Israel and Palestine

Alistair Carmichael Excerpts

Monday 16th December 2024 Westminster Hall

[Dr Savage]

I wholeheartedly agree with my hon. Friend.

In September 2024, the new Foreign Secretary announced the suspension of around 30 export licences to Israel, including components for military aircraft, helicopters and drones, as well as items that facilitate ground targeting.

A constituent wrote to me to say that although this is a national and international issue, it feels profoundly local to them, because there are factories producing military components for export to Israel in Cheltenham, Bishop’s Cleeve, Ashchurch, Tewkesbury and Swindon, which are all close to my constituency of South Cotswolds. My constituent went on to say that they do not believe it is right for the south-west to be so heavily complicit in crimes for which the International Criminal Court has issued arrest warrants for violations of international law, and that Amnesty International has concluded to be tantamount to genocidal in intent and impact.

[Mr Alistair Carmichael (Orkney and Shetland) (LD)]

I agree very much with my hon. Friend on this point. The 2030 road map for UK-Israel bilateral relations, however, has extensive provision in relation to defence and security. It is difficult to see how the current Government could continue with that road map while suspending arms sales. Will she join me in calling for the Minister to clarify today the current Government’s position on that road map, because it was entered into by the previous Government?

[Dr Savage]

I thank my right hon. Friend for his intervention and likewise look forward to the Minister’s statement on the matter.

One of the petitions states:

“Palestinian children have been made orphans, people have been crushed by buildings in airstrikes, and there have been many other tragedies. Arms that have been partly manufactured in the UK appear to be being used in the current military action in Gaza…We believe the UK Government is on the wrong side of history, and must stop the sale of arms to Israel.”

I stood on a commitment to ensure better controls on the UK’s arms exports to countries with poor human rights records. Liberal Democrats have been calling for a presumption of denial to those countries listed as human rights priority countries by the Foreign Office, including Israel. Accordingly, we have supported a full suspension of arms sales to Israel; indeed, I believe that my right hon. Friend the Member for Kingston and Surbiton (Ed Davey) was the first leader of a major UK party to do so.

I say again that these are complex issues with no easy answers, but I hark back to the guiding principle that I stated at the outset: it can never be right to punish human beings for the time and place of their birth.

Israel and Gaza

Alistair Carmichael Excerpts

Monday 20th May 2024 Commons Chamber

[Mr Mitchell]

I am surprised at the hon. Gentleman putting it that way. He is an extremely distinguished lawyer, and I hope he will recognise that the point I am making is that the House is rushing to conclusions that are not merited at this stage in the process.

[Mr Alistair Carmichael (Orkney and Shetland) (LD)]

Whatever opinion the Minister has on the subject of jurisdiction, the arbiters on that as a point of law will be the judges of the ICC. In the event that any or all of the warrants being sought by the chief prosecutor, as announced today, are granted, can the Minister confirm that the UK Government will render any assistance necessary for their execution? Is that not what a Government who respect the rule of law would do?

[Mr Mitchell]

Of course. What I can confirm is that the British Government will always act in accordance with the law.

War in Gaza

Alistair Carmichael Excerpts

Tuesday 7th May 2024 Commons Chamber

[Mr Mitchell]

I have made it crystal clear where the Government stand on the issue of any Rafah offensive, and we will continue to do everything we can—as I have clearly, I hope, set out to the House—to bring about an urgent resolution of this extraordinarily difficult and catastrophic situation.

[Mr Alistair Carmichael (Orkney and Shetland) (LD)]

In recent months, Israeli forces in Gaza have been responsible for the killing of aid workers, medics and journalists, including British citizens among them, and they have been responsible for the targeting of civilian infrastructure. In these circumstances, what possible basis can there be in law for continuing to supply weapons to Israel?

