Ryan Cornelius: Detention in UAE

Debate between Blair McDougall and Tim Roca

Tuesday 19th November 2024 Commons Chamber

[Tim Roca]

The hon. Member makes an important point. I will return to the FCDO in a moment and perhaps address some of what he mentioned.

As I said, Ryan was issued with a 20-year extension to his sentence in 2018. The law sanctioning such extensions was not brought in until after Ryan’s arrest. In April 2022, the United Nations Working Group on Arbitrary Detention completed a detailed investigation that found that the UAE’s treatment of him contravened eight articles of the universal declaration of human rights, to which the UAE is a signatory. The group ruled that Ryan has been held in conditions amounting to “torture”, that he had not received a fair trial, and that his detention was “arbitrary”. It called for his immediate release. As things stand, he has not been released. He remains an arbitrarily detained British national in the United Arab Emirates—a country that is an ally.

[Blair McDougall (East Renfrewshire) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing the debate, and pay tribute to him for his work, not just on behalf of Ryan Cornelius but on political prisoners and the rule of law more generally. Does he agree that it seems we live in a world where increasingly autocratic countries will take citizens of other nations into arbitrary detention, and that when it comes to the toolkit that was normally available to countries such as ours, options such as having consular access that makes a difference, and making representations, have been eroded? Does he feel that we need a new toolkit for this different landscape?

[Tim Roca]

I thank my hon. Friend for raising that important point. He has also been vocal in his support for British citizens who have been arbitrarily detained, and on wider human rights issues. I commend him for his work on that agenda. The FCDO point about the toolkit is really important. The difficult question that we have to ask ourselves is: how have we have reached the situation where one of our citizens is languishing in the jail of a friendly country—a close ally—with all the potential damage to UK-UAE relations that that does?

I have huge admiration for the work of the FCDO and its staff, and I know from colleagues and friends around the globe how much its work is appreciated and respected on the world stage. We have many fine diplomats and public servants, but I have to say in all candour that it has been failing for many years in its handling of state hostage taking and arbitrary detention of British nationals abroad, Ryan Cornelius included.

In the last Parliament, the Foreign Affairs Committee published a significant report with a number of recommendations, not all of which were taken up. It criticised the FCDO for its “unnecessarily defensive culture” in this area, which “impedes scrutiny”, harms victims and their families and undermines public trust. The report found that previous Governments of all stripes had failed to learn the lessons from responding to such situations, and had been slow or unwilling to call out guilty countries. Our Atlantic allies, the United States and Canada, have learned those lessons, and created official roles to co-ordinate the response to state hostage taking and arbitrary detention in order to get their people home, which is, of course, a priority for all of us. Indeed, the creation of such a role was one of the Committee’s recommendations to the Foreign Office and the Foreign Secretary.

This time last year, when the Foreign Secretary was the shadow Foreign Secretary, he committed a Labour Government to creating a special envoy for arbitrary detention and state hostage taking. I warmly welcome the Minister of State to her role—I think I can still call her a new Minister a few months into the new Government —and I know that she takes these matters seriously. I ask her to reflect back to her colleagues and the Secretary of State that we should stick to that commitment. Let us follow in the footsteps of Canada and the United States, and let us not be advised out of that promise by officials.

As I conclude, I return to the heart the debate with one simple request to His Highness Sheikh Mohammed. As a gesture of friendship, for the continued prosperity of our countries and for our mutual security, I hope that he will grant clemency to Ryan Cornelius. The UAE’s national day, Eid al Etihad, is only around the corner on 2 December. I hope that on that day of great celebration, the Dubai Government will find the good will to extend a pardon to Ryan and allow him to return home to the United Kingdom and his family.