Russia

Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean Excerpts

Monday 26th July 2010 Lords Chamber

[Lord Howell of Guildford]

My noble friend is quite right. At present Russia is not complying with its commitment to evacuate Georgia, where it still has troops, as well as South Ossetia and Abkhazia. We are all the time raising this issue and pressing the Russians to get into a more acceptable and positive position but progress is slow. At the moment they are not moving.

[Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean]

My Lords, the noble Lord mentioned the economy and the important issues between Russia and us. He will know that the UK-Russia intergovernmental steering committee on trade was successfully relaunched in 2008 and last met last November. Are there any plans for that steering committee to meet again this year and, if so, will it be touching on some of the thorny issues such as international banking standards, concerns about corruption and corporate governance taxation?

[Lord Howell of Guildford]

I cannot answer the noble Baroness on her precise question about the meeting at this moment, but I will check. On corruption, she puts her finger on one of the central problems. There is no doubt that there is a very great deal of corruption still in Russia today and some of it at alarmingly high levels. President Medvedev has highlighted this and says he wants to tackle it. We will do everything to support him but we would like to see more results in certain cases than we have seen so far. Corruption is the cancer that could undermine the whole Russian progress.