Middle East

Lord Rotherwick Excerpts

Tuesday 23rd February 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Rotherwick (Con)]

My Lords, I was fortunate to visit Israel last week, where the Israeli Government expressed to our group of Peers a wish for peace and economic prosperity for themselves and their neighbours. The Palestine Liberation Organization gave a somewhat different and muddled view.

During the British mandate of 1920 to 1947, there was much unrest between the Palestinian Arabs and the Jews. Attacks on, and massacres of, Jews occurred in 1921 and 1929. In 1936, during the Great Arab Revolt, thousands of Jews were attacked and killed; some fled the area. Indeed, in 1939—77 years ago—my father served in what was then Palestine with his regiment, the Royal Scots Greys. I discussed our trip with a great friend who has worked as an NGO in Israel and he asked me, “Is it surprising that the Gaza people behave in the way they do when they have an apartheid or separation wall?”. “Look at the facts”, I said. In 2002, during the second intifada, around 52 Israelis were killed or wounded each week by Palestinian terrorism. After the completion of the security barrier, less than one Israeli was killed or injured a week. Even this figure would not be accepted in the UK. Today, during the recent wave of violence, the odd rocket still keeps falling on Sderot near the Gaza Strip, and Israelis are regularly stabbed, but the suicide and pipe bombers are defeated by the security barriers. These barriers are saving thousands of lives.

Many attempts at a permanent, peaceful solution have been made. Israel has signed up to most but the Palestinians have not. It seems to me, as a Christian, that the Palestinians have no intention of committing to any agreement unless they can have total control of all of Israel.

Arctic Ice Cap

Lord Rotherwick Excerpts

Monday 6th December 2010 Lords Chamber

[Lord Rotherwick]

My Lords, the principal driver of the temperature of the earth is the sun and fluctuations have occurred for as long as measurements have been recorded. The Arctic is among the most sensitive to temperature fluctuations and consequent changes in the ice cap. Notwithstanding the downsides of the melting of the ice cap, one of the upsides, as mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Jay, is the increased accessibility of the north-west passage. This opens up considerable economic and environmental benefits, providing scope to obviate existing security threats in the Gulf of Aden and introducing alternative routes to the Suez and Panama canals.

Nor should we ignore Greenland, an autonomous country within the kingdom of Denmark, located within the Arctic Circle. It is the world’s largest island and owes its name to the agricultural opportunities that settlers were keen to exploit—a green land that as a private pilot I have landed on a number of times. Populated for around 5,000 years, the Norse Vikings established farmland settlements around the year 1000 AD, something which would have been impossible in 1900. However, even at the time of the Vikings’ presence on the island, almost the entirety of the land mass would have been covered by at least a 1 kilometre sheet of ice, yet the climate along the coast was conducive to supporting an agricultural community, attractive in its similarity to the lifestyle of the Scandinavian farmer of that period, based on arable and livestock farming.

Approximately 85 per cent of the island is covered by ice and Greenland benefits, as we have heard, from valuable fish stocks, an issue which ended its brief membership of the European Community in the 1980s. Its natural resources include coal, iron ore, lead, zinc, molybdenum, diamonds, gold, platinum, niobium, tantalite, uranium, fish, seals, whales and hydropower—quite a lot. Additionally, there are significant potential oil and gas fields, especially in the northern and north-eastern parts of the island. The current economy remains critically dependent on increased catches and exports of shrimp, Greenland halibut and, most recently, crabs. These represent around 82 per cent of the country’s total exports.

Opportunities for fishing in Greenland may be widened further but the scope to broaden its economic position in respect of other natural resources should not be discounted. For example, the increased interest in hydrocarbon exploration off Greenland’s western coast represents a significant opportunity to deliver both economic and environmental benefits. The potential abundance of hydropower generation could also become a considerable source of power. Similarly, there has been an increase in tourism in Greenland. Cruise liners now operate in the western and southern waters during the peak summer tourist seasons. Although debates on topics of this kind tend to be characterised by the threat of impending doom, we should not forget that opportunities will emerge. We should be alert to them and include them in our considerations.