British Children: Syria

Debate between Andrew Murrison and Emily Thornberry

Tuesday 22nd October 2019 Commons Chamber

[Dr Murrison]

I thank my right hon. Friend for his points. He is right to say that the UK Government’s approach to this is, I hope, informed by compassion and care for individual cases. Our priority clearly has to be unaccompanied children and orphans, and that is where our attention currently is.

My right hon. Friend has given me a figure—I have to say that I do not recognise that figure—although, of course, we are talking to all the agencies and to those with an influence on the ground, to better understand the situation, and, of course, we will do all we can. The situation is fast-moving, and getting access to camps and people is extremely difficult. The ceasefire that he has spoken of is due to expire tonight, but we hope that it will be sustained. Under those circumstances, of course, all things become possible.

[Emily Thornberry (Islington South and Finsbury) (Lab)]

I thank you, Mr Speaker, for granting this urgent question, and the right hon. Member for Haltemprice and Howden (Mr Davis) for securing it. His contribution was powerful and it was right. I entirely share his concerns about the dozens of innocent children—many just infants—who are legally British citizens and who find themselves, through no fault of their own, caught up in the latest upsurge in violence around the Daesh detention camps in northern Syria, triggered by the unilateral withdrawal of US troops and the subsequent invasion of the region by Turkey and its mercenary militias. The reckless and treacherous actions of the Trump Administration were always going to have human consequences, including the increased endangerment of the innocent British children living in the detention camps, nearly all of whom have already experienced—as the right hon. Member for Haltemprice and Howden says—huge physical and psychological traumas in their lives because of what they have seen and the conditions in which they have grown up.

It is all very well for some to say that the sins of the father, and in many cases the mother, should be visited on the children, but that is not who we are as a country or a people. Instead, we have a moral and a civic duty to ensure that these British children are brought back to the UK to receive the shelter, care and counselling they need, even if that necessitates bringing back their mothers to face justice in our courts for the crimes they may have committed. If the Minister of State agrees with that, as I hope that he does, I must ask another difficult question, and one with which we need to wrestle.

If we were having this discussion two months ago, we would have been talking about negotiating the repatriation of these children with our Kurdish and American allies. Now, as a result of Donald Trump’s actions, that negotiation will need to involve Assad’s regime, Russia and what are now their Kurdish allies. So I ask the Minister of State, unpalatable as it may be, does the Foreign Office believe that to achieve the repatriation of these children, it will be necessary to restore formal diplomatic relations with the Assad regime, and will that be on a permanent or a temporary basis?

[Dr Murrison]

I completely distance myself from the phrase “sins of the father”. There is no question about this. These are innocent minors; they are vulnerable people and we must do what we can for them. It is entirely wrong to associate them with what their parents may have done. Indeed, we need to ensure—as my right hon. Friend the Member for Haltemprice and Howden (Mr Davis) made very clear in his question—that the cycle does not continue. That is fully understood.

The shadow Secretary of State touched on the legal position of minors who are living in camps with their parents. That brings us to a very difficult area indeed. I am sure that she would not want to trespass too far in that regard, nor would she want to remove children from their parents.

We have been clear about our attitude towards the Assad regime. As the right hon. Lady will be very well aware, the reality is that the Assad regime appears to have permeated most corners of the country now, and we have to think about what that means if we are to pursue our humanitarian goals. I think that most western countries—the telephone conversation I had with the global coalition against Daesh yesterday would certainly indicate this—are trying to work out what we now do when it comes to operating in the new reality, which sadly has been made a great deal worse by the events of the past few days.

US Troop Withdrawal from Northern Syria

Debate between Andrew Murrison and Emily Thornberry

Tuesday 8th October 2019 Commons Chamber

[Dr Murrison]

Nevertheless, Mr Speaker, I think the eloquence of my right hon. Friend probably justified the time he took.

I will try to address some of the points my right hon. Friend made. I absolutely agree with him about this being primarily an issue about Daesh. To answer his question about foreign fighters and others, my worry would be that this will divert the SDF from its activities against Daesh in the Euphrates valley—absolutely, 100%.

My right hon. Friend will understand that we are talking to all our interlocutors at the moment. This situation is very kinetic and very fast-changing, and we of course need to ensure that, so far as we can, we influence our partners in the way that he has just described.

As I understand it, the US withdrawal, if it happens, will be fairly small-scale. It will involve a small number of troops in the immediate vicinity of the border. That is our understanding. We do not support any incursion by Turkey into north-west Syria.

My right hon. Friend will know from previous outings at the Dispatch Box of the extent, breadth and depth of support for the crisis in Syria. We are among the top few in terms of our financial contributions to that awful humanitarian disaster. I hope that that begins to address some of the points he raised.

