Resolution to Kill

by E. V. Seymour

  ‘I suppose we should be thankful for small mercies.’

  ‘Not sure I agree.’

  Beckett inclined his head.

  ‘If Chatelle has been taken by the same group who kidnapped the others, we could all be in for a nasty surprise.’

  The slight flicker in Beckett’s eyes suggested that although he said nothing he was thinking a great deal. ‘You still believe that the Americans have a hand in it?’

  ‘Believe is too strong a description. All I’m saying is that it can’t be discounted. Think about it. Asia is on the rise. China could soon be the new kid on the block. Whatever the official American view on the UN, historically America has never been a fan of what they consider to be an outmoded organisation unprepared for the new global economic, political and military balances.’

  ‘Even our own Prime Minister has expressed views to that effect,’ Beckett chipped in.

  ‘Either the politicos think it should grow teeth and become the world’s hottest

  law-enforcement agency,’ Asim said, ‘or they wish to see it wound up and re-formed into a strictly humanitarian agency with no peacekeeping role …’

  ‘Put it like that, who better to step into the breach than a US-funded organisation like the Alliance to take care of the heavy-duty stuff? Is that what you’re saying?’

  ‘Clay was certainly pushing it as hard as he could,’ Asim said.

  ‘And with things looking decidedly sticky again in the Balkans…’

  ‘Don’t forget the rise of Iranian paramilitary groups, one of America’s biggest enemies, embedded in the woodwork…’

  ‘It would be a good time to press home the advantage.’

  ‘Exactly. As for Chatelle, she’s regarded as a powerful individual who’d like nothing better than reform of the charter. The woman once argued for a UN standing force and its own intelligence capability.’

  ‘I don’t need to be told,’ Beckett said crisply. ‘It was the reason for our earlier suspicions, if you remember.’ He looked off for a moment. ‘How do you think she’ll hold up?’

  ‘She’s tough, a born survivor.’

  ‘Yes, I remember. Remind me again of the details.’

  ‘Father killed in the Congo by army troops in 1960. Mother committed suicide when Chatelle was ten. Brought up by an aunt.’

  Beckett nodded mournfully. ‘Looks like we’re caught in rather a bind.’

  ‘You mean if the Americans are dealing in dirty tricks?’

  Beckett drummed his long fingers on the table. ‘I don’t know, Asim. Do we seriously think that the Americans would fund a ragtag group of disgruntled refugees? The only reason they got interested in the Balkans during the last conflict was because they were shamed into it.’

  ‘Sometimes you have to think the unthinkable.’

  Beckett clearly wasn’t sold. ‘For God’s sake, you’re asking me to believe they’d kill their own people? They’re Americans, not Russians,’ he said pointedly. ‘And it’s simply not normal for us to take on those who are supposed to be our allies. Think of the fallout. Think of the damage to our intelligence relationship.’

  ‘I am aware of the possible dangers,’ Asim concurred with a straight look.

  Beckett let out a long, heavy sigh. ‘We really don’t have a bloody clue, do we? Any word from Clay?’

  ‘Nothing,’ Asim said. ‘Any news from your man?’

  ‘Saul? Not since he last checked in.’

  ‘What do you want to do about Tallis?’

  Beckett flashed a chill smile. ‘We let him run, as agreed. Right now, it’s possible he’s all we have.’

  In many ways Stella Diamond reminded Tallis of Chatelle. Not in appearance but in manner. Unmarried, strong, an independent type of woman, she exuded warmth, which he found attractive. She was also smart, something he rated. And she was direct.

  After his collapse he had a hazy memory of Stella manhandling him back to her apartment near the Old Synagogue in Skenderija, where he crashed out for a straight twenty-four hours. When he finally awoke and got up she greeted him with crossed arms, a sharp look and four words.

  ‘You carry a gun.’

  He admitted he did.

  ‘Strange for a university lecturer.’ The tone was excoriating. He braced himself. This would be the time she threw him out, he thought. To his surprise, she didn’t. ‘Who are you?’

  ‘My name is Tallis, Paul Tallis. I used to work for the intelligence service, MI5.’

  ‘Used to?’

  ‘That’s right.’

  ‘What exactly happened to you?’

  ‘I was abducted.’

  ‘By whom?’ She sounded suspicious. She looked worried.

  ‘An Iranian fundamentalist group.’

  Her face clouded. For Iranian, Tallis suspected she’d translate Muslim. Free of prejudices, Stella Diamond’s heart, he knew, was with those whom she believed had suffered the most. No fool, she appreciated that every ethnic group had blood on its hands when it came to the fighting, yet it did not come easy for her to cast Muslims as bad guys. He could tell that it troubled her. He briefly wondered whether the failed love affair, to which she only alluded, had been scuppered by race or religion. ‘Those questions you asked about Garich, the massacres,’ she said, clearly trying to understand his role, ‘are they connected to the deteriorating political situation?’

  ‘I genuinely don’t know.’

  ‘But they might be?’

  ‘Yes.’

  For a long moment she studied him, then offered him coffee and something to eat. He accepted, sat in her cream-painted kitchen with blue tiles on its walls, watching as she warmedzeljanica, a pie of spinach and cheese wrapped in filo pastry.

  ‘Men who fled the fighting the first time are returning from Europe,’ she said ruminatively.

  ‘A bad sign.’

  ‘Place is like a tinderbox. It’s in the air. There are reports that the city is being surrounded once more. You know they’ve taken Fikret?’

  ‘What?’ Tallis said, dismayed. ‘Who took him?’

  ‘I have no idea. Fundamentalist Serbs, probably. They seem most vocal.’

  Tallis thought of Josif. It felt as if he had glass shattering inside his brain. The old alliances were the same. The rage was the same.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he said helplessly.

  Stella let out a mirthless laugh. ‘The whole world is sorry, but will it do anything? For reasons that entirely escape me, the Balkans lacks the same level of attention as other parts of the globe. The only time we have a slight stir is when one or other war criminal is finally tracked and hauled before The Hague. ‘

  ‘I can help,’ he said impulsively. ‘Do you know where they’ve taken him?’

  Stella shook her head. ‘It’s reported there are camps being set up secretly, close to Bratunac, near the border.’

  East, where Josif and his men were heading, he remembered. ‘Do you have a car I can borrow?’

  A flush of colour spread over her cheeks. She slowly shook her head.

  ‘But you have a car?’

  ‘I hardly know you.’

  What she meant was that she didn’t trust him. She seemed suddenly distant and contained. All right, he thought, the rules of engagement just changed. ‘You were at Tuzla refugee camp, right?’

  Her expression sharpened. ‘When I first came here. So what?’

  ‘There’s a connection between what happened then and what’s happening now.’

  ‘How? I don’t understand.’

  And so what the Iranians had failed to extract during hours of torture, he confessed to Stella Diamond. He told her about Sabina, the girl with the slow, sad eyes, and Anna, about Bilal, the Albanian, how the girls had been duped and abducted from Tuzla refugee camp in the 1990s.

  ‘With the aid of UN peacekeepers?’ Diamond said, coldly cynical.

  He nodded and told her of the abductions, the killing of American undercover operatives in the Sudan. ‘Stella, the girls are part of a terror
ist network.’

  ‘No,’ she said, vehement. ‘It’s risible. It’s impossible. It’s…’

  ‘True.’

  She sat down with a bump, ran her fingers through her mane of dark hair. She looked up at him. ‘And that’s why you came here to Bosnia and Herzegovina?’

  It was more complicated than that but it would do. ‘I need to find them.’

  ‘How do you know they are here?’

  ‘I don’t. I think Anna might be. According to Bilal, they were fond of a place called Lukomir.’

  ‘I know it. It’s high in the mountains.’

  But first, to prove that he was worthy, he promised he would find Fikret.

  They ate. Tentatively, Stella asked why he’d parted company with the intelligence services.

  ‘A clash of opinions,’ he said, evasive.

  She tried to push some more. ‘How about we play I confirm, you deny?’ There was an awkward smile on her face. He couldn’t make out whether she was simply plain curious, or she had some other unspecified reason. He hoped it wasn’t the latter.

  ‘No,’ he said, vehement. ‘I’ve said too much already.’

  After he’d eaten, Tallis visited the bathroom. When he returned, the small television was on in the kitchen, Diamond standing transfixed in front of it. ‘Isolde Chatelle has been kidnapped in Turkey.’

