Arms Sales: Saudi Arabia

Lord West of Spithead Excerpts

Thursday 28th January 2016 Lords Chamber

[The Earl of Courtown]

My Lords, as I said earlier, and as my noble friend emphasised, the Yemeni people are suffering from the conflict between the rebels and the elected Government. As I said earlier, in the late autumn my right honourable friend the Foreign Secretary was in discussions in Saudi Arabia with the authorities there, and my honourable friend Mr Ellwood was there earlier this week discussing that area of the world.

[Lord West of Spithead (Lab)]

My Lords, the noble Earl is right that compared with every other nation in the world the rules we apply to defence sales are incredibly strict and correct, but of course we have to investigate these cases very thoroughly. Specifically, although no UK military personnel are involved in events that are going on in Yemen or are giving advice on targeting, if I understand the noble Earl correctly, one of the benefits of the fact that we sometimes get involved with countries is that we are able to apply the very strict standards we have of obeying international law. Surely these people could give advice to the Saudis on how to avoid civilian casualties and so on—that must surely be within their remit or are they not allowed even to do that?

[The Earl of Courtown]

My Lords, as I understand it, the noble Lord is quite correct. I gave a brief answer saying that the UK was not involved in carrying out any of the strikes, but I can say that we have a very small number of staff in the Saudi Arabian headquarters in a liaison capacity only. These liaison officers are not involved in the targeting process, as I said earlier. Secondly, there is our ongoing defence engagement relationship with the Saudis. This is part of our long-standing relationship. When concerns are raised by non-governmental organisations or in the media, these liaison officers will pass all available information back to the United Kingdom. This will help inform our assessment of compliance with international humanitarian law.