Tony Blair's Speech: Full text

Part One

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Tony Blair's Speech: Part Two

The Prime Minister, in the full text of his speech told the Labour conference:

In retrospect the Millennium marked only a moment in time. It was the events of September 11 that marked a turning point in history, where we confront the dangers of the future and assess the choices facing humankind.

It was a tragedy. An act of evil. From this nation, goes our deepest sympathy and prayers for the victims and our profound solidarity with the American people.

We were with you at the first. We will stay with you to the last.

Just two weeks ago, in New York, after the church service I met some of the families of the British victims.

It was in many ways a very British occasion. Tea and biscuits. It was raining outside. Around the edge of the room, strangers making small talk, trying to be normal people in an abnormal situation.

And as you crossed the room, you felt the longing and sadness, hands clutching photos of sons and daughters, wives and husbands, imploring you to believe them when they said there was still an outside chance of their loved ones being found alive, when you knew in truth that all hope was gone.

And then a middle aged mother looks you in the eyes and tells you her only son has died, and asks you: why?

I tell you: you do not feel like the most powerful person in the country at times like that.

Because there is no answer. There is no justification for their pain. Their son did nothing wrong. The woman, seven months pregnant, whose child will never know its father, did nothing wrong.

They don't want revenge. They want something better in memory of their loved ones.

I believe their memorial can and should be greater than simply the punishment of the guilty.

It is that out of the shadow of this evil, should emerge lasting good: destruction of the machinery of terrorism wherever it is found, hope amongst all nations of a new beginning where we seek to resolve differences in a calm and ordered way, greater understanding between nations and between faiths and above all justice and prosperity for the poor and dispossessed, so that people everywhere can see the chance of a better future through the hard work and creative power of the free citizen, not the violence and savagery of the fanatic.

I know that here in Britain people are anxious, even a little frightened. I understand that. People know we must act but they worry what might follow.

They worry about the economy and talk of recession.

And, of course there are dangers; it is a new situation.

But the fundamentals of the US, British and European economies are strong.

Every reasonable measure of internal security is being undertaken.

Our way of life is a great deal stronger and will last a great deal longer than the actions of fanatics, small in number and now facing a unified world against them.

People should have confidence.

This is a battle with only one outcome: our victory not theirs.

What happened on September 11 was without parallel in the bloody history of terrorism.

Within a few hours, up to 7000 people were annihilated, the commercial centre of New York was reduced to rubble and in Washington and Pennsylvania further death and horror on an unimaginable scale. Let no one say this was a blow for Islam when the blood of innocent Muslims was shed along with those of the Christian, Jewish and other faiths around the world.

We know those responsible. In Afghanistan are scores of training camps for the export of terror. Chief amongst the sponsors and organisers is Osama Bin Laden.

He is supported, shielded and given succour by the Taliban regime.

Two days before the September 11 attacks, Masood, the leader of the opposition Northern Alliance, was assassinated by two suicide bombers. Both were linked to Bin Laden. Some may call that coincidence. I call it payment – payment in the currency these people deal in: blood.

Be in no doubt: Bin Laden and his people organised this atrocity. The Taliban aid and abet him. He will not desist from further acts of terror. They will not stop helping him.

Whatever the dangers of the action we take, the dangers of inaction are far, far greater.

Look for a moment at the Taliban regime. It is undemocratic. That goes without saying.

There is no sport allowed or television or photography. No art or culture is permitted. All other faiths, all other interpretations of Islam are ruthlessly suppressed.

Those who practice their faith are imprisoned. Women are treated in a way almost too revolting to be credible. First driven out of university, girls not allowed to go to school, no legal rights, unable to go out of doors without a man. Those that disobey are stoned.

There is now no contact permitted with western agencies, even those delivering food. The people live in abject poverty.

It is a regime founded on fear and funded on the drugs trade. The biggest drugs hoard in the world is in Afghanistan, controlled by the Taliban. Ninety per cent of the heroin on British streets originates in Afghanistan.

The arms the Taliban are buying today are paid for with the lives of young British people buying their drugs on British streets.

That is another part of their regime that we should seek to destroy.

So what do we do?

Don't overreact some say. We aren't.

We haven't lashed out. No missiles on the first night just for effect.

Don't kill innocent people. We are not the ones who waged war on the innocent. We seek the guilty.

Look for a diplomatic solution. There is no diplomacy with Bin Laden or the Taliban regime.

State an ultimatum and get their response. We stated the ultimatum; they haven't responded.

Understand the causes of terror. Yes, we should try, but let there be no moral ambiguity about this: nothing could ever justify the events of September 11 and it is to turn justice on its head to pretend it could.