[Emily Thornberry (Islington South and Finsbury) (Lab)]

Thank you very much, Mr Speaker, for granting this urgent question. I thank the right hon. Member for Bournemouth East (Mr Ellwood), along with all those other Members who sought to pursue this issue today, including my hon. Friend the Member for Brighton, Kemptown (Lloyd Russell-Moyle).

The number of UQ applications you had on this issue today reflects the range of concern and, indeed, anger across the House about the Trump Administration’s decision to open the door to a Turkish invasion of northern Syria and to the subjugation of the Kurdish people in Rojava— the very people who led the fight against Daesh and who lost 11,000 brave fighters in the process. Donald Trump is not just abandoning those Kurdish allies; he is betraying their sacrifice. Of all the great and unmatched ways in which he has shamed his office over the last three years, this is one of the very worst.

However, simple expressions of anger will not help the Kurdish people now, so I have four specific questions for the Minister. First, in answer to critics of the decision, Donald Trump said yesterday:

“The UK was very thrilled at this decision … many people agree with it very strongly.”

Will the Minister make it clear today that that is a lie? Can he explain what, if anything, the Foreign Secretary said yesterday to Mike Pompeo that might have given Donald Trump that impression?

Secondly, will the Minister agree to table emergency resolutions at this afternoon’s UN Security Council meeting and tomorrow’s North Atlantic Council meeting prohibiting Turkey from taking any action on the ground or by air to increase its military incursions into northern Syria? Will he redouble our efforts through those bodies to reach a genuine peace settlement, a political solution and the negotiated withdrawal of all foreign forces?

Thirdly, will the Minister also work through the UN Security Council and the High Commissioner for Refugees to make it clear to Turkey that it must not use the American withdrawal as a green light to forcibly resettle non-Kurdish Syrian refugees in the Rojava region in an effort to change its ethnic composition?

Finally, will the Minister insist, as a matter of urgency, that Kurdish representatives are finally invited to join the Syrian committee on constitutional reform so that they are able to stand up for their own rights?

An old rule of middle east conflict is that, one way or another, the Kurds will always get sold out. Donald Trump may be following that rule in the most brutal of fashions, but we must unite today, both here and at the United Nations, and say that this time we will not let it happen.

[Dr Murrison]

I thank the right hon. Lady for her questions. As for the tweet, I have no idea where that came from. It certainly is not based on the conversation that my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary had with Secretary Pompeo last night. Let me be quite clear that we would be opposed to any incursion by Turkey into Syria. The right hon. Lady refers to what is technically called refoulement, which is proscribed under international law, and we would most certainly be against any attempt by any state to engage in social engineering, ethnic cleansing or demographic change.

The right hon. Lady referred to the constitutional committee, and she will be aware that Geir Pedersen led on that at the UN General Assembly and that it will be stood up on 30 October in Geneva. It will be three pillared, with the pillars being the opposition, the regime and independence. Our position would be that all citizens in Syria should be fully represented. There is only one way of making progress in Syria, and that is through an inclusive political process.

--- Later in debate ---

[Dr Murrison]

The US has to answer for itself. I cannot answer for the US or for President Trump—

[Emily Thornberry]

Give it a go.

[Dr Murrison]

The right hon. Lady tempts me, but I am going to resist.

The US, I believe, is talking about seeking to redeploy 50 servicemen at the moment. I have no information on forts, so I cannot answer that question. As for boots on the ground, we need to be careful. The UK does not have regular boots on the ground in Syria; we do not do that. The hon. Gentleman was right to raise international development and Turkey, and he will be aware that we have been a major donor to this particular crisis through the EU Facility for Refugees in Turkey. We are also considering at the moment what our response to FRiT 2 will mean, particularly in the context of our imminent departure from the European Union.

Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe

Debate between Andrew Murrison and Emily Thornberry

Monday 7th October 2019 Commons Chamber

[Dr Murrison]

I absolutely agree with my right hon. Friend and pay tribute to him for the hard work that he put into this case and the cases of other dual nationals in relation to Iran. I have to say that, as a newly arrived Minister in the Department he used to lead, I was genuinely impressed by the attention that he gave to so-called consular cases. He was absolutely rigorous in the application of his time and energy to these cases, and the case of Nazanin was certainly top of his list. I pay tribute to him for that.

