Syria and North Korea

Ann Clwyd Excerpts

Tuesday 18th April 2017 Commons Chamber

[Ann Clwyd (Cynon Valley) (Lab)]

In 1988, I took a cross-party group from this House to see some of the survivors of the Halabja attack. There was lot of discussion about who was responsible, and people such as Professor Alastair Hay went out to Halabja and brought back soil samples and evidence. I wonder whether experts in the UK are again being used to find out who perpetrated this terrible carnage and suffering on the Syrian people. Has the Foreign Secretary talked to such people, who could be of help again due to their experience in dealing with chemical weapons?

[Boris Johnson]

I well remember the right hon. Lady’s efforts in respect of Halabja, and she played a big part in hardening my heart against Saddam Hussein many years ago. She campaigned on the matter with great effect, and rightly so.

What we are doing today is supporting the OPCW’s expert fact-finding mission, and I have sketched out all we know about what happened on the morning of 4 April—the best evidence that we have so far—and I hope the House will believe that the evidence is very persuasive indeed. The fact-finding mission will now draw on a variety of sources, including samples from the victims, environmental samples, munition fragments, footage of the incident and its aftermath, and interviews with survivors, people who were first on the scene, medics and eye witnesses. The mission will be able to draw on signals intelligence, flight tracking, data analysis, meteorological information and other information that will be shared by us and other countries concerned.

Our experience is that such fact-finding missions are able to reach conclusions in very difficult circumstances and, going back to the point I made to the right hon. Member for Islington South and Finsbury (Emily Thornberry), we need such information to create the evidential trail to the individuals responsible. There is good evidence already, and we will use what we have, when and where possible, not only to impose sanctions but to pursue prosecutions for war crimes.