Sri Lanka
Lord Browne of Ladyton Excerpts(2 years, 4 months ago)
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Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (Con)
My Lords, we are certainly watching that space very closely. Communal tensions arise in any conflict where communities perhaps seek to assign blame to another community. We are also looking very carefully at pre-existing religious tensions. Although there have been raids into the presidential compound and the Prime Minister’s residence, we have not yet seen or monitored an increase in communal tension between the two major communities in Sri Lanka.
Lord Browne of Ladyton (Lab)
My Lords, Sri Lanka has a dark history of human rights abuses, the vast majority being perpetrated with complete impunity. Today’s fear, with the announcement of a state of emergency coupled with political instability, is that these terrible atrocities will begin again. What conversations has the Minister or any of his colleagues had with our partners about how we can avoid these fears being realised? On the issue of impunity, it appears that the Rajapaksa brothers are intent on going to the United States of America. Can we have some conversations with our American ally about whether the impunity they have enjoyed up until now will survive that transfer to the USA?
Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (Con)
My Lords, the noble Lord talks about impunity regarding conflicts past, particularly the civil war. That is why the United Kingdom has led on Resolution 46/1 at the Human Rights Council. When I was last in Geneva, I engaged directly with the Sri Lankan Foreign Minister, saying that we would sustain our support for it. That remains an important issue, and I am sure it will be a point of discussion when the UNHRC returns in September.
As to the current situation with the previous Administration, including Mr Rajapaksa and other members of his family, countries will make their own determinations but we want the perpetrators of the civil war to be held to account. Equally, we want to ensure that the communities that suffered do not see the conflicts of the past occur again.
Tigray
Lord Browne of Ladyton Excerpts(2 years, 4 months ago)
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Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (Con)
My Lords, again, without getting too much into the arms sales issue, as I have said repeatedly from the Dispatch Box, we have a very rigid policy when it comes to arms and defence sales across the world; those same principles are applied irrespective of which country may be requesting that support or assistance from the UK.
Lord Browne of Ladyton (Lab)
My Lords, this conflict is a humanitarian disaster of monumental proportions; 9 million people have been affected by it and about half a million people have died. Turning to the peace process which has been proposed, the TPLF does not trust the African Union to lead the peace process and wants Kenya to lead it instead. Given that on Thursday last week Prime Minister Abiy’s spokesperson spoke very positively about the relationship between Ethiopia and Kenya and between Prime Minister Abiy and President Kenyatta, should we not argue for the Kenyan Government to work alongside the AU and its envoy as a compromise solution? Surely with what is at stake, that is what is necessary: a compromise.
Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (Con)
My Lords, the noble Lord makes a very valid proposal and I assure him that in our engagement with Kenya the importance of the situation in Ethiopia is part and parcel of our discussions. I think there will be a change of leadership very shortly in Kenya, with President Kenyatta stepping down. But it is equally important that we engage proactively to ensure that whoever then goes on to lead Kenya is fully engaged in finding a solution to this process.
Aiden Aslin and Shaun Pinner
Lord Browne of Ladyton Excerpts(2 years, 5 months ago)
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Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (Con)
My Lords, I hear what the noble Lord says. Of course, he is right to articulate that we have been making representations, including directly with the Russian authorities. We do not recognise the de facto authorities in occupied parts of Ukraine, and I think that is the right approach. I assure him of our good offices in every element of ensuring the rights of all the detainees who are currently being detained by Russia and strengthening the hand of Ukraine in their representation.
Lord Browne of Ladyton (Lab)
My Lords, in the case of Aiden Aslin, on 18 April, Graham Phillips, a former British civil servant and pro-Russian propagandist, published a video interview with him—a prisoner of war, in handcuffs, physically injured and manifestly under duress—and extracted from him an admission, in those conditions, that he was not a Ukrainian soldier but had a different relationship with the war. Experts who have studied this video and its circumstances say there is sufficient evidence there to support the view that this was a breach of the Geneva conventions on the treatment of prisoners of war, and that Phillips, a British citizen, is at risk of prosecution for war crimes. As he is a British citizen, ought we not to be further investigating this to see whether he has indeed violated international law, and issuing a warrant for his arrest?
