen the pitfalls of the Yugoslav and Rwanda tribunals. They have done the utmost but the law did not give the prosecutors the latitude and the defendants all guarantees for a fair trial.

Q: Do you think the division of Old and New Europe first suggested by US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld actually exists?

A: I think that is an American approach used for the sake of propaganda. It is interesting to see the Americans trying to tackle the problem of terrorism which is, of course, a terrible threat to all of us. There are faced with some problems that are not in the center of their interest or their experience. For people in America, it is very hard to understand the Muslim world.

On the contrary, Europe has never been a unity of political thinking. And here the natural tension. The idea that now there is an Old and New Europe is something, which is not beneficial for discussion or debate and has no purpose I would say. Europe is not divided by its attitude towards the United States. But Europe has a very sensitive and delicate attitude towards issues like the Iraqi problem and the war on terror.

In Holland we had a fiercely debating Parliament on should we follow the American guidance. Of course, we easily agreed that Saddam Hussein had to go somehow and that he was a threat. On the other hand, we wished everything to be done within the rule of the law. Finally we agreed that we would give political support (this is what the Christian-democratic government did) but not military support. And some people thought that's cowardly, others thought that's far too much. But this is what a properly functioning democracy is about - there are many voices.

You see, the position of the Dutch government proved the position of all Christian-democrats across Europe, the same was with the socialists and so on. But within their own nations they had to compromise.

The United States has this bipolar political system and we should not forget it is very different from what we have in Europe.

Q: Some say the controversy surrounding the International Criminal Court fledging in The Hague with the United States opposing some of its aspects indicates a failure of international law? Can you agree with that?

A: No, I cannot. An international criminal court is a thing which has been fought for by many generations of politicians, philosophers and idealists. Finally we came to that point: it can't be all wrong. It has been an ideal of the mankind for centuries.

However, there is the issue of how to implement the ideal into a global system. Perhaps this will take some time but I think it is very much to the benefit of mankind if a criminal court - this or a similar one - will be obeyed by the nations.

Again, all sovereign states have been very hesitant to accept anything which will affect their sovereignty.

But in fact, Mr Bush faced with the former Iraqi government would have a point in simply bringing these people to The Hague for trial. He should be glad there is such a court!

Q: To prepare this exhibition you have worked with Bulgaria‘s General Department of Archives. What was the most interesting aspect of the time spent in Bulgaria?

A: Two aspects. First of all, in terms of the substance of the exhibition. I told my Bulgarian colleagues when I started my work in Sofia that in 1899 Bulgaria made a very great and favorable impression in The Hague [at the first international peace conference]. It was a newcomer but its envoy behaved wonderfully. His name was Dimitur Stanchov and he gained prominence at the Hague Conference.

And then my colleagues found out that they have much on this but they haven't done any research recently. So our joint work was very interesting.

The second aspect which is much more important was to get in touch with people in Bulgaria - people in similar disciplines but with different background. In the past six months, I've been to Vienna, Geneva, St Petersburg, Budapest, and Tallinn. I've seen many nations on the move but what I find here is, as the French say tres sympa - very sympathetic. Sofia is very lively city and you have texcellent cuisine.

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