The action we take will be proportionate, targeted. We will do all we humanly can to avoid civilian casualties. But understand what we are dealing with.

Listen to the calls of those passengers on the planes. Think of the children on them, told they were going to die.

Think of the cruelty beyond our comprehension as amongst the screams and the anguish of the innocent, those hijackers drove at full throttle planes laden with fuel into buildings where tens of thousands worked.

They have no moral inhibition on the slaughter of the innocent. If they could have murdered not 7,000 but 70,000 does anyone doubt they would have done so and rejoiced in it?

There is no compromise possible with such people, no meeting of minds, no point of understanding with such terror.

Just a choice: defeat it or be defeated by it. And defeat it we must.

Any action taken will be against the terrorist network of Bin Laden.

As for the Taliban, they can surrender the terrorists or face the consequences and again in any action the aim will be to eliminate their military hardware, cut off their finances, disrupt their supplies, target their troops, not civilians. We will put a trap around the regime.

I say to the Taliban: surrender the terrorists or surrender power. It's your choice.

We will take action at every level, national and international, in the UN, in G8, in the EU, in NATO, in every regional grouping in the world, to strike at international terrorism wherever it exists.

For the first time, the UN Security Council has imposed mandatory obligations on all UN members to cut off terrorist financing and end safe havens for terrorists.

Those that finance terror, those who launder their money, those that cover their tracks are every bit as guilty as the fanatic who commits the final act.

Here in this country and in other nations round the world, laws will be changed, not to deny basic liberties but to prevent their abuse and protect the most basic liberty of all: freedom from terror.

New extradition laws will be introduced, new rules to ensure asylum is not a front for terrorist entry. This country is proud of its tradition in giving asylum to those fleeing tyranny. We will always do so. But we have a duty to protect the system from abuse.

It must be overhauled radically so that from now on, those who abide by the rules get help and those that don't can no longer play the system to gain unfair advantage over others.

Round the world, September 11 is bringing Governments and people to reflect, consider and change. And in this process, amidst all the talk of war and action, there is another dimension appearing.

There is a coming together. The power of community is asserting itself. We are realising how fragile are our frontiers in the face of the world's new challenges.

Today conflicts rarely stay within national boundaries.

Today a tremor in one financial market is repeated in the markets of the world.

Today confidence is global, either its presence or its absence.

Today the threat is chaos, because for people with work to do, family life to balance, mortgages to pay, careers to further, pensions to provide, the yearning is for order and stability and if it doesn't exist elsewhere, it is unlikely to exist here.

I have long believed this interdependence defines the new world we live in.

People say: we are only acting because it's the US that was attacked. Double standards, they say. But when Milosevic embarked on the ethnic cleansing of Muslims in Kosovo, we acted.

The sceptics said it was pointless, we'd make matters worse, we'd make Milosovic stronger and look what happened, we won, the refugees went home, the policies of ethnic cleansing were reversed and one of the great dictators of the last century will see justice in this century.

And I tell you if Rwanda happened again today as it did in 1993, when a million people were slaughtered in cold blood, we would have a moral duty to act there also. We were there in Sierra Leone when a murderous group of gangsters threatened its democratically–elected Government and people.

And we as a country should, and I as Prime Minister do, give thanks for the brilliance, dedication and sheer professionalism of the British Armed Forces.

We can't do it all. Neither can the Americans.

But the power of the international community could, together, if it chose to.

It could, with our help, sort out the blight that is the continuing conflict in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, where three million people have died through war or famine in the last decade.

A Partnership for Africa, between the developed and developing world based around the New African Initiative, is there to be done if we find the will.

On our side: provide more aid, untied to trade; write off debt; help with good governance and infrastructure; training to the soldiers, with UN blessing, in conflict resolution; encouraging investment; and access to our markets so that we practise the free trade we are so fond of preaching.

But it's a deal: on the African side: true democracy, no more excuses for dictatorship, abuses of human rights; no tolerance of bad governance, from the endemic corruption of some states, to the activities of Mr Mugabe's henchmen in Zimbabwe. Proper commercial, legal and financial systems.

The will, with our help, to broker agreements for peace and provide troops to police them.

The state of Africa is a scar on the conscience of the world. But if the world as a community focused on it, we could heal it. And if we don't, it will become deeper and angrier.

We could defeat climate change if we chose to. Kyoto is right. We will implement it and call upon all other nations to do so.

But it's only a start. With imagination, we could use or find the technologies that create energy without destroying our planet; we could provide work and trade without deforestation.