British Council Contractors: Afghanistan
Lord Browne of Ladyton Excerpts(2 years, 5 months ago)
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Lord Browne of Ladyton (Lab)
My Lords, if I understand this correctly, these people are contractors for the British Council, and employees of GardaWorld are working as security contractors for the Government and the embassy. In Scotland, they are very well known to us; we know exactly who these people are and we know a lot about them. Presumably, given what they were doing, we must be very sanguine about their attitude towards security. Why were these people excluded from the ARAP scheme in the first place? Why does the British Council now tell us that it was allowed to put only employees through the ARAP scheme and not the contractors? Why is it only now that we recognise that we should fulfil our obligation not only to them but to their families, to the extent of 1,500 people? Why do we not just include them in the ARAP scheme and give them the flexibility that everyone else has, rather than putting these people—a lot of whom, as we know, are living in daily fear of their lives—through this short window of opportunity to get registered for resettlement and, we hope, to get back to security with us?
Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (Con)
My Lords, first, as the noble Lord is aware, there are two different schemes: the ARAP scheme has its eligibility criteria and the ACRS—which is now open as this particular pathway—has its own criteria. I know of individual cases of people being considered for the ARAP scheme but not being accepted on to it. However, there have been opportunities, as we have seen in certain cases, allowing others then to go through the ACRS process.
On the small window of opportunity that the noble Lord asked about, there is a cap on the number we will be taking in year one which is both manageable and, I think, consistent with the announcements we have made previously. Equally, this is only year one; other pathways are also open to those seeking settlement, including Pathway 2, on which we are working very closely with the UNHCR. There are those people, including those from the cohorts we have discussed, who will be in neighbouring countries. We are working very closely with the UNHCR on that pathway as well. Therefore, ARAP, ACRS, Pathway 2 and, indeed, ACRS Pathway 3 are different routes, which enable people to go through a process which would allow for their resettlement in the United Kingdom.
Ukraine: Defence Relationships
Lord Browne of Ladyton Excerpts(2 years, 5 months ago)
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Lord Browne of Ladyton (Lab)
My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Cormack. I agree with him that we face an extraordinarily great challenge in the West, and those of us who subscribe to our values can only face that challenge together; there is no possibility of us doing so individually. I draw attention to my entry in the register of interests, particularly my chairmanship of the European Leadership Network, and vice-chairmanship of the Nuclear Threat Initiative. I join other noble Lords in thanking and congratulating my noble friend Lord Liddle for securing this timely and welcome debate and for the careful and balanced way that he opened it.
On Friday I chaired a meeting of the core group of the Euro-Atlantic Security Leadership Group. The EASLG, which was formed after the 2014 invasion of Crimea and Donbass, is sponsored by the European Leadership Network, the Munich Security Conference, the Russian International Affairs Council and the Nuclear Threat Initiative, and includes former and current officials and experts from Euro-Atlantic states. The EASLG is designed to test ideas and develop proposals for improving security in areas of existential common interest in these complex and difficult times. It operates as an independent and informal initiative, with participants from more than 15 countries who reflect the diversity of the Euro-Atlantic region, and it particularly includes both Ukrainians and Russians in this conversation.
Our focus was on Ukraine. I will draw the attention the House to two humanitarian challenges that we discussed, which otherwise are unlikely to surface in this debate but are a very strong reflection of the complexity of modern warfare, and also one issue of deep strategic importance that has emerged recently in this context. At this discussion we were joined by representatives of the International Commission on Missing Persons and the Halo Trust, which is a British and US charity set up to remove the debris left behind by war, in particular land mines and unexploded ordnance.
The estimates assembled by the ICMP from a variety of sources suggest that, since the beginning of 2014—when this war really began—more than 2, 500 people may have been kidnapped, abducted, forcibly disappeared or have gone missing from all levels of Ukrainian society, as well as from all sides of the political and conflict divide. This is now a weapon of war, as is moving people deliberately. Six million Ukrainians, mostly women and children, have left Ukraine, and many of these children are subject to disappearance because we do not know where all of them are.
The ICMP has been working in the war zones of Ukraine for years. It reported to us that the commitments agreed in an MoU between the Ukrainian Government and the International Commission on Missing Persons had not even begun to be implemented prior to the outbreak of hostilities on 24 February. Now, with a new legal framework, the whole situation has changed and, four weeks ago, the ICMP returned to Kyiv to make new arrangements. It has set up a forensic mission which was sent to Ukraine; it has completed its work and is now able to return with evidence and genetic samples from bodies so they can be identified. There is interest in setting up a data depository that could serve multiple objectives, including potentially the pursuit of war crimes, and the ICMP hopes to set up an office in Kyiv to support these efforts. My question for our Government is, in considering this significant challenge, what resources are we devoting to supporting it?
The Halo Trust has been at work in various locations in Ukraine since 2016, with 450 Ukrainian staff, mostly locally engaged. The programme has now shifted from eastern Donbass to the centre of the country. Survey and risk-reduction teams are on the ground, dealing with new threats, which include anti-tank mines that have been laid in farmland, making these fields unusable and exacerbating the food security issue that will affect a substantial part of the world. Until they are cleaned up properly, we will not even begin to reverse the damage that has been done. Ukraine’s state emergency services have, by Halo’s estimate, already done a huge amount of clearance. Many minefields have been partially cleared, but partially cleared is not good enough in this situation; they require additional time and cost to finish the rest. Halo, however, is working under pre-war restrictions in Ukraine, precluding the use of high explosives. This requires pausing to allow the military, which is not equipped to do this, to deal with the issue before Halo can move in. Halo is trying to lobby the Ukrainian Government to lift this restriction, and any additional support that our Government can give in their communication and discussions with them will be extremely important. I urge the Government to take on this and other issues that the Halo Trust is dealing with. I commend the Government for the financial support that they have given—as have the US Government—to Halo, but it will not be able to do its work properly unless some of these local blockages are removed.
I turn now to the strategic question, which I raised at Oral Questions on Tuesday. Security guarantees in some indiscernible form continue to be referenced as a major issue in ending the war in Ukraine. I understand that Kyiv is now in discussion with the Quad about them. On Monday, the Prime Minister met President Zelensky, and Number 10 briefed the press that they had discussed security guarantees. In March, there was apparently progress on this in the negotiations between Ukraine and Russia; in April, that process stopped. There are many questions about this. This is a fundamental issue for us. We need to be at the table if security guarantees that involve our country in commitments are being discussed in the resolution of this conflict.
The most important question for the Government is this: when will someone come to Parliament, explain what is being discussed and spell out the implications of these security guarantees, which are clearly already being discussed, for our future security and that of the West?
Ukraine: International Conference
Lord Browne of Ladyton Excerpts(2 years, 5 months ago)
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Lord Browne of Ladyton (Lab)
My Lords, security guarantees in some indiscernible form continue to be referenced as a major issue in ending the war in Ukraine. We understand that Kyiv is now in discussion with the Quad about them. Yesterday, the Prime Minister met President Zelensky and No. 10 briefed the press that they had discussed security guarantees. When will the Government make a Statement to Parliament about what is being discussed and the implications for us, the United Kingdom, of these guarantees?
Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park (Con)
My Lords, the UK position has not changed. We have been providing support continuously since the beginning of this grim episode. I think it is true to say that we are the second largest contributor of military equipment and the second largest supporter of Ukraine through humanitarian efforts. We have always maintained that, although it is for Ukraine to determine the final settlement, arrangements or agreement, if such an agreement is reached with Russia, our support is unambiguously with Ukraine.
Queen’s Speech
Lord Browne of Ladyton Excerpts(2 years, 6 months ago)
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Lord Browne of Ladyton (Lab)
My Lords, in less than three months of fighting Russia has lost one-third of the ground combat force it committed to the invasion of Ukraine. Every wrecked Russian tank—taken out by light anti-tank weapons deployed with minimum training, unslung in seconds from the shoulder and deadly accurate—is further evidence that traditional armies can no longer expect to dominate simply because they have more troops, weapons and money. As weapons have become smaller, more effective and widely dispersed, it has become harder and harder for traditional militaries effectively to achieve their aims through brute force, as they meet resistance at every turn. Resistance in this case includes information warfare, hacking and cyber- attacks, as well as social media, which President Zelensky excels at, casting the conflict in terms of good and evil and projecting an aura of invincibility.
Our own experience in Iraq and Afghanistan underscores the reality of contemporary warfare: that invasion and occupation is more expensive and temporary than it is quick and permanent. As always, the future belongs to those who embrace it and, in this context, who empower the decentralisation of weapons technology, information currency and individual ingenuity and courage.
