Toby on Tuesday

'Enlarge and Expand' 

Last week I wrote about Turkey’s application for EU membership.   Today I want to write about yet another candidate country, Bosnia-Herzegovina, with a membership application that is far further advanced.   Now, on 28th June, 1914, Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria, heir to the Austro-Hungarian empire, and his wife Sophie were assassinated when visiting its capital, Sarajevo.   This was the trigger that ignited the First World War and just five weeks later Britain went down into the abyss.   Today we live with the consequences of that assassination and, if we vote to “Remain” a member of the EU, we shall find ourselves in a political union with Bosnia-Herzegovina.   In 2010, visa-free travel to the Schengen zone (and by definition on to Britain) began and last month the country applied formally for EU membership, an application which, given its close links to Germany throughout the 20th century, will be little more than a formality.   Yet we know so little about this particular Balkan state with its population of some 4 million and with which we may soon be intertwined.   So some study is worthwhile and here I am indebted to my dear old friend Rodney Atkinson, as gifted and original a political economist as his brother Rowan, now appearing on ITV as Maigret, is an actor.

 

Now Rodney has recently published his latest polemic on the EU, “And Into the Fire – Fascist Elements in Post War Europe and the Development of the European Union.”   Published by GM Books, it is available through Amazon as either an ebook or as a paperback.   And Chapter 14 is entitled ‘Bosnia:  Re-formed the Nazi SS Division “Handzar” in 1991.’   It describes our very own Paddy Ashdown’s little-known appointment (through Tony Blair’s influence) as “High Representative for Bosnia and Herzegovina” from 2002 to 2006, when he became all-too close to Alia Izetbegovic, the country’s President from 1990 to 2000.   And at Izetbegovic’s funeral in 2003 our Paddy declared, “He became the father of his people – the person who did more than any other to ensure the survival of the modern state of Bosnia and Herzegovina.”   That’s quite a tribute but just for the record, Izetbegovic had been the author of “The Muslim Declaration”, in which he commended Pakistan as the model for the future of his country.   And in it he wrote, “There can be no peace nor co-existence between the Islamic Faith and non Islamic institutions...The Islamic movement must and can take power as soon as it is morally and numerically strong enough not only to destroy the non Islamic power but to build a new Islamic one.” 

 

Rodney’s book also describes how Izetbegovic re-formed the Bosnian Muslim Nazi SS Division from World War II, the “Handzar” or “Dagger” Division.   And he reproduces a photograph on display at the Imperial War Museum showing Heinrich Himmler inspecting the 13th Waffen SS Division Handzar, responsible among other grisly tasks for maintaining the rail link between the Balkans and Auschwitz, as well as a Balkan War poster from 1991 with the headline, “The Handzar Division is Ready.”   More recently, the “Handzar Division” formed Izetbegovic’s personal guard.   And Rodney quotes a Wall Street Journal report from 2001 that, “For the past 10 years, the most senior leaders of al Qaeda have visited the Balkans, including bin Laden himself on three occasions between 1994 and 1996.   The Egyptian surgeon turned terrorist leader Ayman Al-Zawahiri has operated terrorist training camps, weapons of mass destruction factories and money-laundering and drug-trading networks throughout Albania, Kosovo, Macedonia, Bulgaria, Turkey and Bosnia.   This has gone on for a decade.”   

 

Now, a vote to “Remain” part of the EU would be a vote to be in a political union with both Turkey and Bosnia-Herzegovina.   Somehow we have to get this message across to voters.   The EU never stands still and my firm belief is that the safe choice is now to “Leave”.   Both Turkey and Bosnia-Herzegovina may be exotic and exciting places to visit, but history has a horrible habit of repeating itself.   Paddy Ashdown might have got just a bit over-excited at becoming a “High Representative”, but there is a limit to the amount of excitement that most of us can take and that limit that has definitely now been reached!

 

Until next Tuesday!

 

Toby