South Sudan: Famine

Lord Collins of Highbury Excerpts

Thursday 23rd February 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Bates]

I am grateful to the noble Lord for raising that point and for his work in the all-party group, which produced a valuable report just yesterday on the general situation in the region. He is absolutely right: many of the crises that we face are not man-made, but this one most certainly is. I have just left an emergency planning meeting with co-ordinating partners on the situation in Somalia, where some 6 million people are at risk because of famine. We are doing the best we can there, but in South Sudan the frustrating thing is that, although we committed £100 million, the UN Mission in South Sudan is in place on the ground and many humanitarian workers are risking their lives to deliver aid. Unless there is implementation of the existing peace agreement, the future of the people in South Sudan, particularly women and children, looks increasingly bleak.

[Lord Collins of Highbury (Lab)]

I congratulate the Government on their immediate humanitarian aid response and welcome the Secretary of State’s commitment to engage with other donors, including the EU. This is all good news. However, in making that announcement, she referred to this crisis being caused by war and conflict. Last week, we debated Sudan in Grand Committee. The Foreign Office Minister, the noble Baroness, Lady Anelay, referred to our work in support of the African Union. Can the Minister reiterate what we are doing to build sustainable peace efforts and trade? This comes back to our previous point that development is about not just humanitarian aid but building peace and sustainability, particularly in Africa.

[Lord Bates]

The noble Lord is absolutely right and I appreciate his remarks. On the specific points that he mentions, we have supported and encouraged the work of the Intergovernmental Authority on Development—IGAD—which has led a lot of this work, and have worked through the UN Security Council on that. We have worked with international partners. We are part of the troika with Norway and the United States, which is key in intervening in this area. My noble friend Lady Anelay is looking at the work we are doing across the border, because, although some 3 million people are internally displaced, increasingly, as refugees flow across the border in search of support, that is destabilising other countries in the region. My noble friend Lady Anelay was in Uganda visiting one of the refugee camps. We have committed another £50 million of support in that regard. A huge amount has been done, but the UK cannot do this alone; the international community must step up to the plate. We need to see more action there.