Somalia

Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean Excerpts

Monday 21st March 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Howell of Guildford]

I can certainly confirm that, as the noble Lord said, al-Shabaab is a vicious and dangerous group which has been responsible for numerous terrorist attacks in Somalia and the killing of soldiers, AMISOM troops, innocent civilians and parliamentarians, and which shows no regard for human life. The noble Lord asked what we could do. Her Majesty's Government have a Somalia strategy which they are pursuing. We are working with the AU, the EU and other allied forces and we are doing everything we can to establish a political strategy for the area. It is called a “dual-track” strategy, whose objective is to encourage both the transitional Government, provided that they commit to the right degree of reforms, and the bottom-up development of responsible and constructive groups who can oppose these very unpleasant people. They are a real danger, and the noble Lord is absolutely right to draw attention to their vicious and unacceptable activities.

[Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean]

My Lords, may I press the Minister a little further on the question of reform? In his Answer, he said that there would be no extension of the transitional institutions’ mandate without reform to make them more legitimate in the eyes of their own people. What help is being given by DfID in this reform process and how is it being co-ordinated with help from the European Union?

[Lord Howell of Guildford]

I say in response to the second part of the noble Baroness’s question that we are supporting the European Union training mission, which trains up personnel and returns them to Mogadishu to assist policing and the upholding of law and order, such as it is in the area. We are working with it on a number of other programmes as well. As a result of the DfID review, the UK has agreed to provide up to £250 million—a very considerable amount indeed—in support of Somalia over the next four years, but we shall have a review of how that is going halfway through, in 2013. Our objective is to help support prosperity and tackle poverty across Somalia and to support efforts at peacebuilding and reconciliation at national, regional and, as I was saying a moment ago, at local level. It is the co-operation of the transitional Government and their commitment to this programme that are the conditions on which we base our support for them.