Less has been said about the use of artificial intelligence in the Ukraine war than about anti-tank missiles but in April, a senior Defense Department official said that the Pentagon—quietly—is using AI and machine-learning tools to analyse vast amounts of data, generate useful battlefield intelligence and learn about Russian tactics and strategy. Just how much the US is passing to Ukraine is a matter for conjecture and I shall not do that. A powerful Russian drone with AI capabilities has been spotted in Ukraine. Meanwhile, Ukraine has itself employed the use of a controversial facial recognition technology. Prime Minister Fedorov told Reuters that it had been using Clearview AI—software that uses facial recognition—to discover the social media profiles of deceased Russian soldiers, which authorities then use to notify their relatives and offer arrangements for their bodies to be recovered.
If the technology can be used to identify live as well as dead enemy soldiers, it could also be incorporated into systems that use automated decision-making to direct lethal force. This is not a remote possibility; last year, the UN reported that an autonomous drone had killed people in Libya in 2020. There are unconfirmed reports of autonomous weapons already being used in Ukraine. We are seeing a rapid trend towards increasing autonomy in weapons systems. AI and computational methods are allowing machines to make more and more decisions themselves.
Our Government see AI as playing an important role in the future of warfighting. The integrated review, presenting AI and other scientific advances as “battle-winning technologies”, set out their priority for
“identifying, funding, developing and deploying new technologies and capabilities faster than our potential adversaries”.
There is an urgent need for strategic leadership by government and for scrutiny by Parliament, as AI plays an increasing role in the changing landscape of war. We need UK leadership to establish, domestically and internationally, when it is ethically and legally appropriate to delegate to a machine autonomous decision-making about when to take an individual’s life.
The development of LAWS is not inevitable, and an international legal instrument would play a major role in controlling their use. In the absence of an international ban, it is inevitable that, eventually, these weapons will be used against UK citizens or soldiers. Advocating international regulation would not be abandoning the military potential of new technology; it is needed on AWS to give our industry guidance to be a sci-tech super- power without undermining our security and values. Weapons that are not aligned with our values must not be used to defend our values. We should not be asking our honourable service personnel to use immoral weapons.
The war in Ukraine has brought home the tragic human consequences of ongoing conflict. The use of LAWS in future conflicts and the lack of clear accountability for the decisions made pose serious complications and challenges for post-conflict resolution and peacebuilding. The way in which these weapons might be used and the human rights challenges they present are novel and unknown; the existing laws of war were not designed to cope with such situations and, on their own, are not enough to control the use of future autonomous weapons systems.
The integrated review pledged to
“publish a Defence AI strategy”.
More than a year later, there is still no sign of it. The Government’s delay in publishing the strategy while the technology is outpacing us means that the UK is unprepared to deal with the ethical, legal and practical challenges presented by autonomous weapons systems today.
Covid-19: Global Vaccine Inequity
Lord Browne of Ladyton Excerpts(2 years, 7 months ago)
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Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (Con)
My Lords, I pay tribute to my noble friend’s work in Nepal, and I am grateful for his briefings on his work there. We delivered 131,000 AstraZeneca vaccines to Nepal in October and since August, overall through the COVAX facility, we have delivered a further 2.2 million donated vaccines to Nepal. COVAX remains in our view the best way to allocate vaccines, but we are also working directly with the Nepalese Government to ensure that we focus some of our support directly on the medical, social and economic consequences of Covid-19. I hope to visit that country soon, and we will be focused on these priorities bilaterally with the Government of Nepal.
Lord Browne of Ladyton (Lab)
My Lords, on 12 May, the White House will co-host the second global Covid-19 summit, a gathering intended to build momentum for vaccine donations, discuss efforts to end the pandemic and prepare for future health threats. Can the Minister confirm that we will participate in that summit meeting, and if so, can he tell the House what our priorities are for the meeting and whether the Government plan to make any announcements of actions there to address the continuing global vaccine inequity challenge?
Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (Con)
My Lords, I can confirm to the noble Lord that we will of course be actively engaged and working with the United States on that very event. In terms of priorities, as I have already said, we are very much focused on the most vulnerable. When we look at the global south there is much work still to be done. Indeed, two weeks ago during our UN presidency of the Security Council, I chaired a meeting of the Security Council specifically on Covid-19 which focused on reaching the most vulnerable, particularly those affected by conflict or humanitarian crises.
