Iraq: Coalition Against ISIL

Chris Williamson Excerpts

Friday 26th September 2014 Commons Chamber

[Jeremy Corbyn (Islington North) (Lab)]

This is the third time during my lifetime in Parliament that I have been asked to vote to invade or bomb Iraq. I have voted against on previous occasions, and I will not support the motion today. I ask the House to think a little more deeply about what we have done in the past and what the effects have been. We have still not even had the results of the Chilcot inquiry.

The current crisis descends from the war on terror, the ramifications of which have been vast military expenditure by western countries and the growth of jihadist forces in many parts of the world. Many people have lost their lives, and many more have had their lives totally disrupted and are fleeing warzones to try to gain a place of safety. Only two weeks ago, it was reported that 500 migrants had died trying to cross the Mediterranean to get into Malta, and many die every day trying to get to Lampedusa. Many of those people are victims of wars throughout the region for which we in this House have voted, be it the bombing of Iraq, the bombing of Libya, the intervention in Mali or the earlier intervention in Afghanistan.

We need to give a moment’s thought to where the problems come from. The growth of the Taliban came from 1979, when the west decided to support the opposition in Afghanistan. The Taliban morphed into al-Qaeda, which then morphed into various other forces in Africa, particularly in Nigeria, and of course into the current group, ISIL. That is an absolutely appalling group of people—there is no question whatever about that. Their behaviour, with the beheading and abuse of people, is quite appalling.

[Chris Williamson (Derby North) (Lab)]

Will my hon. Friend comment on the argument that the air strikes have so far prevented the expansion of ISIL forces? Would more air strikes go further in preventing ISIL from taking more ground?

[Jeremy Corbyn]

The air strikes have had some effect, but I do not believe that further air strikes and the deepening of our involvement will solve the problem. I will come to that in a moment, if I may.

We are right to talk about ISIL’s appalling human rights record, but we should be careful with whom we walk. The Prime Minister pointed out that there had been a ministerial visit to Saudi Arabia to get it on side in the current conflict. We sell an awful lot of arms to Saudi Arabia, and there is an awful lot of Saudi money in London in property speculation and various other investments. Saudi Arabia routinely beheads people in public every Friday, executing them for sex outside marriage, religious conversion and a whole lot of other things, but we have very little to say about human rights abuses there because of the economic link with Saudi Arabia. If we are to go to war on the basis of abuses of human rights, we should have some degree of consistency in our approach.

One should be cautious of the idea that bombing will be cost-free and effective. There was a military attack in Tikrit on 1 September, as reported by Human Rights Watch. It was an attempt to strike at a supposed ISIL base of some sort in a school. It resulted in 31 people being killed, none of whom was involved in ISIL, which was nowhere near. We will get more of that.

I believe that the motion that we are being asked to support will lead us into one war after another. There has to be a political solution and political development in the region. I have had a lot of e-mails on the subject, including one this morning from a lady aged 91 that said, “War begets violence, which begets the next war.” We need to take a different stance.