President Sisi: Visit

Baroness Kinnock of Holyhead Excerpts

Monday 2nd November 2015 Lords Chamber

[The Earl of Courtown]

A number of issues have been raised by Peers around the House and we want to see progress on all of them.

[Baroness Kinnock of Holyhead (Lab)]

My Lords, can the Minister confirm that the UK will unequivocally raise concerns about the flagrant and wide-ranging abuses of human rights presided over by President al-Sisi? Can he also confirm that there will be absolutely no negotiation or agreement on the transfer of any arms or equipment that could be used for internal repression?

[The Earl of Courtown]

My Lords, as I said before, we will raise these issues with President al-Sisi and his Ministers. On the arms situation, as the noble Baroness will be aware, this is a highly regulated regime and we try to ensure that Egypt remains subject to the EU Foreign Affairs Council-agreed suspension on arms exports. The suspension means that licences are suspended if we judge that they might be used in internal repression. We assess all applications from Egypt against the EUFAC suspension threshold and the consolidated criteria.