Sexual Violence in Conflict

Douglas Alexander Excerpts

Thursday 14th February 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Douglas Alexander (Paisley and Renfrewshire South) (Lab)]

I congratulate the hon. Member for Oxford West and Abingdon (Nicola Blackwood) on securing this important and timely debate in the House today. It is timely, not least because of recent developments at the United Nations and in the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, and it represents a significant issue that deserves proper time, attention, debate and indeed action.

I welcome the personal interest shown by the Foreign Secretary in advancing work on this issue and recognise his personal efforts to raise the issue on the international agenda. Where there is agreement in all parts of the House, it is only right that it be acknowledged, and on this issue, the Foreign Secretary has our full support in the efforts that he has made to prioritise the prevention of sexual violence in conflict both for the United Kingdom and for the wider international community. His efforts have been widely acknowledged and are rightly praised.

However, the recent work of the Foreign Secretary builds on decades of vital and important work done by countless charities, non-governmental organisations, political leaders and human rights activists. I am sure the Foreign Secretary would agree with me when I say that their unrelenting commitment to this issue is what has helped ensure that the issue today is becoming more of a focus for Governments right around the world. Our efforts today build on the work of many and it is only right that we pay tribute to their contribution. In particular, it is right to single out the work that women human rights defenders do on this crucial issue. Those working in this area are often subject to the gravest threats and risks, facing intimidation, abduction and even killings by those who oppose the work they do. They do it simply because they are there to do the right thing. Much more must be done to support these groups and promote their agenda so that theirs is not a struggle they face alone.

I welcome the work already being done by the recently appointed UN Secretary-General’s special representative on sexual violence in conflict, Zainab Bangura. Hers is a crucial and difficult task, which is why we fully support the recent pledge Her Majesty’s Government made to offer direct financial support to help fund her office.

Given the degree of cross-party support on the issue, I will echo some of the sentiments already expressed by colleagues in the Chamber before turning to the specific package of measures the Foreign Secretary has set out. When debating policy responses on this issue, it is only right that we first take time to acknowledge the sheer scale of the challenge, and indeed the extent of the suffering, that we are seeking to address. More than 75% of rapes in England are never reported to the police, so it should come as no surprise that we know very little of the true extent of sexual violence committed in conflict. However, there must be no doubt that rape and sexual violence are used today as weapons of war, and indeed as weapons of torture and mass persecution. The UN Secretary-General, Ban Ki-Moon, has rightly described sexual violence as

“the most pervasive violation of human rights across the globe”.

It is time for the international community to step up its efforts to respond to that harrowing truth.

The conflicts that have in part defined the last decades of war have themselves in part been defined by the prevalent and tragic use of sexual violence as a weapon of war. During the 1994 Rwandan genocide, more than 250,000 women were raped, and 50,000 women were reported to have been raped during the war between Croatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina. During the post-election violence in Cote D’Ivoire in 2010-11, sexual violence was widespread, with over 50% of reported incidents involving children. Although deeply disturbing, the statistics cannot do justice to the scale of human suffering involved; it is only the personal accounts that come close to beginning to shed light on the scale of the horror that the use of sexual violence in conflict inflicts on its victims. The horrors continue today in the conflicts that still rage across the world.

It is therefore right that the UK has made the issue a priority for our presidency of the G8. We sincerely welcome the steps that the Government have taken to help direct efforts at both UK and international level towards addressing the issue. The Foreign Secretary will therefore have our continued support in his efforts to ensure that tackling sexual violence in conflict receives the attention and, crucially, the resources that it rightly deserves.

However, I am sure that the Foreign Secretary would agree that the real challenge we face collectively is how to influence the facts on the ground in conflict areas. The true measure of the success and effectiveness of any steps agreed by the G8 will be their capacity to effect change in some of the most difficult and dangerous regions of the world.

Let me turn to the specific package of measures the Foreign Secretary has set out. We welcome the Government’s preventing sexual violence initiative. It is right that one of its key components is trying to overcome the apparent impunity that has existed on the issue until today. Sexual violence as a tool of war remains one of the least prosecuted crimes. We need to do more to improve accountability on the issue more generally. That is why the work of the specialist teams the Foreign Secretary spoke about, which will be deployed to conflict areas, is welcome. The work they do to gather evidence, help build local capacity and help civil society to investigate alleged crimes will be vital. Tragically, however, demand will always outstrip the capacity of even those groups when documenting and prosecuting crimes on such an horrendous scale. That is why we support calls to ensure that this UK-led taskforce is also focused on building up local in-country capacity to deliver the necessary accountability without leaving countries totally dependent on welcome but necessarily outside support.

Also key to any effective response are efforts to improve international co-operation and co-ordination to prevent sexual violence in conflict on the ground. That level of co-ordination is best achieved through the United Nations, so it is vital, as we have heard, that the necessary resources are made available to the relevant departments so that well-meaning objectives can be turned into concrete outcomes. That is why we hope that the Government will consider recent reports that the gender-based violence area of responsibility within the United Nations remains chronically underfunded. Effective prevention must also extend to regulations on the supply of arms and trade in arms, which are too often ultimately used in so many of the conflicts where sexual violence becomes prevalent. In effect, the irresponsible transfer of military equipment across borders fuels gender-based violence within global war zones, and the equipment is also transferred outside war zones, remaining in operation long after conflicts have officially ended.

In that regard, we will be encouraging the Government to clarify their position in relation to the upcoming negotiations on the arms trade treaty at the United Nations. As the Foreign Secretary will be aware, article 4.6 of the draft text, which explicitly refers to gender-based violence, requires states only to “consider” taking measures to prevent arms sales from facilitating such abuses. Many argue that this provision must be strengthened if the treaty is to have a hope of providing effective prevention, and must therefore stipulate that all practical measures to ensure weapons are never used to perpetrate or facilitate acts of gender-based violence be included in the treaty.

Let me turn to the specific regions where I am sure that the Government recognise that we have not only a strategic interest but, potentially, an operational advantage. It is only right to acknowledge that the prevention of sexual violence in conflict is not confined to those countries that are technically defined as being at war. Afghanistan still reels from the effects of conflict in recent years. Given our operational capacities on the ground there, I would welcome the Government’s making it a priority area for UK efforts on this issue. The Government’s stated objective of making Somalia’s stabilisation and development a UK strategic priority means that any UK-led initiatives in that country should focus on responding to the reported use of sexual violence during decades of conflict and on ensuring that everything possible is being done to prevent its re-emergence in future.

No one can deny that at its core the issue we are debating is a moral one. The suffering and scale of the terror alone should be justification enough for the international community to act. However, the Foreign Secretary is right to say that it is also a foreign policy issue and therefore a strategic imperative for the United Kingdom in working together with the international community in its efforts to do more. The use of sexual violence in conflict not only makes the conflicts themselves harder to resolve but contributes to making their legacy even harder for local communities ever to overcome, in turn perpetuating precisely the type of insecurity that it is in our collective national interests to prevent.

Ultimately, the best remedy to prevent the use of sexual violence in conflict is to put an end to conflict. That might seem to be straightforward common sense, but it should inform all our efforts on this issue, because that means that any approach to tackling it will always be embedded within a broader strategy for preventing conflict, promoting stability, and protecting against insecurity. Where the Government are taking steps, as they are, to advance this kind of approach, they will have our full support.

[Several hon. Members]

rose—