Drugs

Baroness Stern Excerpts

Thursday 17th October 2013 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Stern (CB)]

My Lords, I, too, am most grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Meacher, and declare my interest as the vice-chair of the All-Party Group on Drug Policy Reform, which she chairs so ably and energetically and which she has ensured is well known in many corners of the world. I shall concentrate in my remarks on human rights matters concerned with the international aspects of global drugs policies and the involvement of the Government in these.

I begin by congratulating the Foreign and Commonwealth Office on its human rights policy and the actions taken to pursue it, which are admired worldwide. They are very effective and send a message to the world about British values.

The Home Affairs Select Committee said in its report at recommendation 61:

“The Government should not turn a blind eye to capital punishment and other human rights abuses affecting those involved in the drugs trade. In particular, we recommend that the Government ensure that no British or European funding is used to support practices that could lead to capital punishment, torture, or other violations”.

It is this recommendation which I would like to pursue. There are many ways in which the international drug enforcement regime can lead to human rights abuses. There are drug detention centres where addicted people are held against their will; rigid and draconian laws that impose long, mandatory prison sentences on small-scale impoverished participants in the drugs trade; sentences to be served in overcrowded, inhuman and degrading prison conditions; and prison conditions that can lead to the transmission of deadly diseases related to injecting drug use with inadequate or non-existent healthcare and no respect for the right to life or the duty of care.

Of all these, the death penalty is the most extreme. I declare an interest as I chair the All-Party Group for the Abolition of the Death Penalty. Six countries currently execute drug traffickers: China, Saudi Arabia, Vietnam, Malaysia, Singapore and, of course, Iran. Accurate figures are hard to come by but it is clear that Iran has executed hundreds of people for drug trafficking. Figures from the Iran Human Rights Documentation Center suggest that in 2012 there were 552 executions, 346 of which were for drug trafficking. Pakistan also imposes death sentences on those convicted of drug trafficking and almost restarted executions earlier this year.

It is very important to know what the Government’s approach is to giving financial support to anti-narcotics activities or to contributing via the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, or the European Union, to anti-narcotics work in any state that uses the death sentence for drug trafficking. In response to the Home Affairs Select Committee, the Government said that they have a guidance document, Overseas Security and Justice Assistance, which I have read. It is an excellent document. If followed, it should ensure that no aid is given to programmes which lead to human rights abuses. The Government also say that they have lobbied the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime to ensure that human rights are respected when undertaking these programmes, yet we read reports that the Government support the work of the Pakistan anti-narcotics force and have supported anti-narcotics work in Iran.

Can the Minister say first whether, directly or indirectly, British government money goes to counternarcotics work in Iran, Pakistan or any other country that imposes the death penalty? If it does, how do the Government ensure that that money is so ring-fenced that it does not lead to the arrest and subsequent sentencing to death of any individual? Secondly, in the light of what is known about prison conditions in many parts of the world, is the Minister satisfied that the Government do not support drug enforcement activity anywhere that would lead to torture or cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment?