Syria

Lord Bishop of Exeter Excerpts

Wednesday 10th July 2013 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Warsi]

The Government have consistently approached this matter by responding to the situation on the ground. I do not think that they can be criticised for actually responding to it and encouraging agreement when we think that it is possible. The countries that we are trying to get agreement between—the US and Russia, with the UN of course playing a facilitating role—are all committed to Geneva 2 and to a transitional executive authority that would be in accordance with the wishes of the Syrian people. It was right, in the run-up to the G8, to get as much agreement as possible, and it continues to be right to continue to push Russia and the US to come to an agreement to bring the coalition and the regime around the table.

[The Lord Bishop of Exeter]

My Lords, does the Minister accept that, if the international community is to have any hope of starting to resolve this dreadful situation, all parties to the conflict need to be at the negotiating table? If that is the case—and I ask this particularly in the light of the fourth Question on the Order Paper—how does she respond to the suggestion that this ought also to include Iran?

[Baroness Warsi]

The right reverend Prelate will be aware that this question has been raised in the House before. Our view is that those parties that were party to Geneva 1 should be party to Geneva 2. The challenge that we have at this moment is to get the opposition and the regime around the table to agree a road map. Of course, if other parties can play a constructive role, that, too, would be appreciated, but the role that Iran is playing in Syria at the moment is not considered to be constructive.

Egypt

Lord Bishop of Exeter Excerpts

Tuesday 2nd July 2013 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Warsi]

The noble Lord is of course familiar with the reports in the press about what the defence Minister said. However, it has helpfully been indicated that there is no intention for there to be a military coup. It is anticipated that this period may allow President Morsi to engage with and reach out to members of the opposition. We have concerns—and indeed have made statements—about the imposition of religious controls through the constitution. I had discussions with both the Sheikh al-Azhar and the new Coptic Pope in February of this year, during which these concerns were raised. It is important that freedom of religion, which includes the freedom not to have a religion, is absolutely respected within Egypt.

[The Lord Bishop of Exeter]

My Lords, perhaps I may follow that up. The vulnerability that the religious minorities of Egypt have experienced since the departure of President Mubarak was brought home during the visit last week of the most reverend Primate the Archbishop of Canterbury to Cairo, where he met and heard from the leaders of a number of Egypt’s religious communities. Can the noble Baroness tell us what is being done to encourage and support religious leaders who build relationships across divides to provide a public voice for calm and non-violence, and what guarantees have been sought to protect Christian minorities in the event of an escalation of violence?

[Baroness Warsi]

The visit of the Archbishop of Canterbury to Egypt was timely, and of course we are concerned about the ongoing violence, especially the violence which occurred in April at the Coptic church, St Mark’s Cathedral. We are engaged in a number of projects in Egypt through the Arab Partnership. Some £1.7 million has been allocated for 2012-13, and many of the projects involve grass-roots work with community organisations from different faiths to create a sense of understanding. It is important that the discussions and dialogue remain open, and I understand that there is an ongoing dialogue between al-Azhar and the Coptic Church.

EU: UK Isolation

Lord Bishop of Exeter Excerpts

Monday 22nd April 2013 Grand Committee

[The Lord Bishop of Exeter]

My Lords, it may be thought that the Church of England does not have a particularly European perspective, but that is far from being the case. Through its diocese in Europe it is present in all the member states of the EU. It has effective links with other churches throughout Europe and is active in the Conference of European Churches. Together with our partner churches, we are also deeply aware of some of the roots of the EU and the vision of its founders in Catholic social teaching.

It is from this broad base that the Church of England engages with the EU itself through its own representation and structures. Also, in March 2012, it made a submission to the House of Commons Foreign Affairs Select Committee on this very question of the UK’s relationship with the EU.

That submission started from the basis that for the Church the primary purpose of politics, even European politics, is the promotion of human flourishing and the conditions that are necessary to make this happen. This includes economic, social, ethical, cultural and legal conditions. Here, the value of the EU as a single market is not to be ignored. While growth is, of course, not to be treated as an absolute idol, poverty is the enemy of the good life and so of the common good. Thus, regularly over the past 40 years the General Synod has affirmed that, while it has reservations over certain characteristics of European integration—not least its demographic deficit—our propensity as human beings created in the image of God to be creative, productive and generous beings has been enhanced by pooling certain elements of national sovereignty in a common European project. This project, it is worth remembering, has deep spiritual roots. The treaty of Rome is peppered with aspirational phrases such as:

“Determined to lay the foundations of an ever-closer union among the peoples of Europe”,

and:

“Intending to confirm the solidarity which binds Europe and [other] countries and desiring to ensure … their prosperity”,

as well as:

“Resolved … to preserve and strengthen peace”.

One of its founding fathers, Robert Schuman, wrote:

“Democracy owes its existence to Christianity. It was born the day man was called to realize in his daily commitment the dignity of the human person in his individual freedom, in the respect of the rights of everyone, and in the practice of brotherly love towards all”.

It is against this background that we also responded to the Prime Minister’s recent Bloomberg speech, in which he set out a vision and an agenda for European reform. On that occasion, he was certainly right to say that much in the EU needs to change, that the Union should accept the principle that powers can flow not only from member states to institutions but the other way too, and that national parliaments should become more closely involved in EU decision-making. However, there remains a lingering doubt as to whether the Government’s agenda is one of reform for the good of Europe as a whole or a more narrow focus on the repatriation of powers in response to political pressure nearer to home. It would be good to have some clarification about that today.

The value of this debate is that it is a reminder of how much need there is for a more informed public and political debate that might shape both a renewed vision for Europe and our own understanding of how we might best realise it. The churches of Europe see themselves as very much part of that debate and with much to contribute to it. They are deeply embedded in European culture and, although we are distinct, it is still possible and right to think of the family of churches in Europe in terms of the historical embrace of a single faith. Even perhaps particularly as Europe becomes increasingly characterised by the diversity of faiths within it, our own long experience of interfaith dialogue and co-operation has a valuable contribution to make to the pursuit of that founding vision grounded in the common good.

Finally, in this context, it is perhaps especially good to recall an observation of the Chief Rabbi, the noble Lord, Lord Sacks. In an address in Rome last year, he said that,

“the future health of Europe, politically, economically and culturally, has a spiritual dimension. Lose that and we will lose much else besides”.

He went on:

“To paraphrase a famous Christian text: what will it profit Europe if it gains the whole world yet loses its soul?”.

I hope that the failure of successive British Governments to articulate a coherent and constructive policy towards our European partners and to manage to take public opinion along with this will not contribute to that loss of the European soul.

Darfur, South Kordofan and Blue Nile

Lord Bishop of Exeter Excerpts

Wednesday 27th February 2013 Grand Committee

[The Lord Bishop of Exeter]

My Lords, I, too am very grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Cox, for once again bringing the circumstances of this deeply troubled region to our attention. Tragically, since our last debate on this subject in October, the humanitarian situation has continued to be a matter of grave concern. I am afraid that the political deliberations, which the UK Government properly continues to support, appear to be little more than a smokescreen, as the Sudanese Government clearly have absolutely no intention of providing humanitarian access to South Kordofan and Blue Nile states from the north.

In particular, it seems that the vote to create the new state of Southern Sudan has led the Government of Sudan to make southerners accept the consequences of their vote: “You wanted your own country, now go and live in it”. Southerners are being asked to go south. This is, in one sense, entirely understandable—if not entirely defensible—in terms of making people accept responsibility for the choices they have made. However, the human consequences are appalling. The overall drive seems to be to create a single country with a single culture and a single religion. This process is enhanced by the drive to have a single language, Arabic—hence the problem with the marginalization of the Nuba and the continuing attrition in the Nuba mountains.

We in the church continue to hear from aid agencies and our fellow bishops in both Sudanese states of continued bombing, targeting civilian homes, markets, schools, fields and so on. Those stranded, unable or unwilling to flee their homes to the safety of South Sudan, are left to forage for food and water under cover from the bombs. It really is a desperate situation and a tragedy that the international community still appears to be taking little heed of what is looking increasingly like genocide, or at the very least, yet another major ethnic cleansing working itself out. Thousands of people have fled and the humanitarian cost is being paid for by neighbouring states which are absorbing them.

Conditions in the refugee camps remain poor but stable. There are increasing reports of disease outbreaks, and overcrowding is becoming a greater issue in most locations. During the dry season, basic service provision of food, water and healthcare is present and available to the population, but education is lacking. UNHCR will not allow education facilities to be initiated by international NGOs in, for example, Yida for fear that it will encourage refugees to stay.

In our debate in October I raised the concern that, although DflD recognises the role of the church, it is highly unfortunate that UNHCR and other NGOs do not always adopt the same policy. The churches and other religious bodies have a key role to play in both delivery and mediation, but often the UNHCR treats them as special interest groups without a general humanitarian agenda. In the present context of Sudan, the churches are doing an heroic job with limited resources. The young and fast-growing Episcopal Church of Sudan is resilient, but it is suffering from the forced departure of southerners, many of whom have exercised key leadership and responsibility in and through the church and its aid programmes. It is further the case that foreigners with connections to the churches are being told to leave. Others are being visited by the security services and feel intimidated. Each of our dioceses in Sudan is facing the need both to care for displaced and often traumatised people at the same time as losing some of its leading people to the south.

I welcome the commitment of Her Majesty’s Government to addressing these concerns, and the priorities set by DfID for the coming year are to be applauded. However, I have four specific questions and it would be helpful if we could have some clear answers to them for the record. The first question is: what pressure are Her Majesty’s Government putting on the Government of Sudan to stop the bombing and the violence in the Nuba mountains? Secondly, what humanitarian provision are Her Majesty’s Government making for displaced people and refugees, especially in a context where southerners in Sudan are being pushed out to the south? Thirdly, although it is hard to work out the specific strategy or consistency in this, are the UK Government aware of and responding to the expulsion of expatriates from Sudan after interrogation and with no reasons being given? Finally, what support are the Government giving to those being victimised by the Sudanese Government, including those whose schools and institutions have been taken over and appropriated by the security services, thus helping to make an already bad situation even worse?

Israel: Arab Citizens

Lord Bishop of Exeter Excerpts

Thursday 13th December 2012 Lords Chamber

Moved By

[The Lord Bishop of Exeter]

That this House takes note of the issues of equality and discrimination affecting Israel’s Arab citizens.

[The Lord Bishop of Exeter]

My Lords, we each come to debates such as this with our own personal stories. Mine begins with my father who served with the British Mandate force, and I grew up with his memories and photographs, and a strong sense of the historical and moral responsibility that the UK still carries for where Israelis and Palestinians find themselves today. More directly, I have visited the area regularly for the past 35 years, as a one-time trustee of Christian Aid, as a patron of a range of Israeli and Palestinian human rights organisations and also of BibleLands—now Embrace the Middle East. Additionally, my diocese has a companion link with the Anglican Province of Jerusalem and the Middle East. I have met many people of all communities on the ground, and over the years have witnessed a radical change in the composition and culture of Israeli society, with one element of this being increased inequality and discrimination faced by Israel’s Arab citizens. However, I have also seen directly, and wish publicly to affirm, the work of those organisations, including those that are Israeli, working to combat such discrimination and inequality. A wish to highlight both the problem and the work of those seeking to address it are among the reasons I sought this debate, but there are further reasons for having it now.

All the signs are that we may be reaching the end of any realistic prospect of a genuine two-state solution: the past assumption that progress in the peace process would help improve Arab-Jewish relations within Israel no longer holds. Addressing Israeli-Arab discrimination needs now to be seen as a justice issue in its own right and very much framed within a discourse of civil rights. In 2011, the EU acknowledged that Israel’s treatment of its Arab citizens was a core issue that could not be postponed until the peace process is revived.

Secondly, this debate needs to be set within the context of a mood of democratic awakening across the Middle East. Last year, Israel experienced its own democratic awakening with the 14 July movement. Last year’s activism could lead to a deeper process of political awakening, exposing the oppressive power structures and inequalities at the heart of Israeli society, and ultimately opposing all forms of segregation and injustice, including that experienced by Israeli citizens who are Arabs—a term which here I take to include not only Muslim and Christian Palestinians and Bedouin Arabs, but Arabic speaking Druze and a small number of Circassians as well.

My third reason for requesting this debate now is that next year is the 10th anniversary of Justice Theodore Or’s inquiry into Israeli Arab support for the second intifada which concluded that,

“successive generations of Israel’s government have failed to address in a comprehensive and deep fashion the difficult problems created by the existence of a large Arab minority inside the Jewish state. Government handling of the Arab sector has been primarily neglectful and discriminatory”.

They have not shown,

“sufficient sensitivity to the needs of the Arab sector, nor done enough to give this sector its equal share of state resource. The state did not try hard enough to create equality for its Arab citizens or to uproot discriminatory or unjust practices”.

The nature of such discrimination is well documented. Your Lordships will have seen the excellent briefing pack produced by the Library, and I am grateful for briefings not only from various human rights groups but from the Board of Deputies of British Jews, the UK Task Force on issues facing Arab citizens of Israel, whose work I warmly commend, and the Jerusalem-based Jewish Centre for Jewish-Christian Understanding.

In many ways, this debate merely surfaces an ongoing debate in many Jewish circles, in Israel and here. That debate concerns a widening gap in Israeli society between law and practice. In law, Israeli Arabs enjoy full equality and are endowed with the full spectrum of democratic rights. It is also the case that Israeli Arab citizens have made considerable social and economic progress in recent years. Mortality rates have fallen by nearly two-thirds over the past few decades, while life expectancy has risen and infant mortality rates have been slashed.

However, in practice there are many areas of life where Israeli Arabs are systematically disadvantaged. While Israel’s declaration of independence and basic laws purport to enshrine certain rights for Israel’s non-Jewish citizens, there is no explicit constitutional right to equality. Israel is yet to reconcile the tension between its identity as a Jewish state and its claim to be a democracy with equal rights for all. This means that non-Jews are effectively, in many respects, second-class citizens, denied the full rights which their Jewish co-citizens enjoy. As the Association of Civil Rights in Israel has pointed out,

“this is reflected in discriminatory policies in the areas of citizenship rights, economic and social welfare, employment, education and (most crucially) land ownership and development”.

So, Jewish and Arab Israelis have different citizenship rights and constraints in relation to marriage and family reunification. Their economic and social circumstances differ. Despite a legal ban on employment discrimination on the basis of ethnicity or religion, Arab citizens face significant disadvantages in the labour force. The most recent official Israeli survey to look at income differentials between individual employees suggested that the gross monthly income among Arab citizens of Israel was 32% lower than the comparative figure among Jewish citizens. There is, according to Israel’s own National Insurance Institute, a 53.5% incidence of poverty among non-Jewish families compared with 15.2% among Jewish families. Also, Arab communities are among the poorest in Israel. Almost nine in 10 of the localities in the lowest three socio-economic groups are Arab. Arab Bedouin are particularly disadvantaged, with up to 90,000 Bedouin deprived of their ancestral lands and living in what the Israeli Government call “illegally constructed villages” in the Negev where there are virtually no public utilities or government services.

According to the Legal Centre for Arab Minority Rights in Israel, Adalah, the starkest area of inequality and discrimination relates to land holding and planning. It states:

“Jewish and Palestinian citizens of Israel have unequal access to land resources, land rights, and the ability to use the resource of land to develop their communities”.

A UN report in 2003 suggested that Arab citizens, despite their 20%-plus population share, privately own just 3.5% of the state’s total land, while Arab municipalities had jurisdiction over only 2.5% of the total area of the state. In Galilee, despite a 72% share of the population, just 16% of the land is owned by Arab municipalities. Since 1961, there have been 291 new Jewish localities compared with, at most, 25 new non-Jewish ones. It is estimated that Arab citizens of Israel are, in practice, blocked from purchasing or leasing land on around 80% of the land in Israel on the basis of their ethnic identity. The way in which the 2011 admissions law is being used adds to the issue of discrimination a concern about further segregation.

Yet it did not have to be like this, and some of the early aspirations of the founders of the State of Israel were clearly very different. Indeed, the principles of equality and non-discrimination were enshrined in Israel’s declaration of independence of 4 May 1948, when the new state undertook to,

“uphold absolute social and political equality of rights for all citizens, without distinction of religion, race or sex”.

Twenty years ago, there were some grounds for optimism. It is important to remember the constructive work that Yitzhak Rabin did in his second term as Prime Minister to address these issues of inequality in Israel’s life. However, he was probably the last Israeli Prime Minister to do so.

In recent years, the Knesset has passed a raft of discriminatory legislation. In 2009, Avigdo Lieberman’s Yisrael Beitenu party became the second largest coalition partner, after an election campaign during which he repeatedly attacked Israel’s Arab minority. Since then, each Knesset session has been replete with overtly racist Bills that have helped further to alienate Israel’s non-Jewish citizens. Together they seem to be forming a pattern whereby extreme back-bench proposals become watered down to form a steady drip of government initiatives that are slowly eroding minority rights.

This seems to be backed by changes in Jewish Israeli public opinion, with both the FCO and the US Department of State noting a growing and disturbing climate of intolerance, with an increasing desire among a majority of the Jewish public to see preference for Jews over Arabs in various areas of public life and a willingness to see the two communities reducing contact and moving further apart.

Some have suggested that this debate should not be taking place as it colludes with hostility towards Israel rather than offering it a hand of friendship. Nothing could be further from the truth. A peaceful and prosperous Middle East needs a strong and secure Israel. However, threats to Israel’s security come not only from without but also from within. Increased discrimination so easily leads to radicalisation of those discriminated against, whether intentionally or unintentionally. Frustration fermenting beneath the surface could yet bubble over into societal conflict. Should current trends continue unabated, localised intercommunal violence should come as no surprise.

There is the further concern, raised by the Archbishop of Canterbury in a debate in your Lordships’ House a year ago, that discrimination and inequality contribute to the emigration of indigenous Christians from Israel, a further cause of polarisation and loss of community cohesion. By contrast, addressing the discrimination and inequality experienced by Israel’s Arab citizens, and so building community cohesion, could have positive implications both for the State of Israel and for the wider peace process. It would strengthen Israel’s democratic credentials by inviting more participatory models of citizenship, so enhancing a sense of community and belonging. Rehumanising the “other” within Israel might encourage a reframing of the way that Israel negotiates with its Arab neighbours.

The anniversary of the Or report next year offers an important occasion to take stock of the steps and measures that have been taken by the Israeli Government to address the levels of discrimination and inequality faced by Israel’s Arab citizens. Looking back nine years on, there is a widespread feeling that the institutional changes put forward by the Or Commission have not been whole-heartedly adopted. When I tabled a Written Question on the Or report a few months back, the noble Lord, Lord Howell of Guildford, responded on 24 September that,

“few of Or’s recommendations on the socio-economic causes of Israeli Arab frustration have been addressed. We continue to urge the Israeli Government to implement the recommendations made by the 2003 Or Commission, specifically to address (i) economic disparities; and (ii) unequal access to land and housing. In general we condemn all instances of inequality and discrimination against individuals and groups because of their faith, ethnicity or nationality”.—[Official Report, 24/9/12; col. WA 265.]

At the heart of this Motion is an understanding of human dignity and well-being. I am sure that all would agree that inequality and discrimination impair human dignity and flourishing. So I note with pleasure the strong interest shown by Her Majesty’s ambassador to Israel in supporting Israel’s minorities. Speaking at the Israeli Equal Opportunities Commission’s 2011 conference, Ambassador Matthew Gould said:

“Israel enjoys the most extraordinary diversity in its population”,

and that the,

“diversity of Israel’s population is something that should be celebrated”.

However, if that diversity is allowed to lead to increasing division, then the fabric of Israel’s society could be fatally damaged. For that to be avoided, the UK and the EU need to continue to press Israeli Governments for the realisation of Israel as a Jewish and democratic state, in which Jews and Arabs live together with full and equal human dignity and civil rights.

Ultimately this is a question about the character of the Israeli state, the answer to which must have buy-in from all the communities of which it is composed.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Lord Bishop of Exeter]

My Lords, we have had a good debate. I am grateful to all noble Lords who have taken part and to the Minister for her response. Every contribution raised a point to which I would be tempted to respond but I will resist that temptation. Just to return to the point made right at the beginning by the noble Lord, Lord Steel, on the important difference between the Israeli state and the Israeli Government, I regard myself as a loyal Briton but your Lordships may have noticed that I am not always the most enthusiastic flag-waver for everything that comes from the Front Bench to my right. To those noble Lords who talked about the importance of being friends to Israel, I am often reminded of that advertisement for malt whisky: “True friends give it to you straight”.

This is not just a matter of government. It is also a matter of culture—and the disturbing development of culture. We have in Israel today a vicious circle in which discrimination in law and practice leads to disengagement on the part of minorities, which then leads to fears of disloyalty on the part of the majority—and so the vicious circle goes round and round. We need to reverse that and achieve a virtuous circle, which will then flow out to touch the wider region. Otherwise, as the noble Lord, Lord Palmer, and the noble Baroness, Lady Royall, pointed out, we will see more people on the move yet again. We are not powerless. Many noble Lords have pointed to the leverage that we have through the robust and consistent application of international law.

Again, it is not just a question of law. A number of noble Lords pointed to the importance of grace. By one of those acts of serendipity, when I was having my breakfast this morning I turned on Radio 4 and heard “Thought for the Day”, given by the noble Lord, Lord Sacks. It was a remarkable reflection. He talked about yesterday’s results of the census and the rise in the number of those who say that they have no religion. He talked about the importance of religions facing the fact that they might be a minority. He said that was important because religion at its best speaks not out of power but out of powerlessness. Perhaps the healthiest society is one where all religions are a minority and so have to engage with one another. Those are wise words. They are a challenge to us here in the UK. They are also a challenge to Israel.

Motion agreed.

Sudan and South Sudan: EUC Report

Lord Bishop of Exeter Excerpts

Wednesday 17th October 2012 Grand Committee

[The Lord Bishop of Exeter]

My Lords, the most reverend Primate the Archbishop of York spoke in some detail of the pressing need for a peaceful and honourable solution to both the conflict that exists between Sudan and Southern Sudan and the internal conflicts within Sudan itself, not least those affecting the South Kordofan and Blue Nile regions. However, whether such a political solution is quickly forthcoming or not, there is currently, as the noble Lord, Lord Chidgey, pointed out, a severe humanitarian need in these same regions—a need that, sadly, is largely unknown to many who live in the West, especially when we compare it to other humanitarian crises of recent years. It is a need that cries out to be responded to effectively, and now.

Last week I had the opportunity of meeting Bishop Andudu Adam Elnail, the Bishop of Kadugli, and heard at first hand how, one year into the renewed conflict between the Government of Sudan and the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement-North, communities in South Kordofan and Blue Nile continue to experience significant humanitarian needs against a backdrop of severely limited humanitarian access. In South Kordofan there are approximately 400,000 internally displaced persons, more than 300,000 of them in areas controlled by the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement and almost 100,000 in Government-controlled areas. In the Blue Nile region 300,000 people have been affected, resulting in some 80,000 refugees in South Sudan and 32,000 in Ethiopia. The situation is deteriorating day by day because of poor harvests and high food prices, a situation that follows two years when harvests were simply not possible due to the conflict.

Despite the provisions of the tripartite agreement between the United Nations, the African Union and the League of Arab States, as yet no agreement has been reached on conducting a needs assessment in the SPLM-North areas. The Government of Sudan have deployed indiscriminate aerial bombardment against military and civilian targets, and for the past year they have not permitted any humanitarian assistance to enter SPLM-N-controlled areas. In these circumstances it would be good to know what Her Majesty’s Government and the EU can do to enlist the support of those countries such as those in the Gulf, which have influence in Khartoum, to exert pressure to ensure progress in the humanitarian access negotiations. In the absence of progress in such negotiations, it would be good to hear what other options are being considered to ensure that humanitarian needs are met.

Among the most pressing needs are effective aid, especially in food security, which in turn requires agricultural inputs and veterinary services, and I endorse all the comments just made by the noble Lord, Lord Cameron, but also health assistance, including support for EPI—expanded programme on immunisation—activities, basic medicine and support to health workers at the level of primary health care. Looking to the longer term, there is also a need for educational aid, which is often overlooked in the act of trying to meet the immediate needs of the present day, not simply in the context of the Sudan. At present the proportion of humanitarian aid for education globally is just 2% of the whole. There seems to be a general consensus among aid agencies that, as a percentage, this needs to be at least doubled. That in turn requires a reaffirmation of the international community’s commitment to universal primary education, both in the lead-up to 2015 and beyond; commitment to learning for all beyond 2015, including for children in conflict-affected and fragile states and those caught up in emergencies; and, to this end, the improved delivery of education in emergencies by establishing pooled funds, with a single policy framework that combines rapid financing for devolved school construction, teacher recruitment and in-service training, support for local communities and the development of capacity at all levels of government. I welcome the comments of the noble Lord, Lord Jay, on the need for more effective donor co-ordination.

Coming back to education, what is needed is education in literacy and skills but also education, without indoctrination, in basic human rights and the ways of co-operation, something that is very difficult when enmity is longstanding and when a young country is, understandably, trying to avoid being told what to do by the wider world. So there is an important issue to do with the nature of education aid in the medium term. It is challenging, and yet such education support is vital for long-term stability and, hence, recovery.

This brings me, briefly, to the potential contribution of the churches. Even though many within the international NGO sector recognise the value of churches and other faith groups at community level and their long-term engagement, there are still huge obstacles to overcome in order to establish operational partnerships. International humanitarian mechanisms do not currently provide space for engagement with non-NGO-shaped actors. There is often a feeling that the Church should come to the NGO forums, rather than the NGOs seeking out the local wisdom of local faith leaders and networks. Churches, like all of civil society, have struggled to build financial, communications and technical capacity—although, compared to local government, their capacity is strong—so new models for accompanying them need to be found. An understanding of the social and spiritual capital of local faith communities needs to be part of strategic planning, and innovative opportunities for engagement should be tested out.

I welcome the fact that the Department for International Development guidelines recognise that local churches are key partners and players in the delivery of aid, including education, even though the same guidelines tend to oversimplify the situation by stating that Sudan is now a largely homogeneous Arab Muslim state. That this latter statement is not true is demonstrated not only by the two major conflicts already referred to—not to mention the continuing conflict in Darfur, which is a case of multiple and diverse ethnicities, although mainly Muslim—but also by the continued persecution experienced by the local Church, something to which the most reverend Primate the Archbishop of York has already referred.

However, although DfID recognises the role of the Church, it is highly unfortunate that UNHCR and other NGOs do not always adopt the same policy. The churches and other religious bodies have a key role to play in both delivery and mediation, and yet often the UNHCR treats them as special interest groups without a general humanitarian agenda. Such an approach not only risks marginalising significant groups that work for the common good but can also exacerbate tension if people believe that they are the subject of discrimination. A genuine partnership here could be so effective, with church leaders often having the potential to act as honest brokers in the local community as well as delivering local aid, especially education. The Archbishop and Lambeth Palace are deeply committed to welcoming and supporting the upcoming UNHCR High Commissioner’s Dialogue on faith to be held this December, as well as to an international interfaith research project called the Joint Learning Initiative on Faith and Local Communities.

I therefore conclude by inviting Her Majesty’s Government to encourage the UNHCR to recognise the crucial role of churches and other religious bodies in places such as Sudan and South Sudan in building the broad coalition that is needed to ensure that vital humanitarian aid, including educational aid, is delivered to the places where it is required.

Sudan and South Sudan

Lord Bishop of Exeter Excerpts

Thursday 16th February 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Howell of Guildford]

The short answer to the noble Lord is: not enough progress. The special representative to whom he refers, Michael Ryder, is at this moment back in Addis Ababa seeking to get the negotiations within the context of the African Union High-Level Implementation Panel process going again. It is a constant struggle and progress is very slow.

On the particular aspects of the increasingly horrific humanitarian situation in Southern Kordofan and in the Blue Nile area, I am advised that the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, under the guidance of our former colleague the noble Baroness, Lady Amos, does not for the moment want to press for cross-border access either to Blue Nile or to Southern Kordofan because of the impact that that would have on wider humanitarian activities in Sudan. However, it continues to press for cross-line access to all areas of Southern Kordofan. We are supporting it in that approach but we are, of course, up against the continual denial by the Khartoum Government of proper access by humanitarian agencies. It is a difficult situation.

[The Lord Bishop of Exeter]

My Lords, does the Minister agree that crucial to the future stability and security of South Sudan will be assistance towards building effective bilateral trade, security and political relations with its neighbours and the wider east African region? Can he say what DfID is doing to build capacity in terms of good governance systems and structures, strengthening the east African community and supporting South Sudan in its expressed desire to join the Commonwealth?

[Lord Howell of Guildford]

The answer to the right reverend Prelate is that DfID is doing a great deal. It is putting many millions in infrastructure aid and technical support into this new, young nation of South Sudan and into better relations and connections with the whole east African community. The prospects in the long term are very good, but the prospects in the short term are extremely bad, not least because there is, at present, a total block for various reasons on the sale and transfer of oil from South Sudan, where most of it lies, through the pipelines to the north, where it has to be distributed. That, of course, is slicing the revenue of South Sudan almost to zero. We have to overcome these short-term difficulties, but longer term we ought to be able to build a new and more prosperous east African community, which would certainly include South Sudan.

