BBC and British Council

Lord Wright of Richmond Excerpts

Thursday 21st October 2010 Lords Chamber

[Lord Howell of Guildford]

The short answer to my noble friend is yes. The BBC will remain in the same relation of governance to the Foreign Office as now, and in fact no language service can be closed without the written approval of my right honourable friend the Foreign Secretary. On the Burmese service, there were some media reports about closures, but they were speculation—and inaccurate speculation at that—and my right honourable friend made clear to the Foreign Affairs Committee in the other place the value he places on the Burmese service of the BBC World Service. My noble friend can be reassured on the point she has rightly raised.

[Lord Wright of Richmond]

My Lords, I fully endorse the remarks of the Minister on the value of the BBC World Service and its independence. Can he give an assurance that the spending review will not affect the ability of our posts in this part of Europe to analyse and report on political developments in those countries?

[Lord Howell of Guildford]

I hope not and that certainly is not the intention. The noble Lord has raised the broader question of the overall effect of budget disciplines on the Foreign Office and on posts. There will be some effects, but they will be mitigated by the fact that the Foreign Office will draw on the support of the Department for International Development and other sources to ensure that, together, the various departments represented in overseas posts remain as strongly and as acutely plugged into local events as ever.

Israel: Illegal Settlers

Lord Wright of Richmond Excerpts

Thursday 14th October 2010 Lords Chamber

Asked By

[Lord Wright of Richmond]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the Government of Israel’s continued refusal to remove illegal settlers from the West Bank and East Jerusalem; and what action the European Union is taking to help resolve this problem.

[The Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office (Lord Howell of Guildford)]

My Lords, all settlement activity in the Occupied Palestinian Territories is illegal and represents an obstacle to peace. We have consistently pressed Israel to renew its settlement moratorium and are very disappointed that it has not yet done so. My right honourable friend the Foreign Secretary delivered this message to Israeli Foreign Minister Lieberman on 27 September and reiterated it on 6 October. The European Council also set this out in its statement on 16 September.

[Lord Wright of Richmond]

I am grateful to the Minister for that reply. Is he aware that as of June this year up to 200 housing units were under construction that started construction while the so-called moratorium was in place? They add to the 2,000 building units that started before the moratorium and continued right through it to this day. Does the Minister recall that in 1982, after the Israelis invaded Lebanon, the Conservative Administration, of which he was a member, imposed a ban on all British arms to Israel until the invasion was reversed? Will he consider with our European partners a similar ban on an EU-wide basis until a genuine moratorium is put in place and the Israeli Government start to remove illegal settlers from the West Bank and East Jerusalem?

[Lord Howell of Guildford]

I totally share the noble Lord’s correct frustration and dismay that the building activity has gone on even during the moratorium and is probably continuing at this moment in a highly provocative way. We regard that as illegal.

As to embargoes and export restrictions, we take the view that the total isolation of Israel would be a backward, not forward, step in this painful process. We fully agree that pressure must be mobilised. As far as an arms embargo is concerned, we have very tight, rigorous and effective consolidated EU and national export licensing criteria, which we employ. These work very effectively. As the noble Lord indicated, any further ban on development would have to be not merely EU-wide but virtually worldwide. We think that the isolation route is not the right one except, of course, for the crucial issues that I mentioned that are under very tight licensing control.

Russia

Lord Wright of Richmond Excerpts

Monday 26th July 2010 Lords Chamber

[Lord Howell of Guildford]

I agree with the noble Lord that that is a positive and interesting aspect and there have of course been others. I do not know whether your Lordships shared my view that there was something rather splendid about seeing a platoon of the Brigade of Guards marching through Red Square the other day in full dress. I liked that.

[Lord Wright of Richmond]

My Lords, picking up the last point made by the noble Lord, Lord Kilclooney, can the Minister tell us whether Russia, as a member of the quartet, is playing a significant and positive role?

Foreign Policy

Lord Wright of Richmond Excerpts

Thursday 1st July 2010 Lords Chamber

[Lord Wright of Richmond]

My Lords, I am sure it will not surprise my former boss, the noble and learned Lord, Lord Howe of Aberavon, if I decide today to talk about the Middle East. We have had many recent discussions in this House on the situation in Gaza. I would like to return to the long-standing problem of Israeli colonisation of the West Bank and the eviction of Palestinians from east Jerusalem. There are still some 500,000 illegal Jewish settlers on the West Bank, and Peace Now claims that this number is still growing. Palestinians are still facing daily frustration at more than 500 checkpoints and the dreaded wall is still expanding, particularly in the west Bethlehem area, blocking many Palestinian farmers from their own land. The resulting level of unemployment, although not quite as appalling as in Gaza, is nevertheless very serious.

Even worse is the continued eviction of Palestinian residents from east Jerusalem, now including four members of the Palestinian legislature—the noble Lord, Lord Hylton, referred to them—who have been ordered to leave on the grounds that the interior ministry has revoked their permits as “residents of Israel”. According to the ministry's own information, in 2008 alone, 4,577 Arab residents of east Jerusalem had their permits revoked. The Israeli authorities have ordered the recent demolition of 65 Palestinian-owned structures and the displacement of 125 people, including 47 children.

What we are seeing on the West Bank is a human tragedy and a violation of human rights of major proportions. Senior members of Mr Netanyahu's Government have made no secret of their hope that all Palestinians can be removed from Jerusalem and, ultimately, from the West Bank. If, as I hope, Her Majesty’s Government are serious in hoping for the creation of a Palestinian state with its capital in east Jerusalem, something must be done urgently to stop this appalling and shameful tragedy. I hope the Minister can confirm that his right honourable friend is taking up these cases with the Israeli authorities both bilaterally and in co-operation with our European and American partners—in spite of, or is it because of, Mr Netanyahu’s humiliating rejection of President Obama’s repeated calls for restraint. Without determined and effective American action, there is no hope of reversing this ethnic cleansing. Sadly, the quartet office in Jerusalem seems to be adopting a totally supine attitude towards these human rights violations by the occupying power.

All of us speaking in this debate face a dilemma. Having heard Mr Hague’s interview on the BBC this morning, but not yet having studied his important speech in detail, I warmly welcome his intention to strengthen our diplomatic, commercial and economic contacts with the emerging powers, including Brazil and Turkey. In that context I wonder, as did the noble Baroness, Lady Williams, whether it was wise for the UN Security Council to have rejected both Brazil and Turkey’s ingenious attempts to find a solution to Iran’s nuclear ambitions and instead to strengthen sanctions that show no signs of having any practical effect. Unless we change our mentality, as the noble Lord, Lord Desai, put it, and adjust to the new emerging relationships such as those between Iran, Syria, Turkey, Qatar and Brazil, we shall find ourselves left behind in the struggle for political and economic influence in parts of the world that are of massive significance to this country and for the future of a peaceful world.

I share the hope that Iran can be dissuaded from its apparent ambition, although publicly denied by the Iranians at a very high level, to acquire nuclear weapons. But I was struck by the reply of the noble Lord, Lord Howell, to the noble Earl, Lord Onslow, two days ago when he commented that the possession of nuclear weapons by India and Pakistan,

“could be a good example of the theory of mutual deterrence working”.—[Official Report, 28/6/10; col. 1510.]

Should we be surprised if Iran, neighbour as it is to a nuclear Pakistan, threatened by attacks on its nuclear facilities by a nuclear Israel, and neighbour to Iraq from whose aggression in the Iran-Iraq war it suffered more than a million dead, might draw the same lessons of deterrence as India and Pakistan? Whether it has or not, I believe that the arguments for working towards a nuclear-free Middle East are now as strong as they have ever been.

I still have a minute left and I would like to add two footnotes. The first is that some reference has been made today to the Falklands War. I put it on record that one reason why we managed to acquire and gain international support for our recovery of the Falkland Islands was precisely because we had resident posts in a number of embassies which have been or are being closed. Lastly, and on a lighter note, my noble friend Lord Hylton referred to the support of the Isfahanis for British football. I am astonished. Do they not know that British polo originated on the main square of Isfahan?

Gaza Flotilla

Lord Wright of Richmond Excerpts

Wednesday 2nd June 2010 Lords Chamber

[Lord Wright of Richmond]

My Lords, I hope that I will be allowed to add to the earlier compliments to the Minister for his position on the Front Bench and, without being impertinent, to express the hope that he enjoys his relationship with Her Majesty’s Diplomatic Service as much as I enjoyed the privilege of being a member of it for 36 years.

Does the Minister agree that one of the tragedies of this recent incident is not just that it has created further, possibly fatal, damage to the reputation and international credibility of Mr Netanyahu’s Government, but that it must have further reduced such chances that there were of moving towards a settlement between his Government and the Palestinians?

If, as we must all hope, there is now a realistic chance of lifting Israel’s inhuman and unacceptable blockade of Gaza, I hope that the Minister will be able to reassure those of us who have long argued for contacts with the elected authorities in Gaza that the coalition is now prepared to open talks with those authorities, if only to be able to help facilitate the introduction of necessary and vital supplies to alleviate the suffering and unemployment of the people of Gaza. Of course we should not ignore the role of Hamas in launching attacks against Israel but does the Minister agree that, in almost every case, offers of a ceasefire from Hamas have been broken on the Israeli side?

I hope that the Minister can also reassure the House that the Government will continue to press for an end to the illegal colonisation of the West Bank and the eviction of Palestinians from their homes in east Jerusalem.

[Lord Howell of Guildford]

I am extremely grateful to the noble Lord for his kind remarks. I am sure I will enjoy working with the diplomats, though I may not agree with every nuance of diplomacy. I see my job as not only to represent the Foreign and Commonwealth Office in your Lordships’ House, but to represent your Lordships’ views in the Foreign and Commonwealth Office. We have to get to the truth of what happened. It is still obscure as to how this came about, although there are some very ugly realities that we have all seen on television. I would not be quite as gloomy as the noble Lord about the future; it could be that this ugly event has jarred people into a new realism. Mahmoud Abbas has already said he believes that we should press ahead with the proximity talks. I think that is right.

The noble Lord went on to talk about whether the coalition Government should talk to Hamas about such detailed practical matters as the release of personnel. Officials have had to talk to Hamas but the Government do not believe that we should talk to Hamas until it is prepared to take concrete steps some degree in the direction of the quartet’s proposals. So far, it has shown that it is not prepared to take those concrete steps. When it does, the situation could change. Until that is so, that is the position of the coalition. I hope that answers the specific questions of the noble Lord. I agree with his broader proposition that the day must come when there is a Palestinian state, many of the present trends are reversed and these two nations can live side by side in security and peace.