Oral Answers to Questions Debate
Full Debate: Read Full DebateAnna Soubry
Main Page: Anna Soubry (The Independent Group for Change - Broxtowe)Department Debates - View all Anna Soubry's debates with the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office
(11 years, 11 months ago)
Commons ChamberI have regular meetings with groups to discuss this problem and have raised it on numerous occasions with members of the Colombian Government, right up to the President of Colombia. We are extremely concerned to ensure that the human rights of trade unionists around the world, including in Colombia, are protected. It is worth saying that significant progress is being made in Colombia and I hope that we will see, both in talks with FARC, and more generally in terms of the advancement of civic society, a peaceful future for Colombia whereby murder rates in general, including those for trade unionists, fall dramatically to levels comparable to those in many other parts of the world, including Europe.
In the past few weeks there has been growing concern about the human rights situation in the Gambia. I am very grateful to the Minister for all the assistance that he has given my constituent, Deborah Burns, whose husband is one of those who has been threatened with execution on death row. Can the Minister provide an update on the representations made by the Government and assure us that human rights will be restored in the Gambia?
We are obviously very concerned about what is going on in the Gambia, because there has been an effective moratorium on the death penalty since 1985. All of those on death row, including General Mbye, the husband of my hon. Friend’s constituent, had effectively had their sentences commuted to life imprisonment. We have made very strong representations to the Gambian Government. I will meet Gambian Foreign Minister Tangara in the near future, and we will push them very hard indeed on this matter.