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Friday 2nd October 2009 | 14:22

Hague writes to Miliband demanding apology for European "slur"

William Hague has written to David Miliband calling for an apology following the Foreign secretary's comments about the Conservatives European partners in his conference speech.

William Hague letter to David Miliband in full

Dear David,

I was appalled by some of your remarks in the speech you gave to the Labour Party conference. I do not understand why the Foreign Secretary of the United Kingdom should choose to recycle false Soviet propaganda, apparently for the cheapest party political purposes.

As Foreign Secretary you must surely know the true facts and historical circumstances. You must know that to describe the Latvian forces who fought the Soviets as ‘Waffen SS’ is misleading. As you ought to know, the American Displaced Persons Commission declared in 1950 that ‘the Waffen-SS units of the Baltic States (the Baltic Legions) are to be seen as units that stood apart and were different from the German SS in terms of goals, ideologies, operations and constitution, and the Commission does not, therefore, consider them to be a movement that is hostile to the government of the United States’. You should also be aware of the fact that, far from being treated as war criminals, those Latvians who became British prisoners of war were allowed to settle in the United Kingdom by the Labour Government of the time. I am very surprised that you appear to think that you have better judgement in this matter than Clement Attlee.

You must know that TB/LNNK form part of the coalition Government in Latvia. You must know that the majority of Latvia’s political parties, the majority of parties forming Latvia’s current Government including the Prime Minister’s party, have attended the commemoration of Latvians who fought in the Second World War. Your remarks are a slur on the reputation of a country that is a good friend to Britain and a close ally in NATO and the EU. There is a real danger that you could damage relations with Latvia and other countries who suffered under totalitarian Communist rule. More broadly, by endorsing Soviet propaganda as fact you implicitly denigrate the oppression of tens of millions of Eastern Europeans under Communism and abet those who still try to justify the crimes of the Soviet era. I suggest that you withdraw your remarks immediately and apologise to TB/LNNK and the Latvian Government.

My colleague Eric Pickles’ record of combating anti-Semitism and other forms of racism speaks for itself. Your allegation that he defended the Waffen-SS is contemptible and I hope you will have the good grace to apologise to him.

I was also shocked that you chose to repeat smears made against Michal Kaminski without any apparent effort to check the facts. Had you done so, you would have known that Michael Schudrich, the Chief Rabbi of Poland, has said that his remarks have been misrepresented, that it is a gross slur to suggest that Michal Kaminski has a neo-Nazi past and that Mr Kaminski has a noted record for denouncing the elements of anti-Semitism that still linger in Poland. Did you not wonder why, if your allegations were true, the Israeli Government welcomed Michal Kaminski on an official visit to that country last month? I strongly suggest you apologise to Michal Kaminski for your disgraceful remarks.

It is true that it is unwise for people in glass houses to throw stones. So how do you justify that fact that in the last European Parliament Labour MEPs sat alongside an MEP from the Polish Self-Defence Party, whose leader has praised Adolf Hitler, and the Italian MEP Giulietto Chiesa, who has promoted the conspiracy theory that the CIA was responsible for 9/11? Does it not cause you some unease that while so many of our allies in the European Parliament were active in the struggle for democracy east of the Iron Curtain so many of your allies were Communist Party members at the time, including two Polish MEPs named by the official Institute of Polish National Remembrance as collaborators with the secret police?

Democratic politics is at its best when it is a civilised and constructive debate between different points of view. It is deeply regrettable that you have listened to those who prefer the politics of slur and smear. Your duty as the country’s Foreign Secretary is to support our nation’s good relations with our allies. By putting your immediate partisan interests before that duty you have fallen short in that responsibility.

Yours sincerely,

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Hague writes to Miliband demanding apology for European "slur"

William Hague has written to David Miliband calling for an apology following the Foreign secretary's comments about the Conservatives European partners in his conference speech.

William Hague letter to David Miliband in full

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