Global Ocean Treaty

Alistair Carmichael Excerpts

Thursday 25th April 2024 Westminster Hall

[Mr Alistair Carmichael (Orkney and Shetland) (LD)]

It is a pleasure to serve with you in the Chair, Ms Vaz. I congratulate the hon. Member for Torbay (Kevin Foster) most warmly on securing time for the debate. I hesitate to predict anything in politics these days, but I have more than a strong suspicion that this may be one of those occasions when we are all in violent agreement with each other. In order that everybody may have the opportunity to say what they have to say, I will try to keep my remarks suitably brief.

I am quite happy to acknowledge the leading role the Government have taken in the past 10 years that has brought us to the agreement of this treaty. The target of a 30% protected area for the high seas is a significant one. It will not be easy to achieve, but it is an important goal that we should aspire to. Of course, what happens on the high seas may be outwith the jurisdiction of our territorial waters and our exclusive economic zone out to 200 miles, but it is still nevertheless important for the inshore waters on which we rely in my constituency in particular, so we see this as an important opportunity for us. This is also an important opportunity for Britain to continue the leading role we have taken so far. The target of getting 60 countries to ratify the treaty is an important one, and when only four countries have currently ratified it, for Britain to step up to the plate and give early ratification would make a significant difference.

The truth of the matter is that, so often when it comes to what happens at sea, what happens is out of sight and out of mind, and things that happen on the high seas happen in a state of ignorance, because we simply do not know what goes on there. That is not just in environmental areas: if we consider the labour standards and rates of pay on many deep-water fleets, we will see a similar situation.

For me personally, one of the most important aspects of the treaty is the duty that it gives to parties to assess the environmental impacts of things such as plastics. The growth of plastic pollution has been a blight on our shores for decades. The alarming thing I have found in recent years is that when I do a litter-pick on a beach and end up looking at it and thinking, “Well, this is absolutely pristine,” I then spend another 10 or 15 minutes carefully going over it and realise that even in that short time I can fill a carrier-bag with small pieces of plastic. As an islander both by birth and by choice, I see that all the time when walking around our coastlines. The blight of plastic pollution must be tackled. We made so much progress following “Blue Planet II” in 2017, but then along came the pandemic, the closedown and the necessary biosecurity measures. As a consequence, we have lost so much momentum. This treaty might be one opportunity to recoup some of the lost ground.

The hon. Member for Torbay said that our high seas have unique biodiversity, and he is absolutely right. Of course, we used to have lots of unique biodiversity; we did not have to look to the high seas and the oceans for it. On dry land, however, we have already seen the loss of so much of our critical biodiversity and I fear that it has probably gone forever. So this treaty is for all of us a second chance. Our oceans are the lungs of our planet and if we do not take the action necessary for the ratification of this treaty now, we risk treating the biodiversity of our high seas in the same way that we have treated the biodiversity on dry land, and we will all be poorer as a consequence.

Hong Kong Security Legislation

Alistair Carmichael Excerpts

Wednesday 20th March 2024 Commons Chamber

[Mr Mitchell]

My hon. and learned Friend makes an extremely shrewd point. The impact of this legislation is, of course, devastating in the areas that he identifies. This is not legislation that is scrutinised in the way that we understand legislation to be scrutinised. It is not subject to consultation or scrutiny by genuinely democratically elected Members, but that is merely one of the defects that has been identified during this session.

[Mr Alistair Carmichael (Orkney and Shetland) (LD)]

The all-party parliamentary group on Hong Kong, which I chair, heard very powerful testimony this morning from a young Hongkonger who had been a political prisoner in Hong Kong. We will now see more people enduring the indignity of political imprisonment, and the BNO passport visa can be withheld on the basis of the applicant having been in prison. Surely that is something that must be reviewed.

[Mr Mitchell]

That is not a matter, as the right hon. Gentleman will appreciate, only for us. But he is right in his fundamental understanding, as he has set out, about the breach of the law that is going on. As he might have seen, Volker Türk, the UN human rights lead, has said that it looks, on the face of it, incompatible with international humanitarian law.