  Tallis turned to the screen. So his warning had been in vain, and the hostage-takers had gone public, as he feared they would, blowing apart Beckett and Asim’s secret operation and calling them to account. Who the hell was tugging the strings? Bordered by Greece and Bulgaria on the European side, and Georgia, Armenia, Iran and Iraq on the eastern side, with Syria to the south-east, Turkey provided a dream location for people-snatching. In every intelligence building in the world, there’d no doubt be maps of Turkey, a red flag stuck in Bodrum, the entire area, down to the last rock and grain of sand, studied by the great and the good. But would she be found?

  Tallis followed Diamond’s gaze to a sombre-looking newscaster who announced that the next piece of footage might cause distress to viewers. Asking himself how the powers that be had sanctioned the broadcast, he could only assume that it had already been released on the Internet.

  The camera panned to an outwardly calm Chatelle. She managed to blend elegance with exhaustion better than most, only the crackle in her voice betraying her nerves. Haltingly, she talked of the unfolding situation in Bosnia and Herzegovina, the renewed threat of conflict and bloodshed. ‘To this end, I urge the United Nations to defend the very great numbers of people who are at risk. This time we cannot stand by and watch. This time we have to draw up a comprehensive peacekeeping operation and act. Any other form of response either by NATO or the EU is unacceptable to those who hold me captive. They insist they will kill me,’ she said, a catch in her voice, ‘if you do not take firm and decisive armed action.’

  ‘Dear God,’ Diamond murmured. ‘These people are trying to force a change to the charter.’

  ‘I therefore ask -’ Chatelle said, glancing nervously around her and clearing her throat ‘- I plead that the Security Council meets, puts all national interests aside and passes a resolution to that effect.’

  Tallis said nothing. Demands made by terrorists were mostly barking, designed to be unmeetable because they favoured grabbing headlines over negotiation. As far as it went, Chatelle’s prepared statement sounded like a reasonable philosophical proposition rather than the radical suggestion that it was in practice; no way on earth would the Security Council wear it. There were too many vested interests, not least America’s.

  ‘Within the next twenty-four hours,’ Chatelle said, pale. ‘An advertisement is to be placed in The New York Times stating that the United Nations is to reform. Twenty-four hours after that, UN peacekeepers are to arrive in the Balkans to defend and uphold the rights of the oppressed by use of force. If neither demand is met my captors assure me that they will kill me...’

  As they killed others before, Tallis thought, a gruesome image of the general’s wife with her throat cut streaking through his mind.

  Diamond switched off the television, slumped into a chair and rubbed her face with her hands. ‘This is a nightmare. They’ve done the equivalent of chucking petrol over the country and throwing a match at it.’

  Not just Bosnia and Herzegovina. If the terrorists had their way, any country engulfed by armed domestic conflict could potentially find itself being sorted out by a UN-led standing army. The chaos consuming the United Nations as the mighty machinery of governments around the world clanked into action was unimaginable. He envisaged America’s National Security Adviser holding crisis talks in the Situation Room in the White House with the President, one of many crisis talks, the numerous hours devoted to the painstaking study of the tape; the endless chatter in the corridors of power, heads of state, politicians and the opinionated considering the options and every nation wanting to task its own security services to locate Chatelle and send in its own special services to attempt a rescue. And all this played out before an unforgiving media and public. Turkey, the country from which Chatelle had been snatched, would fall under close scrutiny, the possible implications for it as a nation serious. A few countries would be falling over themselves to assist. Most would shy away. He thought of the blame-game, the pointing of fingers, Muslims getting a bad press, Serbs getting a thrashing, the forging of unholy alliances, the spotlight shining on people like Beckett and Asim, who were now, he hoped, sitting red-faced before a meeting of COBRA chaired by the Prime Minister in a Cabinet office in Whitehall.

  Diamond handed him a set of car keys and a map. ‘Find Fikret.’

  And then he needed to find Chatelle. ‘What about you?’ he said.

  She tilted her head. ‘I will stay as I did before.’

  ‘You’re sure?’

  ‘Certain.’ A dark light played in her eyes.

