Iran Nuclear Deal

Emily Thornberry Excerpts

Wednesday 9th May 2018 Commons Chamber

[Emily Thornberry (Islington South and Finsbury) (Lab)]

I thank the Foreign Secretary for advance sight of his statement.

I am sure that there will come a time to debate whether the Government’s approach to Donald Trump since his election in 2016 has been the right one, but today is not the time, because instead I believe that the whole House, and indeed the whole world, should stand united in condemning Donald Trump for the reckless, senseless and immoral act of diplomatic sabotage that he has committed. Every independent inspection has confirmed—even the US Defence Secretary James Mattis admitted this last month—that the nuclear deal is working and Iran is complying with it in full.

Yes, there are other important matters that must be addressed with Iran—its regional activities, its ballistic missile programme, and its record on human rights—but the platform for that dialogue, and the foundation on which future arrangements could be reached, was the nuclear deal. Instead, by seeking to scupper the nuclear deal, Donald Trump has destroyed the platform for future progress and risked triggering a nuclear arms race in the middle east, handing power to the hard-line theocrats in Tehran and pushing Iran back into isolation. Donald Trump is taking all those risks without a single care, without the slightest justification and without the simplest rational thought about what will come next; and in doing so he is sending a message to North Korea that any agreement it reaches with the US will be worthless.

While we could talk all day about the recklessness and idiocy of what Donald Trump has done, the key question is this: how should the world react? And here I believe there are three challenges. First, there is the challenge for the other signatories of how to best preserve the deal. For Britain, France, Germany, China and Russia that means providing urgent legal and financial protection for companies and banks in our countries engaged in trade and financial transactions with Iran so they can continue doing so. As for Iran, it must have the patience and resolve not to respond in kind to this act of belligerence, but to continue working with the other signatories to try to keep the deal alive.

The second challenge is equally serious: how to stop a descent into conflict. Iran is a country nine times the size of Syria with a population as big as Germany’s. The idea of Iran racing to develop a nuclear weapon and the US Administration seeking to stop it through military means does not bear thinking about. Yet we know that that is exactly what the Trump Administration are thinking about. In February, The New York Times published an important comment piece accusing the Trump Administration of employing exactly the same playbook used before the Iraq war to manufacture a pretext for war with Iran. The article was written by Lawrence Wilkerson, former chief of staff to US Secretary of State Colin Powell, and he warned simply:

“I helped sell the false choice of war once. It’s happening again.”

And that was before the appointment of John Bolton. So while we rightly focus our efforts now on trying to salvage the nuclear deal, we must also be alert to stop any further steps the US may take to escalate its confrontation with Iran.

The third and final challenge I want to mention today is equally profound: if we did not know it beforehand, what yesterday’s announcement confirmed is that as long as Donald Trump remains President we must get used to a world without American leadership—a world where efforts to secure peace and progress on the great challenges facing the planet must be made not just without American co-operation but often in the face of the Administration’s active opposition. That is the challenge we now face in relation to Iran, as it has been on climate change, the refugee crisis and the Israel-Palestine peace process. But starting with the consensus in this House today, I hope we can all play our part in ensuring Britain rises to that challenge.

[Boris Johnson]

I am grateful for the right hon. Lady’s point that there is no merit in any reckless and counterproductive attacks on the United States today, and I am sure that she will continue that spirit when the President makes his visit in July and trust, too, that she will communicate that to the rest of those on the Labour Benches and, indeed, to the Labour party in London. She made a good point when she said that the Iranian Government and the Iranian people have not walked away from the deal. They remain in compliance, and it is our duty, as the UK Government with our European partners, to help them to remain in compliance and to assist in the survival of the JCPOA.

To be fair to the US Administration, they have decided that there is another way forward. They have decided that the limitations that they see in the deal—the sunset clauses, Iran’s malign behaviour in the region and the problem of the intended Iranian acquisition of intercontinental ballistic missiles—can be met by bringing all the problems together and having a big negotiation. The UK Government have long taken a different view that the essence of the JCPOA was to compartmentalise—to take the nuclear deal and solve that—but the President has taken another view. It is now up to Washington to come forward with concrete proposals on how exactly it intends to bring the problems together and address them collectively. Our posture should be one of support in that endeavour, although, as I say, we have been sceptical about how that is to be done.

As for North Korea, the whole House will want to wish the President of the United States every possible success in his endeavours and convey to him our admiration for the vigour with which he has tackled the matter.

Oral Answers to Questions

Emily Thornberry Excerpts

Tuesday 27th March 2018 Commons Chamber

[Boris Johnson]

The hon. Gentleman will know that under the Criminal Finances Act 2017, which came in last April, there is provision for unexplained wealth orders to be made against those whose assets might have been corruptly or illicitly obtained, and he can be in no doubt that the National Crime Agency and the national economic crime centre are looking intently at what avenues to explore. However, I stress that this is not something for political direction or control; we in this country operate under the rule of law.

[Emily Thornberry (Islington South and Finsbury) (Lab)]

At the end of an excellent debate on Russia yesterday, I am afraid that the Foreign Secretary failed to answer a single one of the dozens of questions he was asked over the course of four hours, so may I repeat just two of them? First, will the Government now initiate a case against the Russian state at the European Court of Human Rights for its clear extraterritorial violation of human rights in relation to the Salisbury attack?

[Boris Johnson]

I believe that the right hon. Lady has legal training. We must wait for the investigation to be concluded.

[Emily Thornberry]

I do not really understand that answer, but I hope that the Foreign Secretary will give it some consideration. After all, a third of all cases currently before the Court relate to Russia, and its rulings have been used by leading opposition figures, such as Alexei Navalny, to send a powerful message about the Russian state’s abuses.

Let me ask a second question that the Foreign Secretary failed to answer yesterday. Given the justified criticism of Donald Trump and Jean-Claude Juncker for congratulating President Putin on his re-election, will the Government guarantee, for the sake of consistency, that they will not congratulate President Sisi of Egypt on his sham re-election when it is confirmed next week?

[Boris Johnson]

If I may say so, I think that it is a bit much to bash America and the Trump Administration today, as much as that is the right hon. Lady’s instinctive reflex. The United States has just led the world in expelling 60 Russian spies. If she had an ounce of grace, she might concede that that was a very considerable gesture in the right direction. As for any future elections that might take place, we do not anticipate the outcome of any election.

UK Relations: Saudi Arabia

Emily Thornberry Excerpts

Wednesday 7th March 2018 Commons Chamber

[Alistair Burt]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend, who rightly sets this in context. No one denies that there are difficult aspects to a relationship with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, just as there are with a number of engagements the UK has with countries whose views and human rights issues we do not always share. But the important point he made is about having engagement to seek a common view of a future, one that, as he rightly says, is changing markedly and in a way that no one quite anticipated because of the arrival of the Crown Prince in his position. He could well have an influence on the region for the next 30 years, and our engagement and support for the moderate, modernising image he has for Saudi Arabia is important to all of us.

[Emily Thornberry (Islington South and Finsbury) (Lab)]

Thank you, Mr Speaker, for granting this urgent question. I congratulate the right hon. Member for Twickenham (Sir Vince Cable) on securing it, even if it was ahead of my own application.

Let me make it clear at the outset that the Opposition want to have a good diplomatic and economic relationship with Saudi Arabia. But, as in any good relationship, there must be honesty. Most importantly, we must tell Saudi Arabia that as long as it continues the indiscriminate bombing of residential areas, farms and markets in Yemen, and as long as it continues to restrict the flow of food, medical supplies and fuels to a population suffering mass epidemics of malnutrition and cholera, it should not expect our support for that war and its Crown Prince does not deserve to have the red carpet rolled out for him here in Britain.

Let us look at the man to whom the British Government are bowing and scraping today. He is the architect of the Saudi air strikes and the blockade in Yemen; he is funding jihadi groups in the Syrian civil war and ordered his guards to beat up the Prime Minister of Lebanon. In the eight months since he became Crown Prince, he has doubled the number of executions in Saudi Arabia. But we are supposed to ignore all that because of his proposal that Saudi women be allowed to drive, just as they can everywhere else in the world.

The UK Government pretend to care about human rights and war crimes, but when it comes to Saudi Arabia and Yemen, there is nothing but a shameful silence. We all know that that is because all that they ultimately care about is how to plug the hole in trade and growth that is coming because of their Brexit plans. If the Minister wants to dispute that, will he answer one simple question? When are the Government going to stop bowing down to Saudi Arabia and instead use our role as United Nations penholder on Yemen to demand an immediate ceasefire, an end to the blockade, proper peace talks and a permanent end to this dreadful, shameful war?

[Alistair Burt]

I thank the right hon. Lady for her words. She started well by talking about wanting to welcome a relationship with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Should she actually occupy my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary’s position, she might want to review some of the personal comments that she made after that and wonder how that would constitute a decent start to the relationship that she wants to see.

Let me get to the substance and deal with one or two of the right hon. Lady’s questions. First, there is not indiscriminate bombing of civilians, as has been alleged. It is vital that we make sure that, in dealing with the military aspects of the conflict, which was not started by Saudi Arabia, we are able to see that, in terms of international humanitarian law, there is only the targeting of legitimate military targets. The United Kingdom has been as helpful as possible in trying to make sure that the training for that is appropriate. When there have been allegations of civilian casualties, those cases have been dealt with, monitored and investigated in a manner completely different from that in respect of Houthi activity, which I noticed the right hon. Lady did not seek to condemn in any way at all.

On the humanitarian issues, as I indicated, there is not a blockade or restriction of goods coming in. It is important that commercial food and fuel gets in. It is equally important that those who have had missiles targeted at them after those missiles have been smuggled into Yemen are able to protect themselves. We have worked hard to try to ensure that there is protection for Saudi Arabia from missiles coming in and, in doing so, to give Saudi Arabia the confidence to allow more ships to come in to deal with the humanitarian issues. That seems to me to be a constructive way to deal with both sides of the issues, rather than the straightforward condemnation that we heard from the right hon. Lady.

In respect of the current reforms in Saudi Arabia and those going forward, the right hon. Lady reduces them to de minimis by saying that it is all about women driving. As I indicated to the right hon. Member for Twickenham (Sir Vince Cable), who I have to say asked a rather more serious set of questions, the issue of women’s progress is not simply about driving; it is about a whole series of other reforms. Driving has a totemic importance for many people in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia but should not be taken as the sole thing that is changing.

There has been no silence from the United Kingdom on Yemen. We have been very clear about the fact that there is no military solution, which is why we have been working so hard for a diplomatic solution, why we welcome the newly appointed UN envoy, whom the right hon. Lady did not mention, and why we are doing everything we can to try to make sure that there is a diplomatic base. All our evidence is that ceasefires work when there is some relationship on the ground that makes them plausible and feasible. Because of the activity of the Houthis, those who support them and those who direct weapons at Saudi Arabia, it is not possible for there to be a ceasefire with any sense of purpose or sense that it would actually work. What we must do—[Interruption.]

[Alistair Burt]

Thank you, Mr Speaker.

Let me be straightforward: calling for a ceasefire is not the same as having one. We all want to see an end to the conflict in Yemen, and we have said that very clearly to the Saudi coalition. We support the appointment of the new UN envoy and we are working for a ceasefire, but simply calling for one does not do it. We have to make sure that we have the facts on the ground so that we can make sure that a ceasefire actually works.

[Emily Thornberry]

indicated dissent.

[Alistair Burt]

It is all very well for the right hon. Lady to shake her head, but she is not faced with some of the issues that face Government Ministers on this issue, and nor is she giving full credit to the efforts that are being made to try to bring this matter to an end. She is not the sole holder of conscience in this place as we deal with the difficulties of trying to address the humanitarian crisis in Yemen. That is what we are seeking to do and we will continue to bend all our efforts to that, with or without her support.

Government Policy on Russia

Emily Thornberry Excerpts

Tuesday 6th March 2018 Commons Chamber

[Boris Johnson]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend, who is indeed correct that Russia is engaged in a host of malign activities that stretch from the abuse and murder of journalists to the mysterious assassination of politicians. I am glad that he mentioned Mr Nemtsov, as in December I was privileged to pay tribute to his memory at the site of his murder on a bridge in Moscow.

It is clear that Russia is, I am afraid, in many respects now a malign and disruptive force, and the UK is in the lead across the world in trying to counteract that activity. I must say to the House that that is sometimes difficult, given the strong economic pressures that are exerted by Russia’s hydrocarbons on other European economies, and we sometimes have difficulty in trying to get our points across, but we do get our points across. There has been no wavering on the sanctions regimes that have been imposed by European countries, and nor indeed will there be such wavering as long as the UK has a say in this.

A cross-Government review is an interesting idea that I will take away and consider. As my hon. Friend knows, the National Security Council has repeatedly looked at our relations with Russia, which are among the most difficult that we face in the world. I assure him that we will be looking at it again. We must be very careful in what we say because it is too early to prejudge the investigation, but if the suspicions on both sides of the House about the events in Salisbury prove to be well founded, we may well be forced to look again at our sanctions regime and at other measures that we may seek to put in place.

[Emily Thornberry (Islington South and Finsbury) