Foreign and Commonwealth Office

Thursday 14th February 2019 Ministerial Corrections

Counter-Daesh Update

The following are extracts from responses to questions during a statement on Counter-Daesh Update on 11 February 2019.

[Mr Hunt]

My right hon. Friend of course speaks with great wisdom on this because he was responsible for a lot of the training of overseas armies that makes precisely that strategy possible. We have now trained 70,000 Iraqi forces as a result of the programme that I think he may even have set up when he was Secretary of State for Defence.

[Official Report, 11 February 2019, Vol. 654, c. 655.]

[Mr Hunt]

In this country, we can be proud of the fact that we have put £2.7 billion into that process, which has had a huge humanitarian impact.

[Official Report, 11 February 2019, Vol. 654, c. 656.]

[Mr Hunt]

First, in terms of the courage of people who have been fighting in Syria, there is one group that we have not mentioned so far, and that is the White Helmets, who did an extraordinary job in Syria—not so much in the particular conflict against Daesh, but we can be proud that this country has resettled 29 families of White Helmets and was instrumental in getting about 400 White Helmets out of Syria towards the end of last year.

[Official Report, 11 February 2019, Vol. 654, c. 657.]

Letter of correction from the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs:

An error has identified in the response I gave to my right hon. Friend the Member for Sevenoaks (Sir Michael Fallon).

The correct wording should have been:

[Mr Hunt]

My right hon. Friend of course speaks with great wisdom on this because he was responsible for a lot of the training of overseas armies that makes precisely that strategy possible. We have now trained nearly 90,000 Iraqi forces as a result of the programme that I think he may even have set up when he was Secretary of State for Defence.

An error has identified in the response I gave to the hon. Member for West Dunbartonshire (Martin Docherty-Hughes).

The correct wording should have been:

[Mr Hunt]

In this country, we can be proud of the fact that we have put £352.5 million into humanitarian and stabilisation support for Iraq, which has had a huge humanitarian impact.

An error has identified in the response I gave to my hon. Friend the Member for Reigate (Crispin Blunt).

The correct wording should have been:

[Mr Hunt]

First, in terms of the courage of people who have been working in Syria, there is one group that we have not mentioned so far, and that is the White Helmets, who are doing an extraordinary job in Syria—not so much in the particular conflict against Daesh, but we can be proud that this country has resettled 29 families of White Helmets and was instrumental in getting about 400 White Helmets out of Syria towards the end of last year.