(3 years, 6 months ago)
Commons ChamberI thank my hon. Friend for her remarks. Of course, we must work closely with our international partners. That is why we have brought forward today’s meeting at the UN Security Council. Obviously, we cannot second-guess the outcome of the meeting this afternoon. I share many of my hon. Friend’s concerns about the ability of countries to veto action in that multilateral body, but be in no doubt that the United Kingdom is on the front foot and is leading the international response on this crisis.
The Burmese military is as financially corrupt as it is brutal and anti-democratic. The Burmese military have managed to squirrel away stolen assets from the Burmese people, in the UK, in British overseas territories and in other democratic countries in the world. Can we not do more to make sure that they can be returned to the Burmese people?
While China still plays a role in refusing to allow those who are accused of genocides to come to a proper international court, how can the Minister be sure that those that perpetrate genocide are not just going to get away with it? If we cannot get such determinations in an international court, would it not make sense that they are made in a court of law in the UK?
I understand the point that the hon. Gentleman is trying to make. On the reference to genocide, we have been very clear that we support the current case in the ICJ process, putting pressure on Myanmar. I think the case will develop significantly in the coming months; we are monitoring that case very closely.
I do not have a crystal ball with regards to the points the hon. Gentleman raised about China, but we are going to very closely consider the legal arguments and, for example, establish whether a UK intervention would add value in the current case that has been brought to the ICJ.
(3 years, 7 months ago)
Commons ChamberI thank my hon. Friend for his support for the measures we are taking. He is right about them. I share his concern in relation to Xinjiang and also, specifically, torture. Torture is an international crime, and anyone who engages in it, directs it or even takes an order in relation to it will be guilty under international law. The real challenge with China, as we know, is how to get remedy—redress—for these actions. The measures that we have announced today will prevent any profiting from forced labour, or indeed torture, and also prevent any UK businesses from financially, whether inadvertently or otherwise, supporting it.
If we want more significant accountability, the answer is to get an authoritative third-party body that is to review such matters—as, with the greatest respect to my right hon. Friend the Member for Chingford and Woodford Green (Sir Iain Duncan Smith), we have managed to secure in relation to World Health Organisation access to China this week. We have to keep pressing, with our international partners. That is why the group of international partners that is assembled is very important. It must be as broad as possible in order to secure access for the UN Human Rights Commissioner.
Of course I warmly welcome these measures, but they simply are not sufficient for the moment at hand. We need only listen to the Secretary of State’s own comments and read them against the genocide convention to see that there is a clear example of genocide being practised in Xinjiang now. Killing people, causing bodily or mental harm, preventing births, forcibly transferring children—these are all the markers of genocide. Of course we need to come to a view both in this House and in the courts, but the difficulty about doing so through the courts is that China has a veto. How are we going to make sure that we name this as it properly is and that the people who are accountable for it actually come to justice? I have lauded the Secretary of State many times for introducing the Magnitsky measures, but there is no point in having them and just constantly reviewing them if we never blasted well use them.
We have used the Magnitsky sanctions. We recently announced another tranche of measures in addition to the first, and, as the hon. Gentleman will know, we are working on proposals to extend the model to corruption, so we have been extremely assiduous in this area. I understand his point about how we actually hold people individually to account for these crimes. Whether it is genocide or gross human rights violations, the label is less important than the accountability for what are, no doubt, egregious crimes, but he has not suggested anything to me that would precipitate that. We are taking the targeted measures that will cut the funding, inadvertently or otherwise, going into the internment camps, and prevent those in the internment camps who are running them from profiting from it. If we want any wider initiative, we will need a far wider range of international support and we will need to get authoritative third parties to have some kind of access. That is why I referred to the work of the United Nations Human Rights Commissioner, as difficult and challenging as it is, and why I raised it with António Guterres yesterday.
(3 years, 8 months ago)
Commons ChamberUrgent Questions are proposed each morning by backbench MPs, and up to two may be selected each day by the Speaker. Chosen Urgent Questions are announced 30 minutes before Parliament sits each day.
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Very much so. My hon. Friend is correct. We will continue to welcome people from Hong Kong. In fact, the route will open on 31 January 2021 for BNOs. It is a new immigration route and a major change to the UK immigration system. It will afford all those with BNO status, and their immediate family dependents, the right to live, work or study in the UK, and give them a path to full citizenship.
This is so frustrating. We gather every fortnight and we all say all the same things from all the Back Benches, and the Minister says all the same things from the Front Bench about how he cannot speculate and how it would be terrible to actually do anything. The truth of the matter is that we are allowing the Chinese Government endlessly to ratchet up the repression against the people of Hong Kong. Now, we even have British-based banks co-operating in that. For the avoidance of doubt, can I make it clear to the Minister that I do not want him to speculate about using the Magnitsky sanctions, I want him to use them? Secondly, surely to God the least we can do as a British Government is bring in the chairman and chief executive of HSBC and say, “You must not co-operate with oppression in China.”
The hon. Gentleman will understand that it is important that sanctions are developed responsibly and on the basis of evidence. We are, as I have said numerous times, carefully considering further designations. I will not use the word he refers to. It is not appropriate to second-guess who may be designated in the future, because, as I have said many times, it could reduce the impact of designations.
(3 years, 9 months ago)
Commons ChamberUrgent Questions are proposed each morning by backbench MPs, and up to two may be selected each day by the Speaker. Chosen Urgent Questions are announced 30 minutes before Parliament sits each day.
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My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Again, I would like to thank him for his continued work on this issue. We have played a leading role in the international community in holding China to account. On 6 October, 39 countries joined a statement at the UN General Assembly Third Committee, in which we expressed our deep concern at the situation in Hong Kong, Xinjiang and Tibet. We will continue, as I have said, to bring together our international partners to stand up for the people of Hong Kong, to call out the violation of their freedoms and, importantly, to hold China to account for its international obligations.
I am sorry to say that it feels as if the Government have given up on this, to be honest. They did not choose to make a statement on this; they had to be dragged to the House by an urgent question. Frequently, it is Back Benchers in this House who are dragging the Government to make more categorical statements and to stand up to the cross words, which is so far all we have had. They have devoted next to no energy to pursuing this in the vast majority of international forums. The one thing that they could do they repeatedly refuse to do, which is to implement Magnitsky-style sanctions against Carrie Lam and others. I do not know what more the Minister needs to know. We have a country that has millions of people in concentration camps. We have people who are being refused the right to their own religion, and women who are having forced abortion and sterilisation. We have the whole of democratic systems being suppressed, and, frankly, communism today looks remarkably like fascism. Every single time he says, “I can’t speculate,” he is actually announcing that he is not implementing sanctions. Please, please take the whole of the House seriously on this. We must not give up.
(3 years, 9 months ago)
Commons ChamberUrgent Questions are proposed each morning by backbench MPs, and up to two may be selected each day by the Speaker. Chosen Urgent Questions are announced 30 minutes before Parliament sits each day.
Each Urgent Question requires a Government Minister to give a response on the debate topic.
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I have been very clear about our response to the case of Mr Taylor, and I think that it is really important that I remain focused on that. We are continuing to give him consular support and, as I said, at this time we have no evidence that his arrest is linked to his whistleblowing on corruption, so I think that it would be wrong of me to speculate.
I am sorry; I like the Minister but her answers are about as much use as a bath full of blancmange. They are not going to do Mr Taylor any favours, and the real problem is that whistleblowers around the world are going to take away the message that the Interpol red-notice system can be abused with impunity because countries like the United Kingdom are not even going to say boo to a goose. We have seen it repeatedly, time and again: countries such as Russia against Bill Browder and lots of other countries—authoritarian regimes—are completely abusing the Interpol red-notice scheme. Do we not now need proper reform?
I do not accept the hon. Member’s assertion about saying boo to a goose at all. I have been very clear about the support that we are giving to Mr Taylor, and that at this time we have no evidence that this arrest is linked to his whistleblowing on corruption.
(4 years, 1 month ago)
Commons ChamberMr Speaker, with permission, I would like to make a statement on the global human rights sanctions regulations. As we forge a dynamic new vision for a truly global Britain, this Government are absolutely committed to the United Kingdom becoming an even stronger force for good in the world: on climate change, as we host COP26; as we champion 12 years of education for every girl in the world, no matter how poor their background; and on human rights, where we will defend media freedoms and protect freedom of religious belief; and, with the measures we are enacting and announcing today, hold to account the perpetrators of the worst human rights abuses.
I first raised this issue in a 2012 Backbench Business debate. It was a cross-party issue then, as I hope it will be now. I recall co-sponsoring it with the former Foreign Secretary, David Miliband. I also would like to pay tribute to Members from across the House, particularly my right hon. Friend the Member for Haltemprice and Howden (Mr Davis), who sponsored that debate, and the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant), who joined me in that initial debate and who has been chivvying me along ever since, normally from a sedentary position.
I pay tribute to my right hon. Friend for all the work he has done in this area and in promoting human rights in international relations, particularly in his time as International Development Secretary. There is clearly an important role for the legislature, not only in debates and scrutiny in this House, but in the Select Committees. Select Committees, individuals, NGOs and external actors can provide information and evidence, as well as suggestions about how we take these matters forward. We have also, to give maximum transparency to the House today, published a policy note to explain how we will go about it and in particular how the designation process will look at the worst crimes and those who bear the greatest responsibility for those human rights violations.
I am absolutely delighted. Well done. That is not least because human rights in the end are a seamless garment. Uyghur Muslims, gay Chechnyans, Russian journalists, Colombian campesinos and the Rohingya all have human rights. Corruption nearly always goes hand in fisted glove with human rights abuse and nearly always the first step is the repression of democracy—the preventing of people from enjoying their freedom of assembly and their freedom of speech. That is why I strongly urge the Foreign Secretary to look at another clause that would include the repression of democracy and the rights of assembly and of freedom of speech, and therefore look very carefully at whether Carrie Lam should not be on the list.
I thank the hon. Gentleman and also pay tribute to him. These measures would not have come about without the tenacity and advocacy he has consistently put into this area over many years and on a cross-party basis. As I said, this is a first step, and we will consider how we can proceed, but I make no apology for wanting to make the first step a sure-footed one. Just for clarity, the most serious human rights abuses that we have chosen often are used precisely to suppress peaceful protest or freedom of speech. Magnitsky himself was a whistleblower who was tortured for blowing the lid on the biggest tax fraud that we know of in Russian history. I take the hon. Gentleman’s wider points. We will look to progress, develop, fine-tune and enhance this regime as we proceed.
(4 years, 2 months ago)
Commons ChamberI appreciate the hon. Lady’s spirit, but nothing has happened because we do not control China or the Government in Hong Kong. It is not entirely clear to me what specifically she proposes. I am open to all suggestions. I welcome them.
We have called for a fully independent investigation in relation to police treatment of the protesters. We will introduce our mechanism for so-called Magnitsky legislation shortly. [Hon. Members: “When?”] We have been slightly disrupted because of coronavirus, but we will bring it forward shortly. I pay tribute to the work of the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant), who speaks from a sedentary position and has a long-standing position on the issue.
I thank my right hon. Friend, and he is right to say that the actions in relation to Hong Kong and in other areas are opposed to our values as well as our interests. I certainly welcome the fact that we have, it feels to me, a groundswell of cross-party consensus on this issue, because we are stronger when we are bigger than the sum of our parts and we are more effective in getting our message across. We now have to translate that into the wider international community.
I applaud the Foreign Secretary for what he has said; he is being very, very reasonable and, as the right hon. Member for Ashford (Damian Green) said, has the whole House behind him. I just want more oomph from him—a bit more vim and determination—because these are really important principles; the rule of law around the world must hold. So I say to him: please, please, please, bring forward the blasted Magnitsky regulations, which he proposed when he was a Back Bencher. I want him to bring them back to the Dispatch Box, not in weeks, months and years, but in days and hours.
I will do my level best to get this before the House before the summer recess. I hope that the hon. Gentleman, who is most understanding, will recognise that one or two other things have displaced our focus—[Interruption.] I should point out to the hon. Member for Wigan (Lisa Nandy) that the Government have not been in power, and I have not been Foreign Secretary, for two years, but we will get on with it. I share the hon. Gentleman’s restlessness to deliver it and look forward to his support when we do.
(4 years, 5 months ago)
Commons ChamberThe sanctions Act allows the UK to implement our own sanctions regimes, and we intend to use those powers in line with UK interests and values to reinforce the UK’s role as a force for good. We will continue to co-operate with international partners on sanctions, including on human rights, because sanctions are most effective when delivered collectively.
The Foreign Secretary was one of the loudest in clamouring for these Magnitsky sanctions to be brought forward, yet they have been on the statute book for two years and we still do not have the statutory instruments. One Minister has said we will have them “in the coming months”; another has said we will have them “soon”. If the Foreign Secretary were sitting on the Back Benches, he would be saying, “Do them now!”
And we absolutely are. We are working really hard; the hon. Gentleman just needs to wait a little longer. [Interruption.] If the right hon. Member for Islington South and Finsbury (Emily Thornberry) will allow me to speak, I will reinforce my answer. The hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) just needs to wait a little longer. The regime will be coming forward. We are taking the time to get it right, which is absolutely the right thing to do. Just wait a little longer.
(4 years, 5 months ago)
Commons ChamberI thank my hon. Friend the Chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee. He is absolutely right about the consular measures that we are taking to support UK nationals who feel vulnerable or stranded overseas. I also agree with him about the need for an international approach to pandemics such as this; we have not seen anything like this before. That is why we are providing support to build up the capacity in some of the most vulnerable countries. We are doing that with a total envelope of up to £241 million of aid funding and we are working through the World Health Organisation, the Red Cross, UNICEF and other organisations.
More generally, the Prime Minister spoke to his counterparts in the G7 yesterday. They agreed on the importance of a stronger co-ordinated international approach, and that will include everything from economic measures to research and development to make sure that there is the collaboration that will prevent further pandemics from happening.
Our consular staff are doing an amazing job and many of them around the world are volunteers—they are not paid for their work. I hope that the Foreign Secretary will pass on our gratitude on behalf of all our constituents.
May I tease out the issue of people returning home? As I understand the Foreign Secretary’s advice, it is that if somebody is thinking about travelling abroad now, they should bear in mind that they may not be able to get back. But at the same time he is saying that people should not necessarily come back now. That seems to be inconsistent.
I thank the hon. Gentleman for what he said about consular staff; we will pass that on. It does matter that we have cross-party support for the essential work that all our public services are doing.
The hon. Gentleman asked about travel advice. Obviously, we are advising against all but essential travel globally. It is up to individuals to make the individual judgment calls, which will depend on their personal circumstances and on the availability of commercial flights. In the last resort, we have been able to provide repatriation flights, but that is getting more difficult. We will continue to provide support and advice, but ultimately some of those judgment calls will remain a decision for the individual.
(4 years, 5 months ago)
Westminster HallWestminster Hall is an alternative Chamber for MPs to hold debates, named after the adjoining Westminster Hall.
Each debate is chaired by an MP from the Panel of Chairs, rather than the Speaker or Deputy Speaker. A Government Minister will give the final speech, and no votes may be called on the debate topic.
This information is provided by Parallel Parliament and does not comprise part of the offical record
It always changes just before I start, Mr Sharma. I do not take it personally, of course.
I want to start off on a slightly different tack. In March 1936, the Conservative MP for Chelmsford was a man called Jack Macnamara. He travelled to Germany to celebrate the remilitarisation of the Rhineland. Perhaps we might think that unusual today, but many people at the time thought that Germany should be allowed to stand on its own two feet again, after the Versailles treaty.
What changed his mind about Germany was visiting Dachau. The Germans showed it off. Most of the people in there at the time were political prisoners. They were members of the Communist and Social Democratic parties, or freemasons. Some were dissident clergy of various different Churches, and some were Jews. A significant number of them were homosexuals. The Nazi regime said they were there for their own protective custody—their re-education. They were kept in camps where they had to work hard every day. They were told what they had to do. They were told what they had to listen to. They were shown antisemitic magazines and horrible material that they had to inwardly digest. If they ever told anyone what was going on there, whether they told the truth or not, they were subjected to even harsher punishment. On top of that, it was felt that many of those people were being deliberately driven towards suicide.
Every one of those elements is present in what is going on in Xinjiang province in China at the moment. I want to say to Chinese friends that, just as that British MP in 1936 went to the new Germany as its friend and came back a harsh critic of Hitler’s regime—he ended up fighting and losing his life in the second world war to protect the freedoms of the kinds of people who were in Dachau—there is a danger that so too will China completely alienate the whole world community because of its actions in Xinjiang province and its treatment of the Uighurs. In many ways, some of what is happening to the Uighurs is even worse. There is the religious oppression, the refusal to allow people to have their own thoughts, the re-education, the deliberate reculturation and the attempt to destroy a whole community, but it is also applied to children. At least there were not children in Dachau.
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for giving way, and happy to give him an extra minute by intervening on him. He mentioned alienating the whole world, but does he agree that it is not just about that—whether it happens or not—because, clearly, if China is breeding a counter-terrorism problem for itself, that will also be a counter-terrorism problem for the whole world, including the United Kingdom? Terrorists do not abide by national borders, so that is another incentive for the British Government to be slightly more robust on the issue than they probably have been to date.
There is a patent injustice, and injustice tends to lead to people taking some form of action. We would always want it to be legitimate and peaceful. The danger is, as the hon. Gentleman says, that the action being taken will be entirely counterproductive. China says that what is happening is meant to prevent terrorism, but it is far more likely to create it, in China and other parts of the world. Many people see their brothers and sisters on the other side of the world and feel that they are being hard done by, and want to do something about it.
What angers me is that the situation is all of a piece with the creation of a security state. I thought that the whole point of communism was to create a welfare state, but a security state is being created—exactly the opposite. I would also make the point to China that it has done extraordinarily well in the last 20, 30 or 40 years out of the international rule of law. It has served it well and China has managed to make enormous advances economically and culturally. Now it stands, having previously tended to sit to the side in the international community, wanting to take a much more central part in the world—hence all the various initiatives it has come up with around the world. It will not be able to do that if it does not abide by the international rule of law in its own country. On those two points its actions are utterly counterproductive—even if one were to accept the moral outrage that is what is happening to the Uighurs.
I want to end with a point about the Magnitsky Act. It is about time we had such legislation on the statute book. It has been promised repeatedly by the Foreign Secretary and I hope that the Minister will update us on when it will be published, when it will be able to go through, and when we will be able to use it.
It is always a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Sharma. I am battling through a cold at the moment, so I hope Members will bear with me.
It is definitely a cold—that has been confirmed.
I pay tribute to the hon. Member for The Wrekin (Mark Pritchard) for securing today’s debate. The hon. Members for Congleton (Fiona Bruce), for St Helens South and Whiston (Ms Rimmer), for Rutland and Melton (Alicia Kearns), for Bolton South East (Yasmin Qureshi), for Strangford (Jim Shannon), for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) and for Gloucester (Richard Graham) all made impassioned speeches, and I think the debate has been enriched by that.
At the risk of repeating what has already been said, I will seek to limit my remarks to a few key areas. This matter is certainly not new. It has been widely reported as far back as April 2017 that the Uighurs and other Muslims, including ethnic Kazakhs and Uzbeks, have been detained. The fact that we are talking about this issue three years later is shameful. What is truly alarming about the situation in Xinjiang is the sheer scale and institutional nature of the repression. Reports from the region paint a very bleak picture indeed. More than 1 million Uighur Muslims have been arbitrarily detained in re-education camps. Most of the people detained have never been charged with any crimes and have no legal avenues whatever to free themselves. For many of those who have been detained, the harsh reality is that their only crime is being Muslim.
Uighur Muslims have been identified as extremists purely for practising their religion, but this is not the first time that I have spoken about freedom of religious belief in China. Many will be aware of the persecution of Christians and Falun Gong adherents, to name but two religious minorities. That of course flies in the face of China’s own constitution, which specifically protects freedom of religious belief, yet time and again we see that not to be the case at all.
What particularly worries me is the UK’s response. A recent report by the Foreign Affairs Committee notes that some of China’s international interests actively conflict with those of the UK Government. It stated that the
“current framework of UK policy towards China reflects an unwillingness to face this reality.”
The report further urges the UK Government to actively respond
“to China’s attempts to subvert international human rights mechanisms, and support UN efforts to investigate the extremely concerning situation in Xinjiang.”
Our post-Brexit reality adds a new aspect to the situation. The former Brexit Secretary, the right hon. Member for Haltemprice and Howden (Mr Davis), believed—perhaps naively—that we should look to China to replace our lost trade with Europe and deliver our future economic salvation. We have passed that point now, but there really are fundamental issues at play regarding trade and the price we are prepared to pay. For me, turning a blind eye is simply not an option, and I am on the record saying that many times, particularly in relation to India. I have this overwhelming fear that human rights may be forgotten or overlooked in the rush and scramble to conclude a trade deal. I am sure the Minister will seek to reassure me on that point when he responds. However, he can understand my scepticism, given the Government’s track record.
Since the EU referendum in 2016, the number of arms export licences issued to countries on the Foreign Office’s own human rights watch list has doubled, so the Minister will understand my concern and why so many of us in this House seek proper reassurances and guarantees on the Government’s commitment to human rights and freedom of religious belief. Last week, the Minister tried to reassure me in the Chamber that the Government
“will not pursue trade to the exclusion of human rights.”—[Official Report, 3 March 2020; Vol. 672, c. 755.]
While that reassurance is welcome, we need to see it become a central tenet of any trade negotiations with other countries. I know that many here will share the view that human rights should form the foundation of any such talks, rather than being a consideration.
Moving forward, we need to see the UK exercising soft power where Xinjiang is concerned. I would like to hear a commitment from the Minister today that the Government will exert influence on China to welcome UN officials to the province without restrictions. We all need reassurances that the Government will also do all they can to encourage other countries to do likewise, because if we ignore persecution against religious minorities, we open the door for every kind of intolerance and persecution.
Our concerns about this area and the report that my hon. Friend refers to are very well known. The research in the report, and the potential use of forced labour, gives us a better understanding of the situation. We contributed a small part of the overall funding to that research, although we did not play a part in the drafting of the report. It helps to inform us, and my hon. Friend raises a very good point.
I will move on; I do have to finish, and I hope to give my hon. Friend the Member for The Wrekin a couple of minutes at the end. I hope the hon. Gentleman will understand.
Our intelligence is that families are also obliged to host Chinese officials in their homes for extended periods, to demonstrate their loyalty to the Communist party. On the streets, Uighurs and other minorities are continuously watched by police, supported by extensive use of facial recognition technology and restrictions on movement.
Of all the severe restrictions, our greatest concern is that more than 1 million Uighurs and other ethnic minorities—more than 10% of the Uighur population—have been detained in internment camps. The deputy party secretary of Xinjiang stated in December that all detainees have been released from the camps. We have not seen sufficient evidence to support that statement and assess that a significant proportion remain in detention. It is unknown how long each individual is detained, what chance they have of release or whether they can appeal their detention. Clearly, detentions have split families, left children effectively orphaned and created a culture of fear.
China’s initial response to allegations of human rights abuses in Xinjiang was to deny the existence of the camps, but after a significant amount of evidence was reported and international attention increased, that position became untenable. China now describes the camps as education and training facilities. We recognise that Xinjiang is of significant geopolitical importance to China, both as an economic corridor to markets in central Asia, the middle east and Europe, and as home to large gas fields, half of China’s coal deposits and an estimated 20% of its oil reserves. However, although that may partly explain China’s strong security interests in Xinjiang, we believe, based on all available evidence, that its actions are disproportionate, systematic and counterproductive.
Innocent citizens have suffered greatly under the policies. We have been calling, via the UN, for China to close the camps, cease indiscriminate surveillance and restrictions on religion and culture, and allow UN observers unfettered access to the region. China is contravening its own constitutional provisions on freedom of religion and its obligations under the 1948 universal declaration of human rights. I reassure my hon. Friend the Member for The Wrekin that the human rights situation in Xinjiang remains a priority for me, the Foreign Secretary and the UK Government as a whole. We strongly believe that everyone, everywhere, should enjoy equal rights and protection under the law.
My hon. Friend the Member for The Wrekin and the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) made the sensible point that China’s actions could be counter- productive in terms of the potential for being a breeding ground for terrorism. That argument is difficult to disagree with. My hon. Friend the Member for Gloucester (Richard Graham), who knows the region incredibly well, made a similar point. China has some genuine terrorism concerns, but as I said, its actions are indiscriminate and disproportionate, and will be counter- productive in the long term.
My hon. Friend the Member for Congleton (Fiona Bruce) talked about the rights of children. I share her deep concern about the impact of the policies on children in particular. She also mentioned sanctions, as many Members did, including the hon. Member for Rhondda. The Foreign Secretary has announced that the UK will establish a global human rights sanctions regime under the Sanctions and Anti-Money Laundering Act 2018. We will lay secondary legislation to establish that regime in the coming months.
It would be inappropriate to comment on potential designations before the regulations come into force.
The reality is that, now we have left the EU, designing the first piece of UK autonomous sanctions legislation will be complex, and it is worth taking the time to get it right. The hon. Member will have to have some patience, but the matter is very much on our radar and we will do it.