[Emily Thornberry (Islington South and Finsbury) (Lab)]

I thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker, for granting this urgent question, and I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Hampstead and Kilburn (Tulip Siddiq) for so assiduously pursuing this issue and so eloquently explaining why warm words from the Government are no longer enough—if, indeed, they ever were. Like her, I welcome the release of Jolie King and her partner, and I applaud Australia’s Minister for Foreign Affairs, Marise Payne, whom I met recently in Canberra, on her work to secure their freedom. Her success shows what can be achieved, even with Iranian hardliners, when working with tact, diplomacy and dedication to the task—let us be frank: not what we got from the current Prime Minister when he was in charge of this brief.

I will not repeat the many excellent points that my hon. Friend made regarding Nazanin’s health. In the time I have, I wish to focus on one specific issue: the linking by Tehran of Nazanin’s case to the restoration of the money Iran is owed in relation to the tanks purchased prior to the Iranian revolution. I am absolutely clear, and I think we would all agree, that we cannot accept that a dual British national should be held hostage by a state power as a bargaining chip in diplomatic and financial negotiations. Those tactics will never succeed; otherwise, they will be repeated, not just in Iran but by other authoritarian countries around the globe.

However, regardless of the situation with Nazanin, the legal facts are clear, Iran is owed the money and the Treasury has set the money aside. All that remains is to determine the exact amount and to establish a means by which it can be paid over without breaching sanctions regulations. As has been demonstrated today, those questions are unlikely to be resolved by the courts. Does the Minister agree that it is incumbent on the Government to find a way to break this impasse without breaking our principles, so that we can take the issue of the tanks compensation off the table and then have a discussion with Tehran about Nazanin, based not on quid pro quo or diplomatic bargaining but on the simple justice, freedom and humanitarian care that are owed to this innocent woman?

[Dr Murrison]

I thank the right hon. Lady for her remarks. She dismisses warm words; I have to say that these are more than words. Words are important and it is correct that we get our language right in these matters. She refers to tact, dedication and diplomacy; we just had a question from my right hon. Friend the Member for South West Surrey (Mr Hunt), and I have to say that the tact, dedication and diplomacy that he applied to this issue were exemplary. I very much hope that we all approach this matter in the same spirit.

The right hon. Lady is right to say that we appeal to Iran’s decency in this matter. That is where this issue rests and it is absolutely right that we should appeal to Iran in that way. I still hope that Nazanin will be released, because Iran is, as I said in my earlier remarks, fundamentally a decent, civilised nation. I want the Iranians to find that within themselves in order to do the right thing in this particular case.

In respect of the International Military Services debt, the right hon. Lady will know that the matter is before the courts. However, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Tehran has itself specifically decoupled the repayment of debt from Iran’s detention of dual nationals. It is not the UK Government who have done that; it is the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Tehran itself. The right hon. Lady seeks to join the two; Tehran says no, and that the two are separate. Given that Iran has said no, even if we were minded to do so it would be very difficult for us to proceed on the basis of, as she puts it, quid pro quo.

Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe

Debate between Andrew Murrison and Emily Thornberry

Wednesday 17th July 2019 Commons Chamber

[Dr Murrison]

My hon. Friend will understand that the tools in our toolbox are somewhat limited. Iran is an independent and proud nation that has its own view of its place in the world, and it requires us to show some respect, but we need to deplore the things it is doing in respect of the victims of human rights abuses, which are particular acute in Iran.

The UK Government clearly use every opportunity to impress upon Iran how unsatisfactory we regard its approach to human rights to be. However, we also need to ensure that Nazanin comes home, which is our principal priority in this matter. I appeal to Iran, not least because its reputation in this country is being severely damaged, to do the decent thing.

Iran must look at this in a sympathetic light and do what is right, proper and humane in respect of Nazanin, particularly as she has now been moved to the Imam Khomeini Hospital, where she is being treated. We want to know how she is being treated, and whether she is being given the right treatment and in what context. Above all, she must have access to her family, but she must also have consular access, through which we will be able to make a better judgment on where we are.

[Emily Thornberry (Islington South and Finsbury) (Lab)]

Thank you, Mr Speaker, for granting this urgent question. I not only congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Hampstead and Kilburn (Tulip Siddiq) on securing it, but join the Minister in applauding and thanking her on behalf of the whole House for the outstanding passion and persistence she has brought to the fight for Nazanin’s freedom—she is an outstanding Back Bencher.

For all of us who have taken part in this fight, and for all of us who visited Richard Ratcliffe during his recent hunger strike outside the Iranian embassy, the developments we have seen over the past 24 hours are deeply troubling. The fact that Nazanin is back under the control of the Revolutionary Guard, being held in isolation and denied access to consular staff and to her father, has rightly raised concern that she may be being pressed to sign a false confession.

We all know that the hard-line theocrats around Khamenei who have been responsible for Nazanin’s arrest and detention, and her appalling treatment in custody, do not care about the truth of Nazanin’s case, the reality of her innocence or the mental and physical cruelty that has been inflicted on her. They care only about exploiting her and lying about her to support their doctrine of embattlement and isolationism, and to undermine the Rouhani Government’s strategy of engagement. They are the same individuals who have revelled in the collapse of the Iranian nuclear deal, and who are wilfully risking conflict with their actions in the Strait of Hormuz. On a practical level, can the Minister tell us today what is being done to engage with the figures around Khamenei, not just the Rouhani Government, on Nazanin’s case?

Finally, on a wider level, does the Minister agree with the veteran BBC correspondent John Simpson, a man with better insight than most of us put together on matters of diplomacy and foreign policy, that there are two villains in this terrible situation? As John tweeted this morning, Nazanin is both

“the victim of a campaign by political extremists in Iran, and of the carelessness of @BorisJohnson as foreign secretary.”

Does the Minister agree with that verdict, and will he condemn the former Foreign Secretary—our next Prime Minister—for handing Iran’s hard-liners their biggest excuse, their biggest piece of propaganda, to justify this horrific injustice to one of our own citizens?

[Dr Murrison]

The right hon. Lady has elegantly dissected the Iranian state in a very few minutes, and she probably puts her finger on it. Of course, anybody with any experience of Iran will know that there are many Irans, as I touched on in my opening remarks.

We are, of course, concerned by any access that the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps has to this particular case. I would say, though, that the IRGC does care about its reputation. It certainly cares about its country’s reputation, and so does the supreme leader. That reputation hangs in the balance.

The generosity and humanity with which Iran has historically been associated would be amply demonstrated if Iran were to do the right thing in respect of Nazanin. I urge it to do that, if not on Nazanin’s behalf, on behalf of Iran’s reputation, which is rightly important to it.

The right hon. Lady asks how close we are to the supreme leader and, again, she well knows, because she is a student of these things, that access to the supreme leader is exceptionally difficult. We have spoken to President Rouhani, and we routinely engage with our ministerial interlocutors, Minister Zarif and, in my case, Minister Araghchi, and we will continue to do so.

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Iran, of course, is somewhat separate from the IRGC, and it is important to reiterate that we are ensuring the IRGC gets the message that the eyes of the world are on Iran in respect of this case and, if it continues to behave in this way, it will trample all over the good opinion that international observers might have, even now, of Iran—it will do Iran and its people no good at all.

Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Andrew Murrison and Emily Thornberry

Tuesday 14th May 2019 Commons Chamber

[Dr Murrison]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Good governance means doing the things he describes. If Hamas aspires to run its territory as a good Government, it must address the concerns of its population. I will just point out that we have supported Gazans recently by addressing critical water and sanitation needs through a £2 million grant to UNICEF, and we have announced £2 million for the International Committee of the Red Cross for medicines and surgical supplies, so we are doing our bit.

[Emily Thornberry (Islington South and Finsbury) (Lab)]

I join colleagues in welcoming the new Minister for the Middle East to his post. Although I applaud the sterling work that other Foreign Office Ministers have been doing to cover the absence, it really is a disgrace that, at a time like this, we should have 50 days without a dedicated Minister for such a critical region. Does he agree that it is also a disgrace that Prime Minister Netanyahu is proposing to give the Israeli Government and Parliament the legal authority to ignore rulings from the Israeli Supreme Court and to put himself personally above the law?

[Dr Murrison]

I have to say to the right hon. Lady that in general we would support the Israeli Government, who are the only democracy in the middle east and a firm friend of this country. Where we find that our friends are doing something that we consider to be edgy or with which we disagree, we will certainly be keen to discuss that with them. I will meet the Israeli ambassador shortly to discuss a range of issues, and that matter might form part of our discussions, given that the right hon. Lady has raised it on the Floor of the House.

[Emily Thornberry]

We of course support Israel, but we also support the rule of law. We can all see where this is going. Exactly one year on from the slaughter on the Gaza border, Netanyahu is taking a further giant step away from democracy and the rule of law by giving himself immunity against prosecution and complete impunity when it comes to attacking the freedoms of Israeli Arabs, ignoring the human rights of Palestinians in Gaza and completing the annexation of the west bank. Does the Minister agree that now is finally the time for the British Government to take a different step by recognising the state of Palestine while there is still a state left to recognise?

[Dr Murrison]

The crux of the right hon. Lady’s question is whether the British Government would recognise the state of Palestine, and I think she can anticipate my response. We support the two-state solution, when the time is right. That inevitably implies that we will support—recognise—the state of Palestine, but in the meantime we are engaged in building institutions that are necessary to sustain such a state. As I said earlier, that means building institutions across the piece, and we will continue to do that.