West Bank and Gaza

Lord Bishop of Exeter Excerpts

Thursday 9th February 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Howell of Guildford]

I am not sure that I share every nuance of my noble friend’s analysis, but it is certainly not in Israel’s interest to practise manoeuvres to undermine and delay the negotiations by the divide-and-rule process. We now have to watch what is going to happen next, to see whether this Government of consensus will work—we will judge them by their deeds—and to see how the pressure of enlightened Israelis, both in their Government and internationally, can bring them to realise that they will then have a body with whom to negotiate. We also have to see how the talks now going on in Amman, in Jordan, progress. We are putting a great deal of effort, as are other countries, into seeing that progress is made there.

[The Lord Bishop of Exeter]

My Lords, the Minister has already rightly recognised the interconnectedness of everything in the Middle East. I have this morning had an e-mail from the Bishop in Egypt, who writes:

“Egypt is undergoing a very … difficult time. It looks as if the country is experiencing labor pains which may end up by the birth of a new baby, a new democratic Egypt. But it could … be the pains prior to a stillbirth, or an abortion”.

Does he agree that in this context it is really important to do everything possible to encourage rather than diminish confidence in the democratic process, particularly among the Palestinians, and that this is closely linked to the willingness of the international community to recognise and uphold the outcomes of such a democratic process?

[Lord Howell of Guildford]

The right reverend Prelate speaks with great wisdom. This is obviously the aim; it is certainly the aim of the United Kingdom. We make our contribution through a variety of ways: obviously through the EU and the quartet, bilaterally and in every other way. However, the principles he describes are right and will have to be upheld with great vigour, because clearly there are people operating in the whole turmoil and mélange of the Middle East uprisings who are not so interested in democracy. These people have to be outfaced.

Christians in the Middle East

Lord Bishop of Exeter Excerpts

Friday 9th December 2011 Lords Chamber

[The Lord Bishop of Exeter]

My Lords, a year ago I had the privilege of attending a synod of Catholic bishops in Rome called by the Pope to consider this very topic of Christians in the Middle East. One hundred and eighty-five bishops took part, 140 came from the Middle East. For the first time, Arabic was one of the working languages of the synod, although to hear languages such as Armenian, Syriac, Kurdish, Assyrian and Persian spoken in the corridors was to be reminded of the, at times, forgotten trans-ethnicity of Middle Eastern Christianity, and indeed of the region as a whole. It was a reminder of just how deeply embedded, and how widely spread, across the region the Christian church may be found—across Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Cyprus, Egypt, the United Arab Emirates, Jordan, Iran, Iraq, Israel, Kuwait, Lebanon, Oman, Qatar, Syria, Turkey, the Palestinian Territories, and Yemen, there are to be found Christian churches that have been there for a very long time, many of them from long before Islam.

It was in the Middle East that the first Christian community was born. From there, the apostles after Pentecost evangelised the whole world. There the early Christian community formed the structures and liturgies that mark the worldwide church today. There the martyrs, with their blood, fortified the foundations of the growing Christian church. After them, the hermits filled the deserts with the perfume of their holiness and their faith. There the scholars of the eastern church lived and continued to nourish the church in both the east and west through their teachings. In the early centuries and later, missionaries from these ancient churches departed for the Far East and the West, taking with them the light of Christ. Today's Middle Eastern Christians are deeply conscious of being the heirs of that heritage, and they have every intention of continuing to be faithful to it.

The whole region, depending on how you define it, has around 356 million people, of whom about 20 million are Christian, around 6 percent of the whole. That may justify speaking numerically of a Christian minority, but not only is this a term that many Christians in the area would rather avoid, it is also somewhat unhelpful where history has left almost every community—Muslims, Christians, Jews; Arabs, Kurds, Copts, Israelis, Palestinians and Turks—seeing themselves, with some justification, as a minority, depending on the context in which they are being viewed.

In Rome, I was particularly struck by one of the great themes of the synod becoming immediately apparent on day one, as speaker after speaker, in their introductory remarks, spoke about the importance of religious freedom seen, not as the special pleading for the region's embattled Christians, but as the cornerstone of a healthy democratic society, and as a universal cause to be pursued for the good of all, Muslim, Christian and Jew alike. One of the first speakers was Patriarch Antonios Naguib of the Egyptian Coptic church, and interestingly, given that the events of the Arab spring, Tunisia and Tahrir Square, were not then even a stirring in the wind, he chose to underline the importance of freedom of conscience—not so much as a right to be claimed for Christians but, instead, a universal right, which Christians and Muslims defend together for the common good. He also called the rise of political Islam across the Middle East,

“a threat which we must face together”,

by which he meant not just the diverse Christians of the region, but also Muslims and Jews.

While radical Islam is sometimes styled as a special threat to the Christians of the Middle East, it is worth remembering that in terms of raw numbers, the primary victims of religious extremism in the Muslim world are other Muslims. In that context, the case for religious freedom as an essential component of human rights is a project that Christians and many Muslims and Jews can share. But it is very important that such religious freedom includes both freedom of worship and freedom of conscience. That is an important distinction in many majority Muslim states, where Christians are generally allowed to worship openly, but where conversion from Islam to Christianity or any other religion is often prohibited. Even when there is no legal impediment to conversion, social and cultural pressures generally make it a perilous choice. This then leads to a situation in which Christians have a sense of being considered non-citizens, despite the fact that they have called these countries home long before Islam.

It is important to stress that across the Middle East we find a wide variety of countries, and so a wide variety of churches and Christian communities too. They are not a monolithic entity, and it is very unhelpful when they are regarded as so. They have in most places been deeply embedded in the culture of the context of which they are a part, for much of history sharing as much, if not more, with their Muslim and Jewish neighbours, as they have with Christians elsewhere.

I take two towns in the vicinity of Bethlehem that I know well, Beit Jalal and Beit Sahour. Back in the early 1970s it would have been very difficult to tell Christians and Muslims apart, at least in terms of many social customs, intermingling of families, support for one another's festivals and styles of dress. Now all that has changed: the different communities have withdrawn into themselves; the differences are plain to see, and there is worrying polarisation when once there was a common life. Why has this come about? Partly it is in response to local political and security initiatives, but also partly as a response to western military intervention and political rhetoric referring to the region as a whole, together with unhelpful and caricatured portrayals of both communities by western academics as well as the popular media—and also, I have to admit, newer styles of western evangelism and Christian mission, all of which have assisted to push communities apart. Once polarised, reintegration is not so easily achieved.

It really would be helpful to people of all religions across the region if we in the West were a little more ready to recognise our responsibility for what is to be found across much of the Middle East today. It is very easy to forget, given the prominence of Islam in much of public life across much of the Middle East today, just how secular that region was even 30 years ago. In all but the most conservative Gulf states, western fashions were preferred over traditional dress; many people drank alcohol openly in disregard of official prohibition—whether that is a good thing or not—and men and women mixed freely in the workplace, as more and more women were entering higher education and professional life.

In the wake of the Arab spring, I hear much concern being expressed about Islamification and the role of the Muslim Brotherhood. Again I find it cautionary to remember that the Brotherhood had its roots partly in the response by European powers to earlier attempts across the former Ottoman empire to achieve a form of secular democracy immediately after the First World War. In Egypt, Syria, Iraq, Algeria and Lebanon a push, generally with strong support from the grass roots, including women, for a multiparty parliamentary democracy, was firmly crushed, particularly by Britain, France and Italy, while sectarian identity was cynically fostered as a means of sustaining colonial rule. All of this has left a bitter taste but also an aspiration for a more authentically Arab or Middle Eastern style of democracy and, with each new western intervention, there is an exacerbation of the problem facing many Middle Eastern Christians, which is a tendency in the Muslim street to identify them with the West and the policy choices of western Governments, even when such policies are not supported by the churches here or there. Yet, for the most part, in most places, the Christian churches remain deeply committed to playing their part in working for religious pluralism, dialogue and mutual respect. However, they cannot be expected to do this on their own.

One of the most significant addresses to that synod in Rome came from David Rosen, adviser to the Chief Rabbinate of Israel. Christians, he noted, play,

“a disproportionate role in promoting interreligious understanding”,

in the region, but it is,

“not fair to expect the small local Christian communities to be capable of bearing such responsibility alone”.

He is right. They need our understanding, free of stereotypes and simplistic assumptions, and for that understanding to be translated into so many of the policies that impact on that region's life.

Kosovo and Serbia

Lord Bishop of Exeter Excerpts

Thursday 8th December 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Howell of Guildford]

I hope the answer is that it will be positive. The noble Lord is right. Robert Cooper is an extremely able servant of the European Union and, indeed, citizen of this country. The role of the EAS is relevant, although I know that the noble Lord is the first to recognise that with a number of international organisations down there—the UN, the EAS, the ICO and so on—co-ordination is very important. I cannot give an estimate of the speed of progress. It will all come up at the European Council tomorrow. We may see some progress after that but I cannot predict it.

[The Lord Bishop of Exeter]

My Lords, with the EU’s attention currently and squarely focused on the financial crisis within its own borders, is there not a real danger that there will be less time and energy to understand or respond strategically to events in its most immediate neighbourhoods? Will the Minister give an indication as to how the eurozone crisis has impacted on the EU’s foreign policy and its ability to deploy soft power in an area such as the Balkans? Will he also tell the House whether, on the expiry of the mandates of the International Civilian Office in Kosovo and the EU Rule of Law Mission in Kosovo, EULEX, these mandates will be renewed?

[Lord Howell of Guildford]

Yes, I can tell the right reverend Prelate that the mandate for EULEX will be renewed. As to the broader question, clearly the minds of the leadership of the European Union are distracted by the eurozone problems but I do not see that they should impact necessarily on the expertise and determination being applied by the EU authorities in pursuing the dialogue and seeing that Serbia recognises the need to accept and accommodate the independence of Kosovo in its thinking, attitudes and policies so that it can go forward to membership of the EU.