If humankind was able, finally, to make industrial progress without the factory conditions of the 19th Century; surely we have the wit and will to develop economically without despoiling the very environment we depend upon. And if we wanted to, we could breathe new life into the Middle East Peace Process and we must.

The state of Israel must be given recognition by all; freed from terror; know that it is accepted as part of the future of the Middle East not its very existence under threat.

The Palestinians must have justice, the chance to prosper and in their own land, as equal partners with Israel in that future.

We know that. It is the only way, just as we know in our own peace process, in Northern Ireland, there will be no unification of Ireland except by consent – and there will be no return to the days of unionist or protestant supremacy because those days have no place in the modern world. So the unionists must accept justice and equality for nationalists.

The Republicans must show they have given up violence – not just a ceasefire but weapons put beyond use. And not only the Republicans, but those people who call themselves Loyalists, but who by acts of terrorism, sully the name of the United Kingdom.

We know this also. The values we believe in should shine through what we do in Afghanistan.

To the Afghan people we make this commitment. The conflict will not be the end. We will not walk away, as the outside world has done so many times before.

If the Taliban regime changes, we will work with you to make sure its successor is one that is broad–based, that unites all ethnic groups, and that offers some way out of the miserable poverty that is your present existence.

And, more than ever now, with every bit as much thought and planning, we will assemble a humanitarian coalition alongside the military coalition so that inside and outside Afghanistan, the refugees, 4.5 million on the move even before September 11, are given shelter, food and help during the winter months.

The world community must show as much its capacity for compassion as for force.

The critics will say: but how can the world be a community? Nations act in their own self–interest. Of course they do.

But what is the lesson of the financial markets, climate change, international terrorism, nuclear proliferation or world trade? It is that our self–interest and our mutual interests are today inextricably woven together.

This is the politics of globalisation.

I realise why people protest against globalisation.

We watch aspects of it with trepidation. We feel powerless, as if we were now pushed to and fro by forces far beyond our control.

But there's a risk that political leaders, faced with street demonstrations, pander to the argument rather than answer it. The demonstrators are right to say there's injustice, poverty, environmental degradation.

But globalisation is a fact and, by and large, it is driven by people.

Not just in finance, but in communication, in technology, increasingly in culture, in recreation. In the world of the internet, information technology and TV, there will be globalisation. And in trade, the problem is not there's too much of it; on the contrary there's too little of it.

The issue is not how to stop globalisation.

The issue is how we use the power of community to combine it with justice.

If globalisation works only for the benefit of the few, then it will fail and will deserve to fail.

But if we follow the principles that have served us so well at home – that power, wealth and opportunity must be in the hands of the many, not the few – if we make that our guiding light for the global economy, then it will be a force for good and an international movement that we should take pride in leading.

Because the alternative to globalisation is isolation.

Confronted by this reality, round the world, nations are instinctively drawing together. In Quebec, all the countries of North and South America deciding to make one huge free trade area, rivalling Europe.

In Asia, ASEAN. In Europe, the most integrated grouping of all, we are now 15 nations. Another 12 countries negotiating to join and more beyond that.

A new relationship between Russia and Europe is beginning.

And will not India and China, each with three times as many citizens as the whole of the EU put together, once their economies have developed sufficiently as they will do, not reconfigure entirely the geopolitics of the world and in our lifetime?

That is why, with 60% of our trade dependent on Europe, three million jobs tied up with Europe, much of our political weight engaged in Europe, it would be a fundamental denial of our true national interest to turn our backs on Europe.

We will never let that happen.

For 50 years, Britain has, uncharacteristically, followed not led in Europe. At each and every step there are debates central to our future coming up: how we reform European economic policy, how we take forward European defence; how we fight organised crime and terrorism.

Britain needs its voice strong in Europe and bluntly Europe needs a strong Britain, rock solid in our alliance with the US, yet determined to play its full part in shaping Europe's destiny.

We should only be part of the single currency if the economic conditions are met. They are not window–dressing for a political decision. They are fundamental.

But if they are met, we should join, and if met in this Parliament, we should have the courage of our argument to ask the British people for their consent in this Parliament.

Europe is not a threat to Britain. Europe is an opportunity.

It is in taking the best of the Anglo–Saxon and European models of development that Britain's hope of a prosperous future lies.

The American spirit of enterprise; the European spirit of solidarity. We have, here also, an opportunity. Not just to build bridges politically, but economically.

What is the answer to the current crisis? Not isolationism but the world coming together with America as a community.

What is the answer to Britain's relations with Europe? Not opting out, but being leading members of a community in which, in alliance with others, we gain strength.

What is the answer to Britain's future? Not each person for themselves, but working together as a community to ensure that everyone, not just the privileged few, get the chance to succeed.