Escape of Taliban Prisoners Debate
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Chris Bryant
Main Page: Chris Bryant (Labour - Rhondda and Ogmore)Department Debates - View all Chris Bryant's debates with the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office
Escape of Taliban Prisoners
Chris Bryant Excerpts(13 years, 7 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
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Alistair Burt
My hon. Friend makes a very good point. Armed forces from whatever background, whether Afghanis, other elements of ISAF forces or UK forces, must be absolutely reassured that when they have done their job, at great cost to themselves, by securing the detention of those who have caused harm or danger to others, the system at that stage is able to pick those people up and make them secure. It is certainly my intention to ensure that once we have a full report and the Afghan authorities have completed their investigation, that information is transmitted to forces so that they know that if they do their jobs, other people will do theirs.
Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab)
I wholeheartedly support the calls that have been made this afternoon for redoubling the political effort in Afghanistan, but is not one of the most depressing facts about this event that in many cases it will have been British special forces who captured those people in the first place, and it may well be British special forces that have to capture them all over again? I do not expect the Minister to comment on operational matters, but is it not depressing that at this stage we are cutting 650 troops from the Royal Marines—precisely where those special forces are largely drawn from?
Alistair Burt
May I repeat something that I said earlier? Of the 476 detainees who escaped from the prison, as far as we are aware between three and five of them were captured and transferred into the system by United Kingdom forces: as the hon. Gentleman makes his distinction, I have to make that distinction back. A very small number of the total were involved with and detained by British security forces—but that does not avoid the main point, which is that of course there are 476 detainees who should be inside the prison today, not outside. The situation affects all the forces that have been engaged, and we do not draw a distinction as to who detained the prisoners.