  ‘Thanks, Stella.’ Kissing her on both cheeks, he clutched the keys tight in his hand and left.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  Beckett and Asim were on the thirty-eighth floor of the Secretariat Building in New York. Following a meeting with the British Prime Minister, they had a proposition to put before Ingmar Seastrom, Chatelle’s deputy and stand-in secretary general. First they’d had to fight their way through the chief of staff and head of public information, men who’d devoted their entire careers to diplomacy and the service of the United Nations.

  They were seated in a formal conference room with an oval table and chairs for thirty.

  ‘I believe the Prime Minister has made you aware that the secretary general came to us with her concerns.’

  Seastrom nodded gravely. ‘A highly unorthodox move.’

  ‘Which is why we will deny all knowledge, if we have to,’ Beckett said with a slow smile. ‘You really had no idea?’

  ‘None at all,’ Seastrom said. ‘We talked about the situation often, but she gave no indication that she was taking the threat so seriously. I misjudged her.’

  ‘You were concerned?’ Asim said, his voice calmly authoritative.

  ‘Of course. A sinister pattern was developing. I said as much to Isolde.’ Seastrom leant across the table to the two men facing him. ‘Would these people really kill her?’

  ‘I’m afraid so,’ Beckett said.

  Seastrom’s face fell. ‘I can’t believe it. You have no idea how much she’s loved and respected.’

  ‘Partly the reason she’s been taken,’ Asim said softly.

  ‘And there’s no way she can be rescued?’

  ‘Not if we can’t find where she is,’ Beckett said.

  ‘Together with a range of other agencies, we’re using every means at our disposal to find her,’ Asim assured Seastrom.

  ‘And what do you propose we do?’ Seastrom said, spreading his hands.

  Beckett looked at Asim. ‘As you are aware,’ Asim said delicately, ‘this is not simply about securing the release of the secretary general.’

&n
bsp; Seastrom viewed him with a pained expression.

  ‘It’s about the entire future role of the United Nations.’

  Seastrom frowned. ‘A future that will not be defined by terrorists. What are you suggesting? That we accede to the hostage-takers’ demands?’

  Asim said nothing. Beckett cleared his throat. ‘We also have a rather difficult situation unravelling in Bosnia and Herzegovina.’

  ‘Thanks to a number of vicious minority groups, the country is coming apart again,’ Seastrom agreed. He looked mournful. ‘A place dear to Isolde’s heart, she made it a personal crusade.’

  ‘How so?’ Asim’s voice was soft and undulating, yet his eyes were bright with fire.

  ‘She lobbied for extra funding for new development projects there, privately selecting a number of staff to oversee the proper allocation of budgets.’

  ‘Admirable,’ Beckett said, his tone suggesting that they had more important matters of security to discuss. He looked back at Asim, elevating an eyebrow, prompting him to continue.

  ‘May I be frank?’ Asim said.

  Seastrom nodded. ‘Please do.’

  ‘If the Serbs are vilified, the Russians will respond. If the Muslims are vilified, the Iranians will respond. Bosnia has all the makings of playing host to a dangerous clash between East and West. The UN has to step in. No individual country can take the risk.’

  ‘Most of the key players are overstretched in any case,’ Beckett interjected.

  The colour in Seastrom’s blue eyes intensified. ‘I don’t understand. What are you asking me to do?’

  ‘Go ahead with the advertisement,’ Asim continued, ‘then talk to the Security Council, persuade them to pass a resolution unique in its history, a resolution to intervene within a sovereign state, a resolution to use force.’

  ‘A resolution to kill?’ Seastrom’s jaw momentarily dropped open. ‘If we start killing people we will lose not only our neutrality, our most prized asset, but all moral authority,’ he spluttered. ‘It’s against everything we stand for.’

  ‘What do you stand for?’ Beckett said. ‘NATO runs most operations. You allow the British and the French to act as one-man bands and intervene in the occasional awkward trouble spot. You couldn’t prevent the United States from going to war in either Iraq or Afghanistan. You do nothing about Israel biting chunks out of the Palestinians in Gaza. You do nothing about Arabs targeting Israeli citizens with rockets. What, forgive me, is the precise point of your organisation apart from a bit of do-gooding here and there?’