Syria: Russian Redeployment and the Peace Process Debate
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Baroness Stuart of Edgbaston
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Syria: Russian Redeployment and the Peace Process
Baroness Stuart of Edgbaston Excerpts(8 years, 1 month ago)
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Mr Hammond
My hon. Friend is absolutely right. There are two reasons why the humanitarian aid must go on being delivered and getting into parts that it has not yet reached. The first and obvious reason is that people on the ground desperately need it, but, secondly, it is to enable the opposition who are at Geneva to stay there and carry on talking. They find it very difficult to maintain their legitimacy and credibility with their supporters on the ground if no humanitarian aid is getting through and regime bombs and Russian bombs are still falling on them.
Ms Gisela Stuart (Birmingham, Edgbaston) (Lab)
The Foreign Secretary said that he has not talked to Mr Lavrov. Is that because Mr Lavrov is refusing to take his call, or that he has not yet tried? If it is the latter, why not?
Mr Hammond
Again, experience is the answer. I have not tried to make the call, and I am in no doubt that I could predict quite confidently the outcome of such a call to Foreign Minister Lavrov. I have had many conversations with him over the course of our regular meetings at Syria-related events, none of which has been fruitful.