20/02/2016 Dateline London


20/02/2016

Similar Content

Browse content similar to 20/02/2016. Check below for episodes and series from the same categories and more!

Transcript


LineFromTo

reported dead. The government has declared a state of natural disaster

:00:00.:00:00.

across the island and a curfew remains in place. Now it is time for

:00:00.:00:08.

Hello and welcome to Dateline London.

:00:09.:00:24.

Russia says it does not bomb hospitals and Syria.

:00:25.:00:34.

My guests today include a Russian journalist,

:00:35.:00:42.

Janet Daley from the Sunday Telegraph.

:00:43.:00:48.

David Cameron told us he is battling for Britain

:00:49.:00:50.

Can he wind a referendum on how far above the EU have to change

:00:51.:00:58.

Has it failed to live up to the hopes?

:00:59.:01:13.

It is the most significant thing about the EU, that it took all this

:01:14.:01:18.

agony, this week, and three days of solid arguing to get this result.

:01:19.:01:29.

That means that this opportunity that many of us thought existed

:01:30.:01:32.

to reform the EU through this renegotiation of the UK position,

:01:33.:01:38.

If it took them all that hassle and all that discussion,

:01:39.:01:49.

how much of this was pantomime and pre-scripted?

:01:50.:01:52.

It is difficult to say, but the point was that they tried

:01:53.:01:55.

to give the impression that this was the most contentious thing that

:01:56.:01:59.

had ever been presented to them, and then they finally agreed

:02:00.:02:02.

on something, that hardly causes a ripple.

:02:03.:02:07.

Most of these are rhetorical changes.

:02:08.:02:13.

At his press conference David Cameron was saying things

:02:14.:02:16.

He said that we would never be a member of the euro,

:02:17.:02:27.

but no one has suggested that we should join them.

:02:28.:02:29.

The idea that we have created some special status within the EU,

:02:30.:02:35.

The one concession that he did achieve is about benefits

:02:36.:02:47.

Working tax credits are going to disappear

:02:48.:02:51.

because they are introducing the living wage.

:02:52.:02:53.

This will not make any difference to the EU migration.

:02:54.:03:06.

There are so many countries not willing to do it.

:03:07.:03:14.

The hope that this will lead to a more competitive EU

:03:15.:03:17.

was expressed 50 years ago in Lisbon.

:03:18.:03:21.

Everyone agreed to make Europe the most forward-looking

:03:22.:03:26.

The Italians and French are sticking to somewhat rigid mechanisms

:03:27.:03:35.

On the other hand, what is he going to say to his people?

:03:36.:03:47.

Say it wasn't enough and we cannot accept it as a deal,

:03:48.:03:51.

Perhaps he will say what Alex Salmond says he should say

:03:52.:04:00.

- if he campaigns on the deal he will lose.

:04:01.:04:03.

This is good for national security, good for economic security,

:04:04.:04:10.

he has to move it from the specifics to a bigger picture.

:04:11.:04:13.

Note how the issue of security is coming more and more to the fore.

:04:14.:04:18.

Everyone singing from the same hymn sheet, increasing threats in this

:04:19.:04:21.

world, we can't go it alone, we need a larger family to be more

:04:22.:04:26.

effective in containing the dangers arising.

:04:27.:04:30.

Somewhat wobbly, and this is the status of Britain.

:04:31.:04:38.

It's always been separate from the continent.

:04:39.:04:46.

It has never been in doubt we would do things differently,

:04:47.:04:49.

never been in doubt that Britain is not like that about Europe.

:04:50.:04:53.

He said he did not like Brussels when he was just there and he talks

:04:54.:04:57.

like that - it's amazing how you let him get away with it.

:04:58.:05:01.

You've given him a presumed deal and the guy has the nerve to say

:05:02.:05:04.

I was asked by Russian television, while Cameron was debating

:05:05.:05:12.

at the summit, to forecast what was going to happen.

:05:13.:05:17.

I said the package would be very unexciting.

:05:18.:05:24.

That basically nobody thinks that Britain will ever leave the EU.

:05:25.:05:30.

Such an impossible scenario to envisage.

:05:31.:05:35.

They write it so much they repeat it all the time.

:05:36.:05:39.

My point is, if Cameron was serious about this,

:05:40.:05:42.

He never promised anyone a referendum in 2016.

:05:43.:05:50.

He had all the time in the world to work out a really good package.

:05:51.:05:56.

But is that not because you are assuming this is about the EU rather

:05:57.:05:59.

than the internal politics of the Tory party?

:06:00.:06:02.

If it is about the EU, you could say, let's take three

:06:03.:06:05.

If it is about what will I do for the rest of my term,

:06:06.:06:11.

That would be terrible, let's get it over with.

:06:12.:06:18.

He has moved the dates because he's going to leave soon.

:06:19.:06:23.

Because this referendum committee needs to deliver.

:06:24.:06:28.

He can't just say, I am leaving, you can do this.

:06:29.:06:33.

So my suspicions is that we will see the back of Cameron soon.

:06:34.:06:46.

We don't know how much of the deal he brought back today

:06:47.:06:53.

Will there be referendum calls in other countries in Europe?

:06:54.:06:59.

Will the European Court overrule some of this?

:07:00.:07:04.

And on the other side, possibly more important,

:07:05.:07:06.

we don't know how the European Union itself is going to fare as soon

:07:07.:07:10.

If the migrant crisis is again bad, or worse than it was last year,

:07:11.:07:18.

if the euro begins to show new signs of faltering, you may find

:07:19.:07:25.

that the European Union, one or two years from now,

:07:26.:07:28.

looks much different on its own account

:07:29.:07:31.

I would say the European Union loves this referendum.

:07:32.:07:40.

The reason being that the referendum will seal Britain's membership

:07:41.:07:42.

It's not just the views of British people, or those who don't

:07:43.:07:59.

There's a secret subtext being circulated among people

:08:00.:08:07.

in favour of remaining and that is, the whole thing is going to implode

:08:08.:08:11.

It has become unsustainable and migration is going to split it

:08:12.:08:18.

The euro is going to split it north to south.

:08:19.:08:27.

As we saw with Greece's spectacular threat to veto the whole thing.

:08:28.:08:31.

This is not a sustainable project any longer.

:08:32.:08:50.

So it does not really matter whether we vote...

:08:51.:08:52.

That speaks against Alexander's idea to have left the vote on this

:08:53.:08:58.

issue until next year, the date originally set.

:08:59.:09:00.

He can't have the issue hanging round his neck like an albatross.

:09:01.:09:03.

Secondly, the European Union is apparently unravelling

:09:04.:09:05.

on the fringes, and if you need to do anything you

:09:06.:09:08.

We are being a little dismissive of what Cameron has achieved

:09:09.:09:12.

If we turn this upside down and look at it the other the way,

:09:13.:09:16.

I don't think it was melodrama, the way that some of the smaller

:09:17.:09:20.

countries of Eastern Europe, indeed France and Germany,

:09:21.:09:22.

have resisted some of these changes, very strongly, and required 30 hours

:09:23.:09:25.

of negotiation to achieve what Cameron did.

:09:26.:09:28.

I think that tells us that the concessions they made

:09:29.:09:31.

Particularly those countries in Eastern Europe which have

:09:32.:09:36.

benefited so much by the wealth transfer of being a member

:09:37.:09:40.

They have given up something in the face of strong opposition.

:09:41.:09:47.

The issue was blown out of all proportion.

:09:48.:09:53.

Yet it is in the position, we are talking about it

:09:54.:09:57.

We've also seen in the past week the Leave campaign, whatever

:09:58.:10:06.

the arguments for and against, it has been a bit of a shambles.

:10:07.:10:10.

Now you've got Nigel Farage and George Galloway,

:10:11.:10:12.

They will not be, I promise, the official accredited

:10:13.:10:17.

The respectable one will be the official voice

:10:18.:10:25.

But it is true that this kind of essential image of Nigel Farage

:10:26.:10:34.

and George Galloway is damaging to the campaign.

:10:35.:10:39.

People ask themselves, what will this say about me?

