Afghanistan and Pakistan

Debate between Denis MacShane and Jeremy Corbyn

Wednesday 6th July 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr MacShane]

I am glad to hear it, but frankly—I do not want to quote Bismarck and the Balkans and Pomeranian grenadiers—I weep every Wednesday when the poor Prime Minister has to come to the Dispatch Box and yet again read out the name, or perhaps names, of a dead British soldier, and for what? I cannot find an answer to that question.

To give the Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman, the hon. Member for Croydon South (Richard Ottaway), and his colleagues their due, they admit that, because one of their report’s key conclusions, on page 83, is that

“at a strategic level, we seriously question whether the efforts expended…have a direct connection to the UK’s core objective, namely the national security of the UK”.

That is absolutely right; the Select Committee Chairman has summed it up there—it is written down. It is a Foreign Affairs Committee conclusion, and it should be at the forefront of all of our discussions on Afghanistan. There is no longer any connection between UK national security and our men going out on patrol and being shot dead by the Taliban.

The Select Committee’s excellent and thorough report contains an account of a fine passage of questioning, which resulted in a most extraordinary confession by the Foreign Secretary. Committee members were trying to find out who is actually taking decisions on Afghanistan, and specifically in this instance the announcement to withdraw—or retreat—by 2015. Please can we avoid the absurd new euphemism of “draw-down”? It is a retreat and a withdrawal; that is what it is, so let us revert to plain English. The Foreign Secretary said that that decision was taken collectively in the National Security Council. My right hon. Friend the Member for Coventry North East (Mr Ainsworth) asked whether the Defence Secretary had been consulted, and the Foreign Secretary replied:

“I am sure the Defence Secretary was consulted, but I cannot tell you when everybody was consulted. You would have to ask the Prime Minister.”

The Committee Chairman asked whether the Foreign Secretary could confirm

“that the decision wasn’t actually made in the Council.”

The Foreign Secretary said:

“It wasn’t a formal item in the National Security Council.”

This gives a fascinating insight into the mechanism of government. Where was the decision taken—by whom and how? We know it was no longer taken on a sofa, but we are none the wiser—[Interruption.] I have not been invited to No. 10 so I cannot check whether the sofa has gone. We do not know who took the decision and on what terms.

I would argue that we should be getting out a lot faster. Canada is out, the Netherlands is out, and Belgium is pulling out half of its men. The presence of international security assistance force-NATO allies in Afghanistan is now getting thinner and thinner, and, yes, it will be a withdrawal. No general wants to be the one who folds up the flag, climbs the ladder to the top of the embassy building and climbs in a helicopter and leaves, but stopping a war is, perhaps, as great a military art as starting one.

It would be fascinating to look at the official record of the Russian Duma for the 1980s, when the Russians were convinced that they were bringing a civilising mission to Afghanistan, to see whether debates such as this one were taking place. Then, of course, they faced the external foe of the Mujaheddin paid for by President Ronald Reagan and Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. There has been little reference to the fact that the Mujaheddin of the 1980s was a product of western foreign policy. We have heard in the past couple of days that Mr Reagan won the cold war, and part of that winning presumably included the driving of the Soviet Union and its troops out of Afghanistan. If that was the case, every Russian would wish that Mr Reagan had won it a lot earlier; they perhaps believe that the red army should never have gone into Afghanistan. However, the money sent by the west to create the Mujaheddin sowed dragons’ teeth that turned into dragons on 9/11 and 7/7, and it would be good if the people examining the history of that era had the honesty to say so.

[Jeremy Corbyn]

Is my right hon. Friend aware that after Soviet forces went into Afghanistan there was a considerable number of unreported demonstrations by the families of soldiers who had died there, and that there is a huge memorial movement within Russia today on behalf of those who are still not recognised for the sacrifices they made?

