Iran and Syria

Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean Excerpts

Monday 11th November 2013 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Warsi]

I take on board what the noble Lord said. Exactly these kinds of concerns are uppermost in our minds when we are in negotiations. I think that I can give the noble Lord some comfort by saying that we feel that the new Iranian regime, following the election of President Rouhani and the appointment of the new Iranian negotiating team led by Foreign Minister Zarif, has taken a constructive approach. We believe that Mr Zarif wants to resolve this problem and that he is out to do a deal. We feel that Iran is under serious political and economic pressure and that it recognises that it is in its interest to reach an agreement with the E3+3. I hope that we will be able to reach that point soon, but we take part in these negotiations with our eyes wide open, and take fully into account the context in which we are operating and have been operating for a number of years.

[Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean (Lab)]

My Lords, is there not a much more difficult problem about Iran? There are effectively two Governments there. The Minister is talking about discussions taking place under the Rouhani leadership, but back in Tehran, there is a religious leadership that has already tried to rein in the new Government back, in respect of the steps that they have taken towards rapprochement with the rest of the world. What confidence can the Minister—and, indeed, negotiators—have that any eventual settlement will not simply be rejected by the religious leadership in Iran, as it has already tried to distance itself from some of what is going on?

Secondly, I have a question about Syria. In a former life, I was the envoy to Bashar al-Assad and I had to deal with a lot of the people around him who were deeply unpleasant, very sinister and, in many ways, far more unyielding than Bashar al-Assad. Can the Minister give us an assurance that none of these people will be left to wield any power when eventually we see the end of this regime? There have been suggestions that the vice-president would have a role; the vice-president whom I met was certainly not a man I would want to see having any power in Syria in future.

[Baroness Warsi]

The noble Baroness comes to these matters with great experience and expertise. She has made valid points about the different seats of power within Iran. At the moment, we feel that the Foreign Minister and President Rouhani have a mandate under which they are operating. We have had a number of meetings with them; the Foreign Secretary has met the Foreign Minister on three separate occasions, and we genuinely feel that progress was recently made in Geneva. The offer on the table now being considered by the Iranians is something that they will have to come back to discuss; it may well be that on 20 November we will be much clearer about how committed all aspects of the Iranian seats of power are in taking this matter forward. At this stage, however, we feel that progress has been made and that there is an acceptance that this is in Iran’s interests.

In relation to Syria, the noble Baroness made an important point. It is why the statement from the national coalition issued only yesterday said clearly that the transitional council must not include al-Assad or others who have blood on their hands. I think those are exactly the kind of individuals to whom the noble Baroness refers.