Thursday 26th November 2015

(8 years, 5 months ago)

Commons Chamber
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Lord Cameron of Chipping Norton Portrait The Prime Minister
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I am very happy to appear in front of the Select Committee. I cannot promise to do that before a vote in this House, but obviously, were there to be a vote in this House, I would appear in this House—at this Dispatch Box—for a full day’s debate. I will sit and listen to contributions, I will take questions, and I will take as many interventions as I possibly can.

I would say to the hon. Gentleman that I think the Select Committee asked good questions, and I would urge him to read our response in full; it is incredibly detailed. The Chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee has, I think, indicated that the answers are satisfactory. I ask the hon. Gentleman, as a member of that respected Select Committee, to look at it carefully. If there are other points that he wants to raise and write to me about, I am very happy to enter into a correspondence with him.

Daniel Kawczynski Portrait Daniel Kawczynski (Shrewsbury and Atcham) (Con)
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The Prime Minister will know that some of the regional tensions in the middle east and Syria stem from the mutual hostility and antagonism between Iran and Saudi Arabia. During our Foreign Affairs Committee visit to both Tehran and Riyadh this week, we were given assurances that both countries are prepared to start constructive dialogue. Will he use his good offices at the United Nations to bring these two countries together to try to make sure that their hostility stops?

Lord Cameron of Chipping Norton Portrait The Prime Minister
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My hon. Friend is absolutely right that dialogue between Saudi Arabia and Iran is going to be crucial to providing the backdrop to a political solution in Syria. We need to make sure that the potential conflict between Sunni majority nations and Shi’a majority nations does not overtake what is necessary, which is to identify the common enemy: this Islamist extremist violence, most notably through ISIL, which is of course a threat to us, as we have discussed, but also a massive threat to the stability and security of the region.