[Mr MacShane]

Yes, indeed. That conflict contributed to the undermining of the Soviet Union, but in the very worst sense, in that it required the senseless sacrifice of a lot of young Russian men finally to persuade Mr Gorbachev and his new Soviet leaders that the action in Afghanistan had to come to an end. In some ways, I wish that we had been able to defeat communism in Vietnam, because the period after the retreat of the United States was a horribly cruel one in Vietnam—we saw what happened with the boat people, the re-education camps and the killings and tortures. But there was no question of our remaining longer in the vain hope that we could have created a more stable, orderly or democratic regime.

The Select Committee’s report stated:

“We welcome the Government’s attempt to engage more pro-actively”—

I never know what that adverb means—

“with parliamentarians on Afghanistan.”

That might interest the Chair, Mr Deputy Speaker, because I understand that a new poem is doing the rounds there. It goes as follows, “From Kandahar to Kabul, the whispers grow and grow, stand by Pashtuns and Tajiks, here comes Mr Speaker Bercow.” We will see whether our Speaker is going to be the magic solution and whether he will be sent down there to spread lightness and parliamentary tolerance among the peoples of Afghanistan. I do not think that anybody can move an immediate amendment and call a Division on that subject—[Interruption.] Perhaps one of his deputies would be more appropriate.

When I talk about “the west” I mean the broad family of democracies—north America, Europe, and our friends in Canada, Australia, Japan and South Korea. As long as the west is mired in Afghanistan, we will not be able to promote our core interest now, which is to recover economic strength and to recover confidence in the need to have an adequate security profile against the rise of authoritarian powers, which are arming fast, which might, at some stage, threaten our interests and which, because we are lost in the wildernesses of west Asia, we are unable to see coming over the horizon.

In the few years after America withdrew from Vietnam things were unclear, but for the 20 years after 1980 America led the world in many ways. It did so economically, in inventing new forms of technology and in expanding many human freedoms to do with personal liberty and respect for multicultural and multi-ethnic cohabitation. Right now, America is bogged down in this wretched war. The UK is a minor ally of America and the sooner we are out of this war, the better. I sincerely say to those on the Treasury Bench that if they look at history, they will find that it has very often been the Conservative party that has had a greater sense of geopolitical reality than some of the opposing parties and has known when enough was enough. I would like us out before 2015.

Finally, the title of the report we are debating is “The UK’s foreign policy approach to Afghanistan and Pakistan”. It is very detailed on Afghanistan, and I congratulate the Committee on that, but it does not in any way address foreign policy towards Pakistan. Pakistan hardly gets a mention and is seen only in relation to Afghanistan. That might be the way in which the title of the report was chosen—I am not criticising the members of the Committee—but we need a policy on Pakistan and part of that must involve telling the truth to our great friends in India. As long as they have 500,000 people in an oppressive occupation of part of the region—I am choosing my words carefully—called Kashmir, there will be no possibility that the people or the Government and military of Pakistan, however constituted, will not see that as a direct threat to their identity and national interest. If 500,000 armed soldiers are camped on a country’s western border, that is where that country will have to put its troops.

Until we ask India to take a new approach to Kashmir and to take it off one of the world’s fault lines, we will not be in any position to ask Pakistan to take a new and more helpful approach on Afghanistan or on other issues. The western world, if I might use that term—the Euro-Atlantic world, let us say—has spent too long in majority Muslim countries creating giant armies. Whatever the motives for sending those armies originally, they are making matters worse. It is time to get out. I want to spare the Prime Minister, with his many problems, from ever again having to stand at that Dispatch Box to lament the loss of a British soldier’s life in a conflict of which we should no longer be part.

Police Reform and Social Responsibility Bill

Debate between Denis MacShane and Jeremy Corbyn

Thursday 31st March 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr MacShane]

I will take the intervention from my hon. Friend the Member for Islington North (Jeremy Corbyn).

[Jeremy Corbyn]

My right hon. Friend seems to be drawing a distinction between demonstrations outside Parliament and elsewhere. Does he recall that a number of MPs, including me, were arrested outside South Africa house in 1984? The police decided to prosecute us, bizarrely, for behaviour that was offensive to a foreign mission, to which we happily pleaded guilty, given that the protest was against the apartheid regime in South Africa. The court found us innocent on the basis that we had a moral right to protest. As a result, there was a permanent picket outside South Africa house, despite many objections by the then South African embassy. That played its small part in ending apartheid. Surely my right hon. Friend recognises that the right to permanent protest is enshrined in judicial precedent in this country.

[Mr MacShane]

Yes; if one goes to the Chinese embassy in Portland place, the Falun Gong are always there. I am not talking about the other streets of London, and I am not talking about Downing street; I am talking exclusively about the law-making building of our nation, which requires slightly different consideration. I do not see that as the political class dividing itself from the population. I want more protest. However, that is different from saying that one particular issue can stay there for ever. One could be flippant and say that we could have a rota of issues. There could be a right-wing protest, when the fascists, the British National party and the UK Independence party can all come and make their little points.

I think that we are conspiring—perhaps that is an exaggerated word—to devalue the centrality of democratically elected legislatures when we allow protest and noise. Of course it is not preventing anybody from getting in, although hon. Members were prevented from coming in by the foxhunting protest.

North Africa and the Middle East

Debate between Denis MacShane and Jeremy Corbyn

Thursday 17th March 2011 Commons Chamber

[Jeremy Corbyn]

I would expect nothing less, but I should have loved to have it before the debate so that I could have referred to it. That is why I tabled the question. However, I thank the Backbench Business Committee for securing the debate in the first place.

We need to embark on a complete reappraisal of our policy on the whole region. We cannot go on supporting potentates and dictators, absolute monarchs and abuses of human rights. We cannot continue to sell arms, tear gas, riot shields and all kinds of weapons of destruction, and then not be surprised when they are used. As my hon. Friend the Member for Walsall North said in relation to the sale of arms to Libya, who on earth was supposed to be attacking Libya? Why should it require such a vast array of armoury, along with Saudi Arabia among other countries? We need to think carefully about that.

According to an article in the online edition of The Guardian,

“NMS took up to 50 British companies to arms fairs in Libya in 2008 and last November. The last exhibition reportedly showcased military wares such as artillery systems, anti-tank weapons, and infantry weapons.”

All those are being used as we speak. As for the question of arms sales, the Campaign Against Arms Trade refers to

“UK weapons used against pro-democracy protesters in the Middle East”,

and goes on to report:

“The UK sold tear gas, crowd control armament and sniper rifles to Libya and Bahrain in 2010.”

As we speak, they are being used against protesters there. The Prime Minister, rather bizarrely, took a number of arms salespersons with him on his recent trip. Only a year before that, we were selling equipment to Saudi Arabia that is currently being used in Bahrain. And so the list goes on and on.

We cannot continue to assume that none of that has anything to do with us. It is time that we changed our policy on arms sales completely, and ceased to have an economy that is apparently so dependent on the sale of arms to so many people around the world. You cannot sell arms and then complain about human rights abuses when those arms are used against people who suffer as a result.

[Mr MacShane]

On 17 February, the Foreign Secretary said that the UK

“would strongly oppose any interference in the affairs of Bahrain by other nations”.—[Official Report, 17 February 2011; Vol. 523, c. 1135.]

Is my hon. Friend aware of any statement from the Foreign Office calling on the Saudis immediately to withdraw their invasion force?

[Jeremy Corbyn]

I am not aware of any such statement, and I wish there was such a statement, because the Gulf Co-operation Council sending forces into Bahrain is an invasion and an occupation, and is resulting in a great deal of oppression of people in Bahrain at present.

I want to mention three further specific matters. Palestine has been raised on a number of occasions, and there are a lot of issues to do with Palestine; indeed, last weekend I was at a conference dealing with Palestinian prisoner issues. I shall refer to just one astonishing fact, however: since 1967, Israeli occupation forces have arrested more than 800,000 Palestinians, and at present there are thought to be 6,600 Palestinians in Israeli prisons, including children, elected members of the Palestinian Authority, a number of prisoners who are in isolation and at least 1,000 who are deprived of any kind of family visit. Those are abuses of the human rights of those individuals. Add that to the construction of the wall, add that to the settlement policy, add that to the checkpoints, add that to the imprisonment of the people of Gaza, add that to the huge levels of unemployment resulting in Gaza, add that to the ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians living in the Negev desert, add that to the removal of Israeli-Palestinian homes in Haifa and Jaffa—add all that up and what we clearly get is a constant harassment of all the Palestinian people.

I hope that we are serious about human rights, but Israel has been building the wall and continuing the settlements in defiance of all international law and all pressures to the contrary. Where are the condemnations and the sanctions? Where is the public discussion in the west of Israel’s behaviour and policy? I do not want any bombing or assassinations—I do not want any murders or killings—but we see a whole process of hate developing because there is no condemnation of what is being done, which is so damaging to the Palestinian people.

One issue that has not so far been raised is the situation in Morocco, and the Moroccan occupation of the Western Sahara and the several hundred thousand Sahrawi people who have been in refugee camps in Algeria since 1975. I hope that one day the UN through MINURSO—the United Nations Mission for the Referendum in Western Sahara—will take on a human rights role, which I think it should have, and that it will succeed in carrying out the decolonisation statutes, which would give the people of the Western Sahara a right of self-determination.

There is now a third generation of residents in those refugee camps in Algeria, hoping one day to be able to go home. Can we imagine what that must be like? It is not good enough for Morocco to say, “Well, there can be a degree of autonomy in the Western Sahara.” Under international law, it is absolutely clear that, as a former Spanish colony, Western Sahara should, on removal of the colonial power, have the right of self-determination. That right has been denied to the Sahrawi people. It is a sore that runs through their feelings and that runs through the whole region. Again, that can be the start of a problem for the future. I am well aware that the Minister has some sympathy with the views that I am expressing. The all-party group on Western Sahara had a useful meeting with him, and I hope he will be able to give us some further news on this issue in his speech.

Three weeks ago I went on a short visit to Tunisia, where I spent a lot of time talking to people of all political persuasions: those of the left, the centre, a number of Islamic groups and others. It was clear that they were delighted with the removal of President Ben Ali, but they were frightened about the possible return of the Ben Ali regime in a different guise through the power of the security services and patronage in the state. They were therefore frightened of what may well happen in the future.

I was talking to some students in the central square who were very effectively kettling a group of army officers and soldiers, as well as their equipment and tanks. It was slightly bizarre to see a lot of students keeping the army in a square, because in most demonstrations I have been on if the army turns up, people generally think it is bad news. These students thought it was good news to keep the army there because, as they explained to me, a vast array of European-supplied anti-riot equipment was around the corner in the hands of the riot police and they thought that keeping the army in the square would keep the police out because they probably would not fire on the army. It was therefore a perfectly logical choice to make.

I discussed with the students what their hopes for the future were, and the answers were diverse; there was no coherent central theme to what they wanted, except freedom to demonstrate, freedom of assembly, freedom of expression and so on. When I asked them whether they wanted western help they said, “No, because when the west comes in it never leaves. We want to do this ourselves and we want to achieve something different ourselves.”

Amnesty International has sent out a very interesting briefing, pointing out the abuses of human rights and the shootings of people that have gone on in so many countries: Tunisia, Algeria, Sudan, Egypt, Bahrain, Oman and Saudi Arabia. The list goes on and on, and it includes Yemen, describing what is happening there at the moment. There is a common theme, which relates not only to the thirst for peace and democracy, but to an economic issue. So many of those countries have adopted economic policies that resulted in mass youth unemployment. This is about the anger of young people who see no future and no security for themselves in an oppressive state that has been largely supported by the west.

We need to think very carefully. We need to express a great deal of hope about what is going on throughout the region, but military intervention has brought problems in every place that we have been in in the past. I understand all the arguments for a no-fly zone over Libya, but I do not see how it will do anything other than exacerbate an already tense situation.

Foreign Affairs and Defence

Debate between Denis MacShane and Jeremy Corbyn

Wednesday 26th May 2010 Commons Chamber

[Jeremy Corbyn (Islington North) (Lab)]

I am very pleased that we are having this debate so early in the discussion of the Queen’s Speech. For the past years, this House has been dominated by the issues of Iraq, Afghanistan and international law. I opposed both the Iraq and the Afghanistan wars from the very beginning, and I ask the House to consider the damage that they have done to this country’s standing around the world.

The wars have undermined international law and the UN. Vast numbers of people, both military and civilian, have laid down their lives in both countries. The overwhelming public opinion in this country is that the Iraq war was simply wrong. It has done enormous damage to my party and to this country’s standing around the world. I had hoped that the Foreign Secretary would give us a clearer answer on the possible dates for a timetable of withdrawal from Afghanistan.

What would constitute a victory in Afghanistan? When that question is raised, it is very difficult to get an answer. It is clear that there is still terrible poverty in that country, that drug dealing is rampant and rife, and that corruption is even more so. It is also clear that the war has spilled over the border into Pakistan.

I hope that we can set a very rapid timetable for withdrawal from Afghanistan and recognise that this is a war that cannot be won. Our continued presence there does not make this country or any western capital safer: to the contrary, I think that the war makes us more vulnerable and puts us in greater danger. We have to understand that, if we wish to be a player in the world, we have to play by international law, in accordance with the UN.

As the Foreign Secretary and others have noted, the nuclear non-proliferation treaty review conference is going on this week in New York. I want to make two points about that.

First, the 1970 non-proliferation treaty places an absolute requirement on the five permanent members of the UN Security Council—the holders of nuclear weapons, of which Great Britain is one—to take steps towards nuclear disarmament. Many of the countries represented at the NPT review talks have not developed nuclear weapons and have no intention of doing so. They feel very aggrieved that the five permanent members of the Security Council continually lecture them about not developing nuclear weapons and about pursuing nuclear disarmament, while at the same time talking about nuclear rearmament. In our case, that means developing a new Trident nuclear submarine system.

I agree with the right hon. and learned Member for North East Fife (Sir Menzies Campbell) that the defence review absolutely must include the whole issue of nuclear weapons and the Trident replacement. The system is very expensive and, in my view, immoral. It will not increase this country’s safety and security, and its cost is so astronomical that there can be no justification for it whatsoever.

However, nuclear weapons cannot be abolished by the nuclear non-proliferation treaty. There was an excellent piece of investigative journalism in The Guardian on Monday that demonstrated how Israel had involved itself in trying to arm apartheid South Africa with nuclear weapons. The fact that Israel has 200 nuclear warheads at the present time means that, unless there is to be an acceptance of nuclear weapons in the middle east, it is very hard to say that no other countries in that region should ever consider acquiring them if they feel threatened.

I do not want any country, in the middle east or anywhere else, to develop nuclear weapons. I absolutely do not want Iran to do so: for that matter, I do not think that it should develop nuclear power, but my personal opposition to nuclear power means that I would say that about any country.

However, a nuclear-free middle east means that a nuclear weapons convention must be developed. Israel and all the other countries in that region would have to involved. When the NPT review talks in New York conclude this week, I hope that the need for a nuclear weapons convention will be accepted. If we do not develop such a convention, the likelihood becomes ever greater that countries beyond North Korea, India, Pakistan and Israel will develop nuclear weapons before the next quinquennial review in 2015.

At the heart of that, of course, is the issue of Palestine and the middle east. Both Front-Bench speakers referred to the situation facing the people of Palestine, and in particular to the isolation of the people of Gaza at the present time. Along with my right hon. Friend the Member for Manchester, Gorton (Sir Gerald Kaufman) and a number of parliamentarians from countries all across Europe, I took part in a delegation that went to Gaza earlier this year. Two things hit us, and the first was the isolation and poverty of the people of Gaza. We were also struck by the shortages of food, medicine and everything else that they are suffering, and by the sheer hopelessness of the situation facing many young people. The blockade must be lifted, and the EU has an important role to play in that by imposing trade sanctions on Israel, if necessary, to encourage that.

[Mr MacShane]

Does my hon. Friend acknowledge that there is also an Arab country blockading Gaza—namely, Egypt? Does he agree that many of these problems would be solved if Egypt were to lift its blockade?

[Jeremy Corbyn]

Egypt does indeed maintain a blockade of Gaza, but it is not the country that is threatening or trying to occupy Gaza. The crossings between Gaza and Israel, where there are endless restrictions on UN trucks, food, medicines, building supplies and everything else, make life intolerable for people in Gaza. At the moment, a peaceful flotilla of vessels is going from Turkey to take aid, support, succour and comfort to the people of Gaza. I hope that the British Government will put all the pressure that they can on the Israeli Government not to interfere with that flotilla and to allow it to land, so that the people of Gaza can receive the support that is being offered by peaceable people from all over the world.

We are not going to solve the problems of the middle east region by further rearmament. I am concerned that the United States’ policy, announced last week, of giving a further £150 million for a new missile defence system for Israel is a provocative act that will only encourage further armament within the region. The same applies to the deployment of Patriot missiles all along the Gulf. There must be dialogue, negotiation and debate on all the issues, including human rights, with Iran and every other country to bring about peace in the region. We will not achieve it by rearmament, by nuclear weapons or by turning a blind eye to what happened in Operation Cast Lead or to the abuse of Palestinian rights by Israel in its process of occupation.

The Foreign Secretary made a strong point about human rights being the core of foreign policy. Indeed, the previous Foreign Secretary made much the same point. There are many issues that could be raised on human rights, but I just want briefly to say that, if we go down the road of lifting the universal jurisdiction that applies in British courts to people against whom there is prima facie evidence of war crimes or the abuse of human rights, we diminish ourselves in the eyes of the rest of the world and undermine the whole principle of international law and international jurisdiction. If there are people in any country against whom there is such prima facie evidence, they should be brought before a court and tried for war crimes or the abuse of human rights, as appropriate. If we start being selective about this because we like or dislike a particular person or country, it diminishes our standing in the world. I also ask the new Government to pay attention to the deportation of people from this country to countries that have not signed the various protocols on torture and the abuse of human rights. I ask them to stop the process of such deportations.

I want briefly to mention three other issues, which I hope the Minister will be able to respond to later. There is massive abuse of human rights and massive loss of life going on in the Congo. This was not mentioned in the speeches of those on the Front Benches. It is the largest loss of life in any conflict anywhere in the world at the present time. Millions have died, and tens of thousands—if not hundreds of thousands—of women and families have been abused in the eastern part of the Congo. The Government have a decision to make on the future deployment of the MONUC force, and I hope that they will do that with sensitivity. I also hope that they will recognise that human rights abuses have not gone away just because we have good relations with the Government in that country, or indeed because the Congolese army is in the east of the Congo—I have to say that the reverse is the case.

I also want to mention the right of return of the Chagos islanders to the islands in the Indian ocean, which has been fought for through our courts. The case is now going to the European Court of Human Rights. I hope that the Foreign Secretary will intervene, withdraw the case from the European Court and accept the inalienable right of return of those people to the islands from which they were so brutally dragged away in the 1970s and 1980s.

Finally, there is a group of people living in refugee camps in Algeria who were driven out of Morocco in the 1970s as part of the war waged by the Moroccan forces against Western Sahara. Western Sahara remains a territory occupied by Morocco. Unfortunately, Britain acceded to the European fishery agreement, which means that fishing takes place off the coast of Western Sahara, mainly to the benefit of Spanish vessels. The people of Western Sahara remain in those camps. Let us make some effort to ensure that a referendum takes place that allows peace to return, and allows those people to return. They must be allowed to exercise their right under decolonisation statutes to decide on their own future. Whether they become independent or not, they should at least have that free choice. It is simply not right to have left them living in refugee camps for more than 30 years. We can do better than that, and it is up to us to make sure that we do.