Using Montenegro as independence model says it all, Iain Gray tells Alex Salmond

Published on Thursday 23 December 2010 15:36

ALEX Salmond was accused of having "failed as a nationalist" and a First Minister after MSPs were told the SNP cites the war-ravaged country of Montenegro in a campaign promoting independence on the party's website.

Labour leader Iain Gray referred to the website during a bad- tempered First Minister's Questions yesterday, when he said Mr Salmond had "lost the argument on independence" following the SNP leader's decision to shelve flagship plans for a vote on Scotland's constitutional future.

Mr Gray told MSPs that the site holds up the countries of Iceland and Ireland, which have been handed European Union rescue packages for their crisis-hit economies, as models of what an independent Scotland could be like.

The next country in a list of "success stories" within the "independence" section of the SNP website is the former Yugoslavian state of Montenegro, which was caught up in the 1990s Balkan war. It took Montenegro "only 40 days to become a fully independent sovereign state", according to the website.

Mr Gray said it took "40 days, two world wars, the Balkan conflict, ethnic cleansing, a war crimes tribunal and a UN peacekeeping mission".

He said: "You could not make this stuff up, unless you were the SNP. Iceland, Ireland, Montenegro - is it any wonder the First Minister has lost the argument on independence?

"In the real world it's nearly 2011 but in Alex Salmond's Bute House, Brigadoon, it's still nineteen-ninety-something."

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But the First Minister accused the Labour leader of insulting other countries, including nations that send delegations of visitors to the public gallery of the Scottish Parliament. Mr Salmond said: "We often have ambassadors from other countries in our gallery who are welcomed by this chamber. I think Iain Gray will have to be careful how many countries he insults."

The Labour leader hit back and claimed that support for independence in Scotland was at a low. He said: "I think it is the party that has on their website that Montenegro shows how easy independence is that insults the history of that country and that people.

"Everyone knows Alex Salmond has failed as a First Minister but hasn't he also failed as a nationalist?

"The First Minister promised us a big year this year. He was going to have an Independence Bill on Burns Night and a referendum on St Andrew's Day. But he didn't."