Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Lord Swire and Dominic Raab(10 years, 4 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Mr Swire
We raise these issues consistently at senior ministerial levels in Pakistan. My right hon. Friend the Prime Minister and my right hon. Friend the then Foreign Secretary lobbied Prime Minister Sharif during his visit in May. We made it clear that Pakistan must guarantee the rights of all its citizens, regardless of their ethnicity.
Mr Dominic Raab (Esher and Walton) (Con)
Given our historic ties with and moral responsibility for the people of Hong Kong, will the Minister make it clear that our growing friendship with China requires its leaders to keep their promise at the time of the handover to allow free and fair elections in Hong Kong by 2017?
Mr Swire
Indeed. I met Martin Lee and Anson Chan when they were over here last week. We stand by our early commitments. We want to see a transition towards universal suffrage, but ultimately that must be decided by the Government in the Hong Kong special administrative region, by the people of Hong Kong and by the Government in Beijing.
Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Lord Swire and Dominic Raab(10 years, 7 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
The Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office (Mr Hugo Swire)
The UN commission of inquiry report on human rights in the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea documented appalling human rights violations. The UK played a leading role in ensuring a strong UN Human Rights Council resolution on the issue, which made it clear that there can be no impunity for those responsible.
Mr Raab
The report documented a totalitarian state on a par with Nazi Germany, systematically starving, torturing and murdering its own people, and in reply North Korea, backed by China, told the international community to mind its own business. How do we tilt the balance of China’s perception of its national interest so that it stops protecting the war criminals in Pyongyang?
Mr Swire
My hon. Friend is right. The Human Rights Council resolution talked about state-sanctioned horrific violations, which it described as
“without parallel in the contemporary world”.
At the UK-China strategic dialogue my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary raised the commission of inquiry report with State Councillor Yang, and we continue to discuss human rights abuses in the DPRK with the Chinese and other parties.