:10:40.:10:42.

And this could have a significant negative effect on the potential

:10:43.:10:44.

The prospect of a ceasefire and humanitarian help for besieged

:10:45.:11:00.

towns in Syria, the bombing of hospitals by Russian planes

:11:01.:11:05.

or not, depending who you believe, the threat of Turkish or Saudi

:11:06.:11:09.

troops invading Syria or not, and terrorist bombing in the capital

:11:10.:11:14.

And more talk of the new Cold War between Russia and the West.

:11:15.:11:21.

The challenge for everyone around the table is to expand

:11:22.:11:24.

I think the problem is those divisions between the West

:11:25.:11:36.

and Russia are basically fuelling this conflict even more,

:11:37.:11:41.

because until you have some sort of agreement between the major

:11:42.:11:47.

players, you cannot really sort out this situation.

:11:48.:11:50.

The problem for the Russian side is that they are trying to convince

:11:51.:11:53.

the Western partners, whatever you call them,

:11:54.:11:57.

that Assad is not the issue at the moment.

:11:58.:12:01.

Let's make Isis and other terrorist groups the main issue.

:12:02.:12:06.

Unfortunately the Americans are saying one day, one thing,

:12:07.:12:10.

probably we will keep him for a while, the next day they say,

:12:11.:12:13.

And that is causing disruption and misunderstanding.

:12:14.:12:20.

Putin has been basically offering to create the united anti-terrorist

:12:21.:12:25.

operation for how long, months, and no response.

:12:26.:12:29.

We had an agreement in Geneva to stop the bombing

:12:30.:12:38.

And as that was announced the bombing continued.

:12:39.:12:44.

You can't demand a ceasefire in a situation in a week's time

:12:45.:12:51.

when nobody knows who is who and who is doing what.

:12:52.:12:58.

You have to give them at least a month or two.

:12:59.:13:01.

Just a way to show, we are doing this...

:13:02.:13:06.

Why have a ceasefire if you think it won't work?

:13:07.:13:11.

They could not not agree but the terms were

:13:12.:13:17.

Putin's top priority is to keep Assad in power.

:13:18.:13:26.

They don't want to lose their proxy in that region.

:13:27.:13:32.

They want to make sure that their sphere of influence

:13:33.:13:36.

His point is that Assad is irrelevant at the moment

:13:37.:13:48.

because there are much worse people than him.

:13:49.:13:51.

Assad is pushing Syrians and Iraqis and people in the region

:13:52.:13:54.

Until you get rid of the Assad regime you will never stop the flood

:13:55.:14:02.

Assad is a genocidal tyrant and the Russians support him

:14:03.:14:10.

for their own reasons I agree on one point,

:14:11.:14:12.

the isolation in Washington has been absolutely fatal to this process.

:14:13.:14:19.

And it has allowed Putin to occupy the vacuum that has been left

:14:20.:14:22.

None of us around this table like Mr Putin very much,

:14:23.:14:34.

but of all the international leaders to have engaged with this problem,

:14:35.:14:38.

the one who seems to know what he is doing, however

:14:39.:14:42.

much we may dislike it, is Mr Putin.

:14:43.:14:47.

And he has, in less than three months, rewritten the map.

:14:48.:14:51.

And we don't know how far that his going.

:14:52.:15:00.

But along with the bombings of the hospitals and the other

:15:01.:15:03.

outrages committed by Russian air power...

:15:04.:15:06.

Remember that the Russian media is much more present on the ground

:15:07.:15:18.

The Western media comes in and out, the Russian correspondents

:15:19.:15:23.

If you watch Russian TV you would see their reports

:15:24.:15:28.

You mentioned the Obama administration.

:15:29.:15:37.

Is part of the problem not that the Obama administration sees

:15:38.:15:41.

the Kurdish fighters on the ground are doing a lot of the ground

:15:42.:15:44.

fighting, but that the Obama administration is in Nato

:15:45.:15:47.

with the Turks and the Turks are bombing the Kurds?

:15:48.:15:50.

So to go back to your summary, it is a mess.

:15:51.:15:57.

The situation is probably insoluble certainly by Western forces.

:15:58.:15:59.

The trouble is if the Western forces give up and leave the region

:16:00.:16:03.

to Russia and Assad to carve up the region, that would be

:16:04.:16:06.

The tension between Russia and Turkey is appalling.

:16:07.:16:12.

And there is a seriously dangerous situation.

:16:13.:16:19.

It threatens to be the big picture - the Nato mission in conflict

:16:20.:16:22.

with Russia over an area disputed in northern Syria,

:16:23.:16:24.

perhaps to keep going in to clean up...

:16:25.:16:31.

If Turkey goes into northern Syria, if it doesn't do so as a member

:16:32.:16:34.

of Nato, it does so to protect its national interest.

:16:35.:16:37.

You don't have to call up paragraph five, say,

:16:38.:16:47.

when one member of Nato is in conflict, the others must come

:16:48.:16:50.

It's the same in the North and the South.

:16:51.:16:55.

If Saudi Arabia and Turkey go into this, this is what we hoped

:16:56.:16:59.

would happen, the neighbouring Arab states would actually take matters

:17:00.:17:01.

It seems to me we need to move beyond the hubris of thinking that

:17:02.:17:12.

foreign leaders from far away, particularly Western leaders,

:17:13.:17:14.

You said that Russia was changing the map.

:17:15.:17:24.

I'm not approving what they are doing, I'm saying is a fact.

:17:25.:17:30.

If Western leaders withdraw that leaves the field open for Russia

:17:31.:17:32.

It seems to me this matter will have to be settled on the ground in Syria

:17:33.:17:38.

and with the influence of other Arab powers in the region,

:17:39.:17:40.

and the best we can do with our money and armed forces

:17:41.:17:43.

is to support everything we can do in mitigation.

:17:44.:17:49.

You had the chance in Libya, and look what is happening now.

:17:50.:17:53.

The Americans have just bombed again.

:17:54.:18:01.

That is what you want to do now with Syria.

:18:02.:18:08.

It may involve nation-building, staying for a decade,

:18:09.:18:17.

but you cannot go in, remove the leadership and walk away.

:18:18.:18:21.

When everyone says, we have no role in the desert, why do

:18:22.:18:40.

You must call their bluff, and the Turkish government

:18:41.:18:44.

Pedalling her own interests in that area.

:18:45.:18:58.

So the adjacent countries have a duty to tell the intervening

:18:59.:19:01.

We will make our own attempt at sorting out this.

:19:02.:19:08.

We will see the results of that local intervention.

:19:09.:19:15.

Including trying to constrain the Russians.

:19:16.:19:20.

We do have influence, but for goodness sake we should have

:19:21.:19:25.

learned after how many years, 12 years of military intervention

:19:26.:19:27.

Military force is not going to solve this problem.

:19:28.:19:34.

But I wanted to ask you, the Russian Prime Minister said

:19:35.:19:43.

Is that how things are seen in Russia?

:19:44.:19:48.

At the same time as that meeting in Munich last week,

:19:49.:19:51.

John Kerry was talking about new investment in defence

:19:52.:19:53.

We know there has been more hardware strengthening Nato there.

:19:54.:20:01.

I've just been to Moscow and spoken to some of the officials there.

:20:02.:20:05.

I think frustration would be the word that they feel

:20:06.:20:08.

Because every attempt, as mentioned already,

:20:09.:20:16.

to something together, in Syria, fails.

:20:17.:20:20.

Nobody responds, nobody talks in a constructive way.

:20:21.:20:24.

And the Russians are still saying that the West doesn't want to accept

:20:25.:20:30.

one important point - that the invasion of Iraq triggered,

:20:31.:20:35.

what they were saying then to the Americans would trigger this

:20:36.:20:41.

chain reaction across the Middle East and even further

:20:42.:20:43.

Obama, as one official noted, made a crucial mistake

:20:44.:20:49.

by pulling out American forces to early from Iraq.

:20:50.:20:51.

What happened afterwards, which people don't talk about,

:20:52.:21:00.

is that Americans, when they pull out, they leave those bloodthirsty

:21:01.:21:03.

private security companies in those countries.