Oral Answers to Questions

Alistair Carmichael Excerpts

Tuesday 12th March 2024 Commons Chamber

[Mr Mitchell]

My hon. Friend makes a good point. I am aware of those reports. The fact remains that the appalling events of 7 October were, as I have said in the House before, the worst atrocity and the worst killing of Jewish people since the holocaust and the second world war. We continue to want total accountability for the terrible events that took place on that day.

[Mr Alistair Carmichael (Orkney and Shetland) (LD)]

Accepting what the Minister says about there being no money due to go to UNRWA until April, can I say to him, however, that for us to continue not to fund UNRWA sends a truly dreadful signal to other countries on the world stage? Canada and Sweden have resumed their funding. Surely we should be attending to this now as a matter of some urgency?

[Mr Mitchell]

I listed the countries that take the same view as us. The right hon. Gentleman is right that there is a division, but Britain is not due to provide any funding until we reach the next financial year in April. We will, of course, seek to do everything we can to resolve the matter by the time that funding is due.

Israel and Gaza

Alistair Carmichael Excerpts

Tuesday 27th February 2024 Commons Chamber

[Mr Mitchell]

To some extent, my hon. and gallant Friend answers his own question. Dealing with an organisation such as Hamas is extraordinarily difficult, as we have seen over recent weeks and months.

[Mr Alistair Carmichael (Orkney and Shetland) (LD)]

Have the Government of Israel yet shared with His Majesty’s Government their purported evidence of United Nations Relief and Works Agency complicity in the attacks of 7 October, and if so, when did they do it?

[Mr Mitchell]

The review of UNRWA, as the right hon. Member may know, is being conducted first and foremost by the independent UN Office of Internal Oversight Services, and secondly, Catherine Colonna, the former French Foreign Minister, is engaged in writing a separate report. It is to both those two organisations that the evidence is required to be delivered.

Death of Alexei Navalny

Alistair Carmichael Excerpts

Monday 19th February 2024 Commons Chamber

[Leo Docherty]

The hon. Lady is right, and she makes a good point. Putin’s tyrannical regime leaves absolutely no civic or political space for any kind of freedom of expression or political engagement, no matter how moderate. What we can do is ensure that Russian people have more access to the truth and to better information, which is why a lot of our energy goes into working against Russian disinformation across the region.

[Mr Alistair Carmichael (Orkney and Shetland) (LD)]

The House and the whole country are easily and instinctively united in condemnation of this latest evidence of Vladimir Putin’s brutality, but is the Minister not a little uncomfortable that he makes his statement on the same day that his colleagues in the Home Office have announced restrictions on visa access for those from Ukraine fleeing the war against Russia? Does he not understand that we diminish the effect of our outrage unless we are seen to be doing absolutely everything, at home and abroad, to support our Ukrainian allies?

[Leo Docherty]

I know from my own constituency, as all Members will know, that our collective response, whether from the Government, local government or at an individual level, has been consistently generous and open hearted.

Human Rights in Hong Kong

Alistair Carmichael Excerpts

Tuesday 23rd January 2024 Westminster Hall

[Tim Loughton]

Without being as parochial as to mention every one of the 191,000 applications for the BNO visa route so far, this is a subject that has been raised. It was also raised in the Home Affairs Committee, which I sit on, and we had a private session with people from Hong Kong who were escaping the clutches of the Chinese Government. I am well aware, and have made representations, that we need to ensure that people who technically have not been included in that net, although it has been broadened, can be given those protections as well. The hon. Lady makes a valid point, but I cannot comment on her particular district councillor.

The mass exodus has amounted to over 500,000 residents leaving Hong Kong since the beginning of 2021. As I have said, there have been 191,000 applications for the BNO visa route. According to the Home Office, 144,500 Hongkongers have already moved to the UK, and that last figure is rising as we speak. Hong Kong’s population has therefore experienced a net loss since the introduction of the national security law and is in decline for the third year in a row. Hong Kong used to be a colony that was ever-expanding and where everybody wanted to go to have an exciting future, but it is now shrinking; it is a shadow of its former self.

Since the implementation of the NSL, Hong Kong has seen a marked decrease in various world rankings of liberty—most noticeably in Freedom House’s global freedom ranking, where it has dropped 17 places. Hong Kong has seen significant declines in the rule of law, freedom of expression and freedom of assembly, with think-tanks citing China’s increasing restrictions on civil liberties as a factor. After Myanmar, Hong Kong experienced the steepest drop in such rankings. It ranked 140 out of 180 locations for international press freedoms, according to Reporters Sans Frontières, which leaves it trailing behind Colombia and Cameroon.

We have also seen the forced closure and hounding out of many civil society organisations, non-governmental organisations and charities. It has been calculated that as of December 2023, no fewer than 800 such organisations had been forced to close, with over 285 people arrested—172 of whom were prosecuted for allegedly endangering national security.

In 2021, Amnesty International had to close two of its offices in Hong Kong. The Apple Daily Charitable Foundation was removed from the list of Hong Kong registered charities. The New School for Democracy, which was founded by Wang Dan, an exiled student leader of the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests, has had to move to Taiwan following the implementation of the national security law. The Global Innovation Hub—a German think-tank that was expelled from China in 1997—has moved from Hong Kong to Taiwan, also citing the national security law.

The Hong Kong Confederation of Trade Unions was dissolved in 2021; the Civil Human Rights Front, a pro-democracy group that organised some of Hong Kong’s biggest protests, said it had no choice but to disband; and human rights lawyers based in Hong Kong are fleeing abroad amid China’s effort to cleanse the city of dissent. In 2021, the Progressive Teachers’ Alliance, Hong Kong’s largest teaching union, was disbanded; that same year, the Hong Kong Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements of China was among other unions dissolved amid national security fears; and recently the 4 June vigil to commemorate the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre has been banned.

Press outlets have also been closed down, and not just Apple Daily—Jimmy Lai’s paper, which we hear so much about—and its sister publication, Next Magazine: Stand News closed after being raided by police, and senior staff were arrested; Citizen News was forced to shut down amid the Government crackdown; and FactWire, an investigative news outlet, closed down, with its leaders citing safety concerns for staff.

Many of the guardians of free speech in Hong Kong have been arrested, prosecuted and jailed, if they were not able to flee. We particularly think of those, like Jimmy Lai, who stayed and made an honourable and brave stand to face up to the intolerance. That led to the prosecution that is going on now—the biggest pantomime in the far east.

Before 2019, the number of political prisoners went from nought to 1,775. Hong Kong now has one of the fastest growing political prisoner populations in the world, rivalling authoritarian states such as Cuba, Myanmar and Belarus. Further, Hong Kong has the highest number of female political prisoners in the world, at approximately 1,347. Many famous people have been incarcerated along with Jimmy Lai. They are, undoubtedly and without dispute, political prisoners in a place that used to boast of freedom of speech, democracy and all the liberties that we in this country take for granted.

[Mr Alistair Carmichael (Orkney and Shetland) (LD)]

This is possibly the most important part of the many aspects of the destruction of freedom and liberty in Hong Kong: the absence of a free and fair court system. It shows why Jimmy Lai’s case is so important, as the one that we can hear about most easily in this country when there are so many hundreds of others. Does the hon. Gentleman share my frustration that, after all this time, seeing what we can now see about what the court system has come to in Hong Kong, there are still retired British judges operating in that jurisdiction?

Israel and Gaza

Alistair Carmichael Excerpts

Tuesday 19th December 2023 Commons Chamber

[Mr Alistair Carmichael (Orkney and Shetland) (LD)]

Will the United Kingdom Government urge the Government of Israel to ratify the Rome statute and thus become a state party to the International Criminal Court?

[Mr Mitchell]

The right hon. Gentleman will know that Britain is a signatory to the International Criminal Court because we think that it is a vital piece of the international architecture, but it is for all countries to make their own decisions in that respect. He will know that a number of countries, including America, have so far declined to join.