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William Hague has been making waves in the news in his position as Shadow Foreign Secretary for the Conservatives. With a victory for the Tories in the next election looking ever more likely, Linda Haywood probed the views of the former party leader. Read the second in the set of serialised articles here:

Following the arrest of Radovan Karadzic - the former Serbian nationalist leader and alleged war criminal - the EU is still holding out on ascension talks. Despite the July arrest, Ratko Mladic is still at large with many quarters suspecting that Serbian sympathisers are harbouring the former Chief of Staff of the Bosnian Serb Army. I questioned Mr Hague by e-mail about his views on the matter:

Should the arrest of Ratko Mladic continue to be a condition of EU ascension talks with Serbia in the light of the new government’s co-operation with handing over Karadzic? Why is his capture so crucial to Serbia’s reintegration into European politics?

It is important that the international community demonstrates that no war criminal will ever escape being held accountable for their crimes against humanity and for this reason the arrest of Ratko Mladic should continue to be a condition of Serbia’s ascension talks with the EU. The arrest is important because Bosnia and the region as a whole needs justics and closure after one of its most painful periods in history and I hope this will happen very soon.