:21:04.:21:06.

Which turn all the people against them because these

:21:07.:21:10.

That is what happened in Iraq, when they were pulled out and those

:21:11.:21:20.

I am sorry that you are changing the topic.

:21:21.:21:28.

That is water under the bridge, 12 years ago.

:21:29.:21:31.

When you came back from Moscow, I think that was crocodile tears

:21:32.:21:34.

and not understanding what the Russians were doing.

:21:35.:21:38.

We cannot accept cluster bombs on people.

:21:39.:21:41.

You are quoting the one person who makes all these claims.

:21:42.:21:52.

Let's forget the hospital, although the Russians are bombing

:21:53.:21:55.

There is such chaos there that the Western press

:21:56.:22:03.

Excuse me, but Peter Byrne has just returned from Aleppo

:22:04.:22:13.

You know the main thrust of his reports?

:22:14.:22:19.

The locals say, why it is the British government

:22:20.:22:22.

supporting terrorists and not helping to fight for them?

:22:23.:22:25.

This is not a Russian correspondent saying this.

:22:26.:22:30.

Read his reports and you will see what the locals think

:22:31.:22:33.

about the Russian bombing campaign and the Russians helping Syria.

:22:34.:22:38.

All the evidence we've seen on our television screens,

:22:39.:22:45.

apart from Peter, who have got there, is that there's a widespread

:22:46.:22:49.

anger against the Russian air force for its bombing campaign.

:22:50.:22:52.

Just a few minutes left, you cannot say what happened in Iran

:22:53.:23:02.

The point is, we are where we are and we must start

:23:03.:23:09.

The Obama administration treading on its red line in Syria was just

:23:10.:23:18.

a signal to Putin that he could have his way in that region and he's

:23:19.:23:22.

This is an appalling situation and we now have to decide how

:23:23.:23:28.

If that means backing up Turkey as a Nato country,

:23:29.:23:33.

the difficulty there is with the Kurds because they are fighting

:23:34.:23:35.

Isil and the Turks don't like the Kurds.

:23:36.:23:39.

This is a very, very messy situation.

:23:40.:23:41.

No point in trading preposterous stories

:23:42.:23:42.

You raised the question about the European Union

:23:43.:23:51.

These two stories are connected - do you think there is a case that

:23:52.:23:58.

migration will be on the minds of many British people

:23:59.:24:01.

when they vote on the EU referendum on June 23.

:24:02.:24:05.

May it be to Mr Cameron's benefit to say that it is better

:24:06.:24:09.

that the European Union acts in concert, which it hasn't done

:24:10.:24:11.

I'm quite negative about the likely effect of the worsening refugee

:24:12.:24:21.

situation in Europe impinging on the referendum.

:24:22.:24:26.

It might make David Cameron's job more difficult because of the chaos

:24:27.:24:29.

created by the Syrian situation in Europe.

:24:30.:24:39.

Even more exodus from that country.

:24:40.:24:41.

Some said it was Project Fear if Britain was no longer in the EU?

:24:42.:24:51.

The French can say, we will happily let everyone travel

:24:52.:24:59.

The refugee crisis is one of the aftermaths of the Syrian

:25:00.:25:03.

problem which causes great anger in the mind of people in Europe,

:25:04.:25:08.

because we think Russia is instrumental in increasing

:25:09.:25:14.

As far as the referendum is concerned, yes, it might make it

:25:15.:25:18.

harder, but Britain is safe behind the hallowed wall of

:25:19.:25:21.

Do you feel, Thomas, that if Schengen is abandoned

:25:22.:25:31.

for two years it will never come back?

:25:32.:25:33.

We are coming to that crunch time very soon.

:25:34.:25:38.

You can contact us online, we will be back at the same

:25:39.:25:44.

Thank you for watching.

:25:45.:26:11.

It will remain quite unsettled, certainly on Sunday.

:26:12.:26:21.

Outbreaks of rain thanks to this huge arc

:26:22.:26:24.

Download Subtitles

SRT

ASS