Counter-terrorism

Bob Stewart Excerpts

Tuesday 3rd May 2011 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend has put it extremely well. The fact is that there is no place in Islam for this sort of murderous ideology. It is against what Islam is meant to be all about. I hope that the argument that we can get across to people now is that that was an entirely blind alley for so many young people to go down, and that there is an alternative to the repression and frustration that they felt about regimes in north Africa and elsewhere: the democratic awakening that is taking place, which—as I said earlier—is one of the ways in which we will defeat al-Qaeda in the long run.

[Bob Stewart (Beckenham) (Con)]

Does the Prime Minister agree that, having suffered such a grievous loss—that of his wife—the President of Pakistan is totally on side in the battle against international terrorism, and that somehow or other we must help him to rid his governmental structure of people who are sympathetic to al-Qaeda, or indeed the Taliban? I do not know how we can do that, but perhaps the Prime Minister does.