Ukraine: Rape as a Weapon of War
Lord Browne of Ladyton Excerpts(2 years, 7 months ago)
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Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (Con)
My Lords, my noble friend is of course right. We are working through a new initiative to strengthen our approach to sexual violence launched by my right honourable friend the Foreign Secretary. We are increasing the number of countries that are now part of that. As I indicated, I shall also be at the UN in a couple of weeks’ time, where this will be primary among my engagements bilaterally. I can share with your Lordships’ House that we have already made a public commitment to holding a specific event on preventing sexual violence in conflict. We are finalising some of the dates, but it is likely to be in the last quarter of this year.
Lord Browne of Ladyton (Lab)
My Lords, as the noble Baroness has said, increasingly, rape and sexual violence as a weapon of war is becoming the rule and accountability is becoming the exception. One exception is that in Germany in January a Syrian former intelligence officer was sentenced to life imprisonment for crimes against humanity committed in the Syrian civil war, including rape. This is an example of national courts prosecuting irrespective of nationality where an offence has been committed if they have in place universal jurisdiction laws, as in a limited way we do. Even Russia has universal jurisdiction laws. There is enormous potential in this area. Are our Government working with allies and others to explore that route and to extend it substantially?
Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (Con)
I can assure the noble Lord that the answer to that is yes. Earlier this week, I attended a meeting chaired by the Deputy Prime Minister and the Justice Secretary that covered among other issues the very issue that the noble Lord has raised.
To pick up a strand of what the noble Lord, Lord Purvis, may have wanted to ask about, on Yazidis, as I indicated in response to my noble friend Lady Anelay, while the Security Council meeting that we will be hosting will home in on the situation in Ukraine, it will not in any shape or form diminish the continuing issues of sexual violence in other conflicts. I mentioned Nadia Murad. As a Yazidi, she is working centrally with the Government.
On accountability and justice, as was said earlier by the noble Baroness, Lady Hussein-Ece, we know of the experience of the Balkans. It took more than 20 years for women—there have also been men who have tragically fallen victim to this crime—to get any sense of justice. It can take time, but the United Kingdom launched this initiative with the view that it would be very much on the front burner and it remains a key priority. I shall of course update noble Lords on my return from the United Nations about progress being made.
Ukraine
Lord Browne of Ladyton Excerpts(2 years, 8 months ago)
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Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (Con)
My Lords, on my noble friend’s final point, in any sanctions we of course look at a full range of factors to determine who we sanction. We are dynamic in our response, looking at the implications of any sanctions that we have imposed and wider ones that need to apply. I hear very clearly my noble friend’s comments on our defence, but, of course, in advance of this conflict we increased defence spending. Nevertheless, conflicts such as these bring in an important consideration of ensuring that our integrated review and its outcomes are applicable and relevant to the world as we see it today.
Lord Browne of Ladyton (Lab)
My Lords, has the Minister had the opportunity to read the words written yesterday by Richard Haass, the veteran diplomat and peacemaker and the current president of the Council on Foreign Relations? I refer to them because he very clearly stated that, at this stage, there ought to be two priorities for his Government and other Governments who support Ukraine. I refer to him because I agree with him. First, we need to concentrate on ending this war on terms that are acceptable to Ukraine. Secondly, in the meantime, we need to discourage and deter escalation by President Putin—that is crucially important. So we should all think about what is a plausible war termination, because I believe that we will be asked that question sooner rather than later. We should also be very careful about what we say, because if it gives President Putin the sense that he has nothing to lose, he will be discouraged from any form of restraint in those circumstances. I wonder whether our Government are approaching the situation in this way, appreciating—as I am sure the Minister does, having come to know him—that this ought to be very important to all of us.
Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (Con)
My Lords, I have not actually seen the statement raised by the noble Lord, but I will look at it. In principle, I agree with both points raised. The first is very clear: when it comes to peace, any resolution must be led and agreed by Ukraine, as I said in response to the noble Lord, Lord McDonald. That remains part and parcel of our thinking. On Mr Putin and Russia, President Zelensky has repeatedly been calling for direct talks, because it is important that the leaders of those two countries sit down to determine their future pathway. It is also important that other countries that support Ukraine, as we do, fully support direct contact in such negotiations.