Foreign Affairs and International Development

Andy Slaughter Excerpts

Tuesday 15th May 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hague]

We have not set the agenda for the forthcoming visit to Moscow, top of which will be Syria, to which I am about to come, but we regularly discuss such issues with our Russian counterparts. Indeed, on my first visit to Moscow as Foreign Secretary, I specifically met human rights groups in Moscow to highlight some of these issues. That work will continue.

The whole House will abhor the violence and systematic violations of human rights in Syria today. More than 10,000 people—perhaps 15,000—have been killed, with many thousands more displaced or detained. The threat grows of civil war or extremists supported by al-Qaeda seeking to take advantage of the crisis. Progress is being made in the deployment of UN monitors to Syria, in accordance with Kofi Annan’s six-point plan, which continues to offer the best hope of ending the crisis. I discussed the latest position with Mr Annan last night. Some 189 observers are currently on the ground, and the full mission of 300 should be deployed by the end of the month. The presence of UN observers has had some impact on the scale of the violence; however, we should be clear that violence and brutal repression continue. Heavy weapons are still being used, and there has been an increase in the use of snipers, night raids, attacks by militia and systematic detentions.

The Syrian regime has not yet implemented the six-point plan, nor has it shown any sign of being prepared to begin a credible political dialogue or transition. This is unacceptable. The Syrian regime should be in no doubt: if it thinks it can murder, kill and torture its way back into favour with the Syrian people or that the world will turn a blind eye to its actions, it is mistaken. The Annan plan is the Syrian regime’s opportunity to accept the need for a better future for its country and to enter into political dialogue to bring that about. If the regime does not do that, we will be ready to return to the Security Council, and it will find itself facing mounting international pressure and, ultimately, the long reach of international justice.

[Mr Andy Slaughter (Hammersmith) (Lab)]

Those are—I mean this genuinely—very fine words, but Reuters reports that 32 people were killed in Syria yesterday. The Annan plan is not working at the moment. I am not saying that it should not be given a chance to work, but what else are the Government doing to stop the killing in Syria?

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Alexander]

I have been generous and I am keen to make a little progress.

Alongside the welcome measures set out in the Bill to allow for the establishment of a eurozone-only bail-out fund, further steps are needed if we are to have hope of a genuine recovery in Europe, including a real capital lift for the European Investment Bank, new infrastructure bonds and a comprehensive review of how EU structural funds operate.

Before I leave the subject of Europe, let me ask the Foreign Secretary another question that curiously he omitted from his lengthy remarks today. The Government defined themselves in opposition and in the early days of government by their commitment to publish a White Paper on the repatriation of powers from the EU back to Britain. Perhaps the Foreign Secretary will update the House on when we can expect that White Paper to be published. With great flourish, he announced another White Paper was due to be published on the overseas territories, but he curiously omitted any mention of a White Paper in relation to repatriation. The last time he mentioned it in the House was November 2011, when, in a written answer to me in February, he said:

“The Government’s stated intention is to examine the balance of the EU’s existing competences. That review does not have a pre-determined outcome.”—[Official Report, 9 February 2012; Vol. 540, c. 366W.]

Can he at least confirm to the House whether it has a pre-determined time frame? I hope that when the Minister replies to the debate he will be able to share that information with the House.

If there is one example of where the European Union could serve to amplify Britain’s voice and maximise our influence, surely it is in the middle east and north Africa in the wake of the extraordinary events we have witnessed over the past 18 months. In the early part of last year we saw protests spread, from Morocco in the west to Iran in the east, with the success of one set of demonstrators giving energy and inspiration to others. But the Arab spring has not been uniform in its impact, and nor are its outcomes guaranteed. We see continuing and very different challenges in countries as diverse as Egypt, Tunisia and Bahrain. In the case of Syria, I can assure the House that there is bipartisan support for the continued efforts the Foreign Secretary spoke of to stop the Assad regime’s brutal crackdown on its own people.

At a time when the waves of change are sweeping through the region, it is surely a matter of deep regret to us all that progress on the negotiations in Israel and the Palestinian territories remains frozen. Our shared goal across the House is to secure a universally recognised Israel living alongside a sovereign and viable Palestinian state. The international community and the majority of Israelis and Palestinians share a common view of what the principles of a final agreement should be based upon: land swaps around the 1967 borders, Jerusalem as a shared capital, and a fair settlement for refugees.

[Mr Slaughter]

Does my right hon. Friend share my disappointment that Prime Minister Netanyahu has once again refused to countenance a settlement freeze as a precondition for opening negotiations? Does he accept that while settlements are being built there are unlikely to be meaningful negotiations?

[Mr Alexander]

Of course I regret continued settlement building, because the position of the previous Government and, to be fair, that of the present Government are the same: settlement building in the occupied territories is illegal. That is why it was a matter of some pride that, when Secretary of State for International Development, I was able to commit funds to the Palestinian Authority to allow them to map the settlements themselves so that in the subsequent negotiations—alas, we are still waiting for them—there would be documentation allowing justice to be achieved and a proper settlement to be secured. It is a matter of regret, which I am sure is shared on both sides of the House, that so little tangible progress has been made in that regard. Progress seems to have stalled and efforts are needed to reinvigorate it.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Andy Slaughter (Hammersmith) (Lab)]

Today is the 64th anniversary of Nakba, the catastrophe that saw the ethnic cleansing of 50% of Palestinians from historical Palestine with the formation of the state of Israel. I am pleased to follow my very good friend, my hon. Friend the Member for Stockton North (Alex Cunningham), and to endorse his comments about the situation in the occupied territories. Nakba is not just an historical event. As the Palestinian poet Mahmoud Darwish said, Nakba is

“an extended present that promises to continue in the future.”

That is not only true of major events such as the occupation following the 1967 war, the massacres at Sabra and Shatila in 1982, and Operation Cast Lead in 2009; it is to do with the day-to-day suffering and oppression of the Palestinian people.

Earlier this afternoon, I had the privilege of listening to the excellent speech by my right hon. Friend the Member for Lewisham, Deptford (Dame Joan Ruddock) about Palestinian child prisoners. She rightly noted two positive moves in the past 24 hours: the communiqué from EU Foreign Ministers that condemned settlement expansion and home demolition, and the end of the hunger strike by 2,000 Palestinian prisoners and the concessions that led to that. However, those two events also demonstrate the lengths that Palestinians must go to in order to secure redress for basic infringements of their human rights and of international law. They also demonstrate that words, even from the EU—a powerful organisation—will be ignored by Israel unless they are backed by action.

Since the occupation, 40% of the adult male population of Palestine and the occupied territories have been detained in Israeli jails. There are currently 6,000 Palestinians detained in Israeli jails, including 200 children, 330 people in administrative detention—that is, without charge—and 28 MPs. I entirely support the impassioned comments that Members have made about the detention of the former Ukrainian Prime Minister, but 28 Palestinian MPs are being detained in Israeli jails, in most cases since 2006, and in many cases without charge.

Many people are detained in appalling conditions in solitary confinement in 2 metre by 2 metre cells, with just a bed and a bucket, for 23 hours a day for up to 10 years. That includes leaders of the Palestinian people—people such as Marwan Barghouti, who was put into solitary confinement last month. He is tipped to be a future President of Palestine. I think of the way that the British treated people like Kenyatta and Gandhi. My conclusion is that unless there is a level playing field and unless one is prepared to negotiate with those who will form the future Palestinian leadership, there is no chance for the peace process. One has to ask, therefore: what is the future of the peace process? Does Israel want a peace process?

There is a new Israeli Government. We are told that they will have the confidence not to be enslaved to the ultra-religious minorities. Their first act was to have the confidence once again to refuse a freeze on settlement building, because they have such a large majority. Why is settlement building such an important precondition to negotiations? Of course, at the level of principle, the 500,000 Israeli settlers in East Jerusalem and the west bank need to be negotiated away. To increase on a logarithmic scale, as is happening at the moment, the number of settlers and the extent of the settlements while negotiations are going on is surely wrong. Surely that is wrong practically, because there is no incentive for Israel, while it is getting what it wants—the Judaisation of East Jerusalem and the west bank—to conclude the negotiations.

The settlements are not just the nice red-roofed settlements that are sometimes advertised for sale in this country; even the outposts that are now illegal under Israeli law are now being legitimised. Settler violence against Palestinians in the west bank has gone up by 144% in two years. Home demolitions are on the increase, with some 176 Palestinian homes being demolished in the first three months of this year. Bedouin villages are being wiped out, not only in the west bank, but in Israel itself.

I do not have time to talk about Gaza, but I suspect that the Minister knows the statistics on Gaza and knows that it is the world’s largest prison. Imports may get in, in limited amounts, through tunnels and checkpoints, but no exports come out. The unemployment and poverty in Gaza will not be alleviated until the entrepreneurial people of Gaza, whom I have visited many times, are allowed to grow and export their own goods.

The Government operate a double standard on this issue and refuse to recognise the Palestinian state. They have another chance to do so in the General Assembly, which I hope they will take. Israel should be supported and should be a friendly country, but it should not be given a special or privileged status. I read in the Jewish Chronicle two weeks ago about the support that the Israeli Government gave Argentina during the Falklands war, supplying weapons for use against British troops. I never quite understand, therefore, the special relationship that Governments of both parties think that they have with the Israelis, to the exclusion of the Palestinians.

In the short time I have left, I will talk briefly about two other issues. The first is Bahrain. At the end of the week, the King of Bahrain will arrive in the United Kingdom and be entertained, inter alia, by the royal family. Like the grand prix and the Bahraini Prime Minister being invited to Downing street, this lends respectability to a tyrannical regime. The majority of the population in Bahrain is in lockdown. Murder, torture and detention without charge continue, following the popular uprising last spring. And yet, the Foreign Secretary talks about the improving situation. I wish that he would talk more about the detention without charge of people such as Nabeel Rajab, the president of the Bahrain Centre for Human Rights. I wish that the Government would revoke the invitation to the King of Bahrain.

Finally, I wish to say a word about Egypt, which I do not think the Foreign Secretary mentioned, although it is the leading country in the Arab world. The situation there is grave. The presidential elections might be postponed because of the trouble that is occurring. I looked at the Amnesty International briefing for this debate, which states:

“Human rights violations continue to take place in Egypt, in some cases to a worse extent than under Mubarak. Military trials continue, reports of torture being used are frequent, freedom of expression is curtailed and peaceful demonstrations have been met with violence and repression.”

We need to take a strong economic and political interest in what is happening in Egypt. There are strong progressive forces there, and one easy thing that the Government could do to support them would be to co-operate in the extradition of criminals from the Mubarak regime who are walking about freely in London and in the freezing of hundreds of millions of pounds of their assets in London or Britain. Switzerland froze the assets of the Mubarak family within hours of his standing down, but it took us about six weeks. Despite repeated attempts, I have been unable to get either the Foreign Office or the Home Office to confirm what action they are taking.

I very much appreciated what the Foreign Secretary said about the Government’s continuing support for, and confidence in, the Arab spring, but they need to go further than words. They need to support popular and democratic forces in the middle east both economically and politically. They may be in Palestine, Egypt or Bahrain. Let us not just take the easy option and condemn Gaddafi and Assad; let us be even-handed across the piece.

Israel and the Peace Process

Andy Slaughter Excerpts

Tuesday 27th March 2012 Westminster Hall

[John Woodcock]

Does my hon. Friend wish me to pronounce them? If only it were that simple. Of course, his question underlines the primacy of negotiations, which I will expand on later in my speech. If colleagues do not mind, I will rattle through the rest of my speech, so that I give other people the chance to contribute.

We must not underplay or be seen to underplay the toll on Israel from the terror and threats from its neighbours, which have been endured by Israelis for decades and up to the present day. Equally, we should not overlook the fact that weighing on the whole of Israel and its politics is the threat that Iran, whose leader vowed to wipe Israel off the map, could acquire the means to do just that.

The fact that Iran continues to channel funding and arms to Hamas, the Palestinian terrorist group, gives a wider context to Israel’s determination to maintain its security, if one were needed beyond the sustained campaign of terror that has claimed so many Israeli lives over the years. And let us never hold back from pointing out that the lives lost to Hamas are also counted among Palestinian families in Gaza, where the terrorists maintain their yoke of oppression by murdering political rivals and cruelly using civilians as human shields.

Although times remain far too hard, we should continue to trumpet the economic progress being made on the west bank and recognise the contributions that have been made not only by progressives in Israel but by the Quartet, led by Tony Blair. Most of all, we need to give full consideration and exposure to the complexities of the peace process, which are so rarely reflected in reporting over here.

A peace process capable of lasting success will be achieved only if the realities on both sides are understood and addressed. During the past few years, there has been pessimism on all sides about the peace process, particularly from the Palestinian leadership about the progress of negotiations. However, the international pressure needed for both the Israelis and Palestinians to return to the negotiating table must be applied to both sides alike. That includes pressing the Palestinians to put to one side past failures at the negotiating table, so that they can seek to make some headway now. For all the justified international condemnation of continued settlement building, the fact remains that there is only one side at the table at present, and that is Israel.

Fundamentally, everything we do must underline the message that there is no alternative to returning to talks, in order to make the difficult compromises that are necessary to achieve peace. So I ask the Minister to say in his response to the debate what his Government are doing to persuade both Israelis and Palestinians that peace talks are the only thing that will bring them dignity, prosperity and their own state, which they deserve.

[Mr Andy Slaughter (Hammersmith) (Lab)]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

[John Woodcock]

If my hon. Friend does not mind, I will not give way, as I want to get through my speech and allow other people to make a contribution.

We should apply pressure with hope gained from the knowledge that this is not year zero. In fact, at key points in the past it has been Israel that has been prepared to offer up a great amount for peace, only to find that the Palestinian leadership were unwilling or unable to reciprocate. The current Palestinian Authority leadership are a moderate Administration who have achieved much in terms of state-building and reform, but they often say that 20 years of negotiations have brought them nothing. However, that view is fundamentally undermined by the facts, and it also risks undermining what little faith remains in the prospects for a peace process.

There have been huge disappointments for both peoples, and the rapid progress envisaged in the 1993 Oslo accords has certainly not been realised. However, we must also be clear that every time that substantive negotiations have taken place, progress has been made and substantial Israeli offers have been given.

Let us not forget what Oslo achieved and what remains from that agreement today. Oslo was the beginning of a working relationship between Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organisation, a relationship that has now been successfully restored despite the violence of the second intifada. Oslo was also the beginning of Palestinian self-governance over the vast majority of the Palestinian population living in the west bank and Gaza strip. And at Camp David, although the final status agreement that had been hoped for was not realised, the offers given and the understandings that were later expressed in the Clinton parameters demonstrated a seriousness about achieving peace.

The details of Israel’s offer to the Palestinians at Camp David were never officially released and there are differing accounts of what happened. According to numerous reports, however, the proposal to the Palestinians by Ehud Barak, the then Israeli Prime Minister, included an Israeli withdrawal from more than 90% of the west bank and 100% of the Gaza strip. However, after the second intifada and the unilateral withdrawal from Gaza in 2005, no serious Israeli politician can assert that offering land for peace will, on its own, bring peace.

To get back to the table, Israeli Governments have understandably had to take additional robust and sometimes very controversial measures to protect their people from terrorism. There is currently a dangerous pause in the negotiations and pressure is building up to explore alternatives, such as the one-state solution. Let us be clear—that solution would mean both the end of the only Jewish state and the end of Palestinian dreams for their own sovereign state.

In that light, I want to express my support for the universal jurisdiction reforms that have now been completed; they were begun by the previous Labour Government and are still backed by Labour in opposition. Those reforms are vital to ensure that bogus arrest warrants are not issued against visiting Israelis, so that the UK can remain involved in efforts to break the impasse and can continue strengthening bilateral relations.

There are real barriers to a new peace process. Ultimately, there will have to be huge and difficult compromises on both sides. That will require trust, which is thin on the ground at present.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Andy Slaughter (Hammersmith) (Lab)]

Thank you, Mr Walker. In the few minutes that I have, I will first declare an interest. My entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests notes that I went to Egypt last March with the Council for European Palestinian Relations.

My hon. Friend the Member for Barrow and Furness (John Woodcock) has usefully introduced the debate and I hope that we will have an opportunity to discuss the issue at greater length on the Floor of the House. The picture painted by my hon. Friend and Government Members, however, is not one that those of us who regularly visit Gaza, the west bank and Israeli Arabs in Israel would recognise. The actual picture is one of occupation.

[Mr Offord]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Mr Slaughter]

I will give way once, and that will be it.

[Mr Offord]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman. When he went to Gaza, did he visit the Gaza city shopping centre, where many of the goods are provided by Israel at a much cheaper price than those coming through the tunnels from Egypt?

[Mr Slaughter]

I am not sure that that is relevant; I wish I had not given way.

The Palestinian people experience occupation, persecution and discrimination. I wish that some of the rights that Israelis give to their own citizens—some hon. Members have rightly mentioned them—were also provided for the Palestinian people. When considering this issue, the judgment of some hon. Members seems to lapse in a way that it would not in relation to other issues.

My hon. Friend the Member for Islington North (Jeremy Corbyn) has given the example of Operation Cast Lead, in which 1,500 people, the majority of them civilians—many of them women and children—were massacred by bombardment from sea, land and air. I visited Gaza two to three weeks after that happened and saw the devastation that it wrought.

Over the 20 years since Oslo, the number of settlements has doubled from 250,000 to 500,000, irrespective of how the Palestinians were negotiating or of which parties were in government.

[Mrs Anne McGuire (Stirling) (Lab)]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

[Mr Slaughter]

No, I will not give way again.

Israel is portrayed as the victim when it is, in fact, a regional superpower, a nuclear-armed state and, above all, an occupying power. It is a power that has occupied a people for longer than anywhere else in the world.

The Minister did not have a chance to answer a question that I asked him during last night’s debate in the House on Jerusalem, so I will ask it again. What stance will the Government take when the Palestinians go to the United Nations, again, in April for recognition? Could the British Government please take a different attitude?

We cannot expect the Palestinians to negotiate while settlements are being built at their current rate. On 18 December, the Israeli housing Minister announced that another 1,000 new settler homes would be built in East Jerusalem. That was a punitive response to Palestine’s admission to UNESCO. How can there be any basis for negotiation when settler violence has gone up by 150% in two years; when Jerusalem is being ethnically cleansed; when there are 5,000 Palestinian prisoners—more than 300 of them in military detention; and when a report, published just last week, said that child prisoners were being tortured and ill-treated in Israeli prisons?

Those are the offences that have to be addressed. It is time that those who rightly support the state of Israel’s being able to live in peace and security, as we all do, opened their eyes to the crimes being committed against the Palestinian people on a daily basis throughout Gaza, the west bank and, indeed, in Israel. Until we have that—

[Mr Charles Walker (in the Chair)]

Order. I call Mr Ian Lucas.

Jerusalem (Humanitarian Issues)

Andy Slaughter Excerpts

Monday 26th March 2012 Commons Chamber

[Alex Cunningham]

I agree with the hon. Gentleman that everyone should be living together in peace and harmony with the right to the same human rights within the city of Jerusalem, and I hope that one day we will get there. To finish my point, the authorities make it impossible for the centre of Palestinians’ life to be Jerusalem, and then expels them because it is not.

Furthermore, planning rules have been made to ensure that as little land as possible is available for Palestinians to build on. Fewer than 200 building permits are granted each year, even though the EU heads of mission in East Jerusalem assessed that 1,500 housing units are necessary to meet Palestinian housing need. A building permit is rare, mostly because the Israeli municipality has zoned most Palestinian areas to prevent building—according to the UN, that restriction applies in all but 13% of East Jerusalem—but even those who live in areas where building is permitted suffer years of delay and mounting costs in seeking permission to build.

Palestinians face an impossible dilemma as their family grows: do they live in squalid overcrowded conditions, move out of the city, or risk building illegally? Many take the chance of building without a permit, resulting in about 85,000 Palestinians being at risk of losing their homes. In addition, Palestinian homes in East Jerusalem are being demolished by the Israeli authorities: they demolished 670 homes between 2000 and 2008, and recently rubber-stamped the decision to demolish homes in Silwan to make way for a tourist park, which alone will make another 1,000 Palestinians homeless.

That comes at the same time as the building of illegal Jewish settlements continues unabated, forming an inner and outer ring around Jerusalem. The inner ring, home to around 200,000 settlers, combined with the wall cuts off Jerusalem from the west bank. The outer ring, home to another 100,000 settlers, further isolates the west bank from the Palestinian cities of Ramallah and Bethlehem. Moreover, settlements continue to be built on land confiscated from Palestinians. On the fringes, homes are being seized by Israeli settler groups on the pretext that the land on which they are built was once in Jewish ownership, but to which those groups have no legal entitlement.

[Mr Andy Slaughter (Hammersmith) (Lab)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that it speaks volumes about the arrogance of the occupying power that following the UN Human Rights Council’s vote last week, by 36 votes to one, to send a delegation to investigate the illegal settlements—illegal under international law—in East Jerusalem and the west bank, the Israelis have refused to co-operate with the council, refused admission to the delegation, and indeed is considering sanctions against the Palestinian Authority for even daring to raise the matter?

[Alex Cunningham]

It is clear that the world at large wants to do something about these issues, so why will the Israelis not let people in? What do they have to hide? I want an answer to that question, too.

The inequality of treatment of Palestinians’ claims is outrageous. They are legally barred from reclaiming property in West Jerusalem that they were forced to abandon, even if they still have the title deeds and the key to the front door. To ensure that Jerusalem can become the capital of Israel and Israel only, and to try to ensure that it never becomes the shared capital with Palestinians, Israel has used planning laws, home demolitions, settlement building, the wall and insecure residency rights, even as the international community, including the UK, the EU and America, has sat back, talked and done nothing practical to stop Israel. We all know about the influence of the US and of US and European aid to Israel. Why is no one taking action that will result in change?

Let me tell the House about Raya and Issam—two people who best illustrate the injustices faced by the Palestinian people. Raya lives in Jerusalem. Her husband, Issam, lives 15 minutes’ drive from the centre of Jerusalem in a village just outside the city limits in the west bank, but he cannot visit his children’s school and could not be with Raya in hospital when she had their baby, because his village is outside the city boundary. He says:

“It’s easier for me to go on holiday to Germany than it is to visit my children's school in Jerusalem.”

When they married, Issam applied for a family unification permit, so he could live with Raya in Jerusalem. The application cost him $5,000 in lawyer's fees, but was refused on the grounds that he worked for the Palestinian Authority five years earlier. The authorities also cited the fact that he had been in jail during the first intifada 20 years ago, despite his being there only for writing slogans and waving banners. Issam’s 15-minute drive has now turned into a two-hour nightmare, involving travelling by bus to Ramallah and waiting at the notorious Qalandia checkpoint twice a day to take the children to and from school, because an Israeli settlement has blocked the route from his village to Jerusalem.

As a brief aside, there are still 4,417 Palestinian political prisoners held in Israeli jails as of January 2012, including 310 people with indefinite detention without charge or trial, 170 children, 27 elected members of the Palestinian Legislative Council, and seven women.

It is on the record, from both Houses, that the UK has “made representations” month on month, year on year, to the Israelis objecting to increased settlements and home demolitions, making it clear that these actions are unacceptable, are illegal under international law and must stop, but what we are not told is how the Israelis reply, and we are never told of any positive outcome from these conversations.

Israel is accelerating the pace of settlement expansion, demolitions, expulsions and arrests in a way that makes the two-state solution increasingly unviable. Words are not enough; actions are clearly needed, and it is vital to demonstrate that breaches of international law have consequences, not only in diplomacy, but in the wider area of political and economic agreements.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Browne]

I want to address some of the hon. Gentleman’s other points and will then get to that point.

The Government will continue to argue for a just outcome for all the people affected by illegal settlement construction and the confiscation of land due to the separation barrier. That includes funding from the Department for International Development to the Norwegian Refugee Council to provide legal support to communities affected by the occupation.

I want to address a couple more issues, because time is short, and then see what more time I have to accommodate the wider points that have subsequently been made. The Government remain deeply concerned about restrictions on freedom of movement between the west bank and East Jerusalem. The permit system for Palestinians to enter East Jerusalem, whether for work, education, medical treatment or religious worship, is lengthy and complicated. There are heartbreaking stories of sons and daughters unable to obtain permits in time to visit parents dying in hospital or to attend funerals of relatives. Those Palestinians who have regular permits can spend hours queuing every morning at the checkpoints. We have lobbied the Israelis hard on the issue of movement and access, and there have been some improvements on the west bank, but there is still a long way to go.

A related concern is how many Palestinian residents of East Jerusalem face the threat of losing their residency rights in a way that does not apply to Israeli residents. There are families who are forced to live apart, or forced to move to the west bank, because they cannot obtain permits to stay together. There are also concerns about reported moves by the Jerusalem municipality to change unilaterally the boundaries of the city in a way that might deprive thousands of Palestinians of their right to residency of Jerusalem.

The restrictions on movement and access, as well as on building, not only affect individual Palestinian lives but have a very harmful effect on the Palestinian economy. It is estimated that the movement and access restrictions cost the Palestinian economy as much as 85% of its GDP every year.

[Mr Slaughter]

Will the Minister give way?

[Mr Browne]

Let me come to a key point that I want to make, and then I shall give way if I have time.

Israel needs to show a greater flexibility on the movement of people and exports in order to increase employment and to reduce aid dependency. We did see some welcome flexibility earlier this month when we saw the first exports from Gaza to the west bank since 2007. The Under-Secretary, my hon. Friend the Member for North East Bedfordshire, welcomed that in a statement on 9 March, and it is an important step by Israel towards fulfilling its commitment to allow economic development for the 1.6 million people in Gaza. We hope that further transfers of goods to the west bank, including fruit and vegetables, textiles and furniture, will now also be permitted.

But—and this might reassure my hon. Friend the Member for Harlow—I want to add that, on top of everything I have said, having I think made the Government’s position very clear, it would be wrong to give the impression that the Government are concerned only about Israeli action, although Israel has particular obligations under international law as the occupying force.

As the annual Foreign and Commonwealth Office human rights and democracy report, to be published next month, will highlight, we also have serious concerns about reports of abuses carried out under Hamas rule in Gaza. Those include arbitrary detention, the mistreatment of detainees and the use of the death penalty. We are also seriously concerned about rocket attacks fired by militant groups in Gaza.

We continue to believe that the way to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, including in relation to Jerusalem, is through negotiations. Negotiations remain the best way of giving the Palestinian people the state that they need and deserve, and the Israeli people long-term security and peace. If the hon. Member for Hammersmith (Mr Slaughter) wishes to intervene, I just about have time to accommodate him.

[Mr Slaughter]

I thank the Minister for pointing out some truths—I think to Government Members as well. He is going slightly off the subject by talking about the death penalty in Gaza, and perhaps he will also reflect on the 20 Palestinian civilians killed by the Israeli air force recently, as they too suffered the death penalty. His Government are not so good, however, on action. They did not support and, therefore, effectively sabotaged in the United Nations Security Council the Palestinian bid for statehood. If the bid goes back to the UN General Assembly in April, will the Government support non-member status?

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)]

Order. It was meant to be a very short intervention, but that was almost a speech. If you need to, you will have to put in for your own Adjournment debate.

Oral Answers to Questions

Andy Slaughter Excerpts

Tuesday 25th October 2011 Commons Chamber

[Alistair Burt]

The position of the UK Government in relation to the resolution of Kashmir has been long held. It is a matter for the Indian and Pakistan Governments to settle with regard to the wishes and the interests of the Kashmiri people.

[Mr Andy Slaughter (Hammersmith) (Lab)]

Is the Minister concerned at the reputation that the UK is acquiring in Egypt and other post-revolution Arab countries as being a safe haven for criminals from the anciens regimes there? What steps is he taking at the moment to ensure that fugitives from justice in those countries and their ill-gotten gains are returned?

[Alistair Burt]

I do not recognise the reputation that the hon. Gentleman describes, unless they are all going to Ealing. [Interruption.] Maybe just next door; I am sorry. Where a case can be proved against those who have come to the United Kingdom, which involves either seizure of assets or criminal activity, for which it is possible to remove people from the United Kingdom, we will respond to those requests.

Palestine and the United Nations

Andy Slaughter Excerpts

Thursday 15th September 2011 Commons Chamber

[Alistair Burt]

There are many interpretations of what happened at the UN in 1948, but my hon. Friend is right to suggest that a resolution at the United Nations by itself does not secure the peace between peoples unless it is soundly based on proper recognition, respect and confidence between the two. That is what we earnestly wish to see from the negotiations, which we hope will restart shortly and which we are pressing for as part of our approach to this weekend.

[Mr Andy Slaughter (Hammersmith) (Lab)]

The sense of urgency that the Minister talks about seems to be almost entirely absent from the Government’s position. On the contrary, in his response to the right hon. and learned Member for North East Fife (Sir Menzies Campbell) he talked about mutual recognition. Does that not give the game away? Is this not actually about giving the Israeli Government a veto over when a Palestinian state is recognised?

[Alistair Burt]

No. What I am actually about is what I said.

Conflict Prevention

Andy Slaughter Excerpts

Tuesday 21st June 2011 Westminster Hall

[Simon Hughes]

I absolutely agree with my hon. Friend about that point. I have a brother who is still working for the MOD and who has been in the Army in various parts of the world. However, it did not take him to remind me that it is more useful for the Army to stabilise a situation and to teach the skills of conflict avoidance and so on, than it is for it to engage in conflict. Sometimes conflict prevention is not perceived as being the dramatic work by the armed forces for which we pay our taxes, but it is both the most productive role of the armed forces and—frankly—the way that we can save not only the lives of people in faraway countries, such as Afghanistan, but in countries such as our own, including the lives of our service people who would otherwise pay a very high cost.

I also share my hon. Friend’s view that we not only need to have an ambition about the share of our national cake that we give to overseas development but that we need to have our armed forces fully committed to conflict prevention, as they want to be and as they increasingly have the skills to be.

I want to give one or two examples of how successful conflict prevention can be, if it is got right. They are examples of the work of the United Nations Development Programme which, since 2002, has assisted fragile countries to build resilience by strengthening what the UNDP calls “infrastructures for peace”. I commend the work of the UNDP’s Chetan Kumar, who has shown how extraordinarily efficient and effective very small financial contributions can be in transforming difficult situations. Let me give some examples of the UNDP’s success.

In Ghana in December 2008, there were rising tensions between different regions. Chieftaincy-related conflicts in parts of the country and the discovery of oil led to new tensions as the country approached national elections. When the elections were held, there was the narrowest margin of votes recorded in an African election—only 50,000 votes separated the winner and the loser. With tensions rising still further, the National Peace Council of Ghana, an autonomous and statutory national body that was established with assistance from the UNDP, helped to mediate a peaceful political transition. As part of Ghana’s peace infrastructure or peace architecture, regional and district peace councils are also being established.

Then there is the example of Togo in 2005, which shows that all this is not past history; it is very recent history. There were about 250 deaths in the 2005 national elections. However, in 2010 the establishment of a platform for political dialogue prior to the national elections and the ability of civic actors to conduct a sustained peace campaign led to a reduction in tensions and to peaceful elections, as well as to a stable post-electoral period. A code of conduct for political parties and a public peace campaign were developed and implemented with UNDP assistance. Further development included consolidation of a national peace architecture as a priority in 2011.

In Timor, between 2007 and 2009 the peace process that had followed the establishment of East Timor as an independent state nearly collapsed, after a massive return of refugees and internally displaced persons. With UN assistance, a network of community mediators was established; the mediators were trained and deployed; and other conflict resolution efforts enabled the return and resettlement of 13,000 families by 2010. The Government there are now working with the UNDP to establish a new department for peace building so that the country has its own standing internal mediation system.

In Kyrgyzstan, the UNDP facilitated dialogue between civil society, the electoral commission and security agencies.

In Kenya just last year, there was a constitutional referendum without a single violent incident, in contrast to elections just three years previously when 1,500 people were killed and 300,000 displaced. I am very conscious that the Foreign Office Minister here today, who has responsibility for Africa, takes an active interest in these matters. One reason for what happened last year was that, in advance of the referendum, the UNDP provided support for national efforts to reach a political agreement on the new draft constitution and helped to implement an early warning and response system that prevented violent incidents from cropping up, and local peace committees were strengthened in all districts of the country.

I could go on with examples, but we do not have the time so I shall give just two illustrations of the cost-benefit, which is also a consideration in times of straitened finances. Kenya’s leading business association assessed economic losses from post-election violence in 2008 as being $3.6 billion. In contrast, the 2010 constitutional referendum, which was plagued by similar tensions, did not see any violence, and the supported prevention effort cost only about $5 million. In Kyrgyzstan, the recovery costs from the inter-ethnic violence in mid-2010 were estimated to be $71 million, but the regional UN efforts to restore political and inter-ethnic confidence cost approximately only $6 million. I could go on, but I think that people understand my point.

[Mr Andy Slaughter (Hammersmith) (Lab)]

Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that in the examples he has given of UN funding and support the key is the local buy-in—local people arbitrating peace in their own countries? I am afraid that I cannot stay for the Minister’s response today, but perhaps the Government will consider doing as they do in the field of aid, and support local projects that are designed to resolve conflict as well as, of course, using military intervention where necessary in an immediate crisis.

[Simon Hughes]

The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. All the best evidence is that grass-roots initiatives that are long term, engage the village—and the tribes in a tribal community—and are led by local people rather than external agencies, with the support of the international community, are far more likely to be successful.

I want to put the matter in another context. There are various authoritative indicators of conflict around the world, including the International Crisis Group and the “Global Peace Index”, and they tell us something which, if we paused for a second, we would realise for ourselves: after a very welcome decline in the number of conflicts in the past few years there has been a recent increase in violence in the world. The point that I made at the beginning of my speech when I quoted from the article on the World Bank is that inter-state conflict is now not nearly as frequent as it was. The bigger problem is internal conflict, which is likely to increase because many places are afflicted by not just political and economic crises but environmental ones such as water shortages, and other effects of climate change.

The hon. Member for Islington North (Jeremy Corbyn) and I have taken an interest in many countries where there has been internal conflict and civil war, and as long as there is increased pressure on food, water and housing supplies—the normal needs of a community for economic prosperity—it is more likely that tribal and racial tensions will grow. We therefore urgently need to see those environmental problems as a priority if we are to prevent conflict in many of the poorest parts of the world, because they are often the most likely to be afflicted.

[Simon Hughes]

It is, and two other things strike me. For example, west Africa is very rich in natural resources, but the benefit of those resources has historically not gone to the local communities for community development because the resources, particularly the oil, have been taken out by international corporations and there has been abuse, with flaring and so on. In other parts of the world, there is enforced privatisation of natural resources—water, for example—as part of a World Bank or International Monetary Fund programme that has actually reduced the capacity of the community to develop in its own way.

I want to make just two other general points and then end with some questions. I do not want to set out the Government’s stall because the Minister is quite capable of doing that, and there is a good story to tell, but I want to push them to go further. The UK has been working very hard to bring its operations together across Departments, and we have the capacity to be one of the world leaders in conflict prevention. I encourage the Government, through the Minister, to go that extra mile and pick up some of my ideas. It has been put to me that we have 21st-century conflicts but 20th-century institutions. The best example of a case that I have been closely involved with in recent years is that of the Sri Lankan civil war, as it came to its end. In theory, the United Nations had the power to intervene, under the responsibility to protect, but it was completely paralysed and did absolutely nothing. The conflict went all the way, with all the implications that we now know. I sense that internationally, through the UN, and nationally we sometimes intervene too late, because we do not have the international levers that we can pull early.

Since the beginning of the current situation in Libya the hon. Member for Hayes and Harlington has been raising the point that it is comparatively easy to intervene militarily. It is not so difficult to scramble together a military intervention, and it should be as easy to scramble together a conflict prevention mechanism, but it is not. We need to think about how we get the balance of decision making and priorities right, in our Government and in others. The people on the ground, especially in countries where there is repeated, periodic or cyclical conflict, know that it is jobs, justice and domestic security that are likely to give them the most secure future. An illustration that helps us easily to picture these things is that it is often better to respond to an illness by dealing with the early signs of infection than to wait for the epidemic. In the past, we have often responded to the epidemic rather than taking preventive action.

[Mr Slaughter]

The right hon. Gentleman has hit on another key point in relation to the Arab world. Not just in Libya but in all the countries of the Arab spring, the degree of violence and the difficulty, even if things go well, of creating civil society, is due to the legacy of having supported tyrants rather than democratic organisations in those countries over many years. Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that that is a lesson that we, and all western Governments, need to learn?

[Simon Hughes]

I absolutely agree. There is so much, both academic and practical, that we should have already learnt. The age of the empires of the world mercifully is coming to an end, but there is still a view that that sort of intervention by force is, in the end, what we need to display as our effective international activity, even though all the evidence is that different sorts of interventions are now much more needed.

I am grateful to all those who have briefed us for this debate. It should really be a seminar rather than a debate. I commend Saferworld, which has supplied some very good material and I shall summarise its five points about the areas on which Governments should concentrate. First, it picks up the point made by Labour Members, namely that we need to understand the context and put it first, and that each context is different. Secondly, we have to put people at the heart of conflict prevention. Thirdly, we have to work cross-departmentally in Government. Fourthly, we have to work with our international partners. Fifthly, a crucial issue is the arms trade and the need to curb it—many of the poorest countries spend large parts of their funds on arms rather than on other things.

I also commend the work of PATRIR—the Peace Action, Training and Research Institute of Romania—and Kai Brand-Jacobsen, the director of its department of peace operations. Ministers and others will have seen its work. It has identified 22 lessons for country-level prevention, as well as lessons for international support and prevention efforts, improving effectiveness and preparedness, and identifying key gaps and challenges, and the way in which we can apply those from here.

I have, with the help of the officers of the all-party group, prepared some questions. I have given the Department notice of them, so I hope that they do not come as a frightening surprise to the Minister. I will then end with some key requests. It would be good for the Government to set out what they mean by conflict prevention and which programmes they are funding in which countries to prevent which conflicts—we would then have more transparency about the details of the Government commitment—and how they evaluate the effectiveness of those programmes. It would be helpful if the Government could regularly gather information from the existing data sets on work around the world and learn the lessons from it. It would be good if the Government would consider establishing an organisation similar to that in Washington DC, to study, educate and train in the field of peace building, covering all elements of policy, from grass-roots policy to international diplomacy in the voluntary, public and private sectors and the like.

What in-house training are members of the civil service and diplomatic service receiving on conflict prevention? Are we able to get the Commonwealth to do more? It is for ever looking for an effective role. As a big supporter of the Commonwealth, I think there is an opportunity for it to play a much more direct role in conflict resolution and prevention. In the case of Sri Lanka, it was a lamentable failure for a Commonwealth country to be engaged in such a situation. The Commonwealth Secretariat could work with the Government on the issues.

Would it be possible—I hope that the Minister will respond positively to this, although it is not just his decision—for the Government to agree to an annual opportunity to stocktake conflict prevention? I would like us to have an annual debate on the issue. We have annual debates on the armed services—the Royal Navy, the Army and the Air Force—and it is just as important that we have an annual opportunity to review conflict prevention in the world. It would be a strong signal marker of our collective wish as a Parliament and a Government.

Will the Minister tell us how much the Government spent last year on conflict prevention and on overseas military intervention, so that we can compare the two? Is there a cost-benefit analysis of those two forms of spending? Is there a way of projecting how the cost benefit would be helpful as we think, in these straitened economic times, about how we are going to spend our resources abroad? That would produce obvious answers in relation to where we ought to prioritise.

There has been growing cause for concern in Sudan in recent days, and now the Archbishop of Canterbury has expressed concern about the situation. Are we, in our overseas development work, supporting the civil organisations on the ground in such countries to help prevent conflict, rather than just going in and using more traditional responses?

Do the Government monitor the infrastructures for peace developments so that we can promote good practice in other places around the world? Following on from a point made by the hon. Member for Hammersmith (Mr Slaughter), are we learning the lessons from the past year of the Arab spring about engaging with local communities in the Arab world, as opposed to just dealing with the governance in some pretty unsavoury places, so that we are with the people preparing for the change? Are we making sure that it is local citizens who are leading such developments? This country’s education processes are also an issue. Will the Government consider adopting the same approach as that in the Department for International Development’s policy paper, “The engine of development”, to make sure that we always have stakeholder dialogue—I hate the word “stakeholder”—between key participants?

The Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe has missions in potentially troublesome places in the Balkans and eastern Europe. Can we work with it to go to other places that look as though they are at risk of conflict in the future? Can we get better co-operation between the OSCE and the European Union in enhancing common foreign and security policy?

What about the places—this has been one of my perpetual frustrations since I have been in this place—where there have been stalled peace processes? Cyprus, for example, has been on the agenda every year that I have been here. There has just been another round of talks, which do not appear to have moved anything. We should seek to move things on. In the end, Northern Ireland resolved its problems as much through grass-roots movements from the community, particularly those involving women, as it did through political forces from the top. Cyprus desperately needs, and would benefit from, the same. Finally, is there any capacity within Government to expand the resources of the new stabilisation unit and the new strategies that the Government have put in place?

I hope that that is a helpful short tour of the horizon. I hope that the Government will say that they will seek to build a more formal and systematic approach, based on best practice, across Government Departments, and that they will accept that we need to beef up our capacity to lead on conflict prevention around the world. I hope that they will see the stabilisation unit as something that prioritises not just stabilisation but conflict prevention. I think that that has been the lesson of Afghanistan. I hope that they will be honest about the gaps and the challenges and give us an opportunity of annual stocktaking. Finally, I have one suggestion. I am always wary of tokenistic titles, but as there are three Departments that have to work together—the Ministry of Defence as much as the others—it may be that the Government need to think about who is the lead Minister across Departments for making sure that there is a driven policy for integrating the policies.

It would be a commendable and good thing if the way in which we organised Government was seen to give as much priority to prevention as it does to defence and military matters. A minister with responsibility for conflict prevention in the world would be a way forward. Other countries are setting up departments of peace, rather than departments of war, and are realising that we need to shift from ministries of defence to ministries of peace. We may not be culturally ready for that yet, although many would welcome it, but we need to move in that direction. I hope that this debate will show that a growing group of people in this Parliament and in all the Parliaments of the democratic world want this move. There is now a network around the world.

I shall end with a plug. For those who want any more information, there is a website entitled www. conflictissues.org.uk. I hope that this is the beginning of a debate that engages not just us but many others outside this place, and that the Government are ready to respond warmly.

Middle East and North Africa

Andy Slaughter Excerpts

Tuesday 7th June 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hague]

We will see over time the effect that we have in Bahrain. It is important to have channels of communication to the ruling family and the ruling group as well as to the opposition forces in Bahrain, and Britain is one of the few countries that has both those channels, which our embassy in Manama has built up over the years. We should use those channels constructively because there is no solution in Bahrain other than one based on a successful dialogue between both sides. We have to continue to encourage that.

[Mr Andy Slaughter (Hammersmith) (Lab)]

The Foreign Secretary has consistently condemned the use of live fire against unarmed protesters by murderous regimes such as Assad’s and Gaddafi’s, so why does he find it difficult today to condemn exactly the same thing by the Israeli regime? What protest is he making to the ambassador and to the Government of Israel and what sanctions will he consider if there is a repetition of these events, which go on week by week on all of Israel’s illegal borders?

[Mr Hague]

I have pointed out that the responsibility for the situation on the borders is not entirely on the Israeli side. I have made very clear our opposition to the use of lethal force and that the defence of borders and boundaries should be proportionate. Hon. Members should make no mistake about that. That is the message that we convey to the Israeli authorities. We should not be so short-sighted as to believe that in the case of Syria no one else is involved in trying to create those incidents and putting people in a position in which they are caught up in violent incidents.

Africa and the Middle East

Andy Slaughter Excerpts

Monday 4th April 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Andy Slaughter (Hammersmith) (Lab)]

On Friday, the Israeli newspaper Ha’aretz reported that the Foreign Secretary, with French and German support, intends to propose the recognition of a Palestinian state on 1967 borders, with Jerusalem as its capital, at the next Quartet meeting in two weeks. Is that true? If so, I commend that positive step, but ask him not to get sucked into the issue of land swaps and to maintain the right of return for refugees.

[Mr Hague]

I hate to disappoint the hon. Gentleman on something that he was going to commend me for, but no, we are not proposing the recognition of a Palestinian state. We have recently upgraded the Palestinian delegation in the UK to a mission. What the UK, France and Germany are putting to the Quartet is that the basis of negotiations set out by the Quartet, including the United States, should include 1967 borders, with land swaps, a just settlement for refugees and Jerusalem as the shared capital of both states. We are advocating that as an established basis for negotiations, but we are not advocating proceeding unilaterally with the recognition of a Palestinian state.

Libya (London Conference)

Andy Slaughter Excerpts

Wednesday 30th March 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hague]

I will have to be a bit careful with my answer. Clearly, events such as the attack by coalition aircraft on a major ammunition storage depot in the early hours of Monday will have made a difference to the ammunition supplies of the Libyan regime. It is very difficult to quantify that, but it will have made a significant difference. Equally, the successful attacks on regime vessels that were seeking to blockade Misrata yesterday will have made a significant difference to their ability to blockade that city. It is not possible to put a precise statistical estimate on the things my hon. Friend is asking for, but one can say with a fair degree of confidence that, if it had not been for coalition activity, the citizens of Misrata would by now have sustained many, many more casualties. Indeed, it is entirely possible that the city would have been taken over by regime forces, with desperate consequences for many of its inhabitants.

[Mr Andy Slaughter (Hammersmith) (Lab)]

The Foreign Secretary says that coalition and British forces should follow the letter of the UN resolution, and indeed the resolution of the House, but are they doing so? Reports coming out of Libya suggest that we are supporting offensive actions by the rebels, and there are mixed messages about regime change, including from the Government Front Bench. Does he accept that there will be a breakdown in the broad consensus either in the UN or in this House if there is not clear evidence that only humanitarian and protective ambitions are being achieved?

[Mr Hague]

No, I do not accept any of the premises of the hon. Gentleman’s question. What we have just seen at the London conference is a serious broadening and deepening of support for what we are doing under the United Nations resolution and I have stressed the importance of maintaining that. He can be sure that British forces and our allies are acting entirely within the UN resolution and I am not aware of anyone who is able to bring to the House any evidence that they are doing anything other than that. He would do well to support our forces in the difficult job they are undertaking rather than to entertain the idea that they are doing something different.

North Africa and the Middle East

Andy Slaughter Excerpts

Thursday 24th March 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hague]

Yes. My hon. Friend is quite right, because overarching all that we have discussed in today’s statement is what I referred to in the House on Monday: the need for a bold, ambitious and historic programme on the part of the United Kingdom and the European Union to provide a magnet for positive change to the countries of north Africa and the middle east. Although today we are discussing the detail of what is happening in individual countries, that is all under the umbrella of a European policy towards the region that has to be drastically revised to come up with solutions and offers that match the unprecedented—in this century—challenge that we all now face.

[Mr Andy Slaughter (Hammersmith) (Lab)]

With so much international attention focused on Libya for obvious reasons, other regimes in the region appear to think that they can use military force against civilians with impunity. The Foreign Secretary has commented on the matter already, but what specific steps will he take with Syria, which is killing its civilians in Deraa, and with Israel, which is almost daily killing civilians in the Gaza strip?

[Mr Hague]

In answer to earlier questions, I have made clear the position on Israelis and on Palestinians, and the need for them all to make the necessary compromises. We have also discussed Syria and the strong messages that we have sent to the Syrian regime, but the hon. Gentleman does not provide an exhaustive list. At this time, Iran has imprisoned opposition leaders and become one of the most oppressive regimes in the world. It also has one of the worst human rights records in the world. We will of course vigorously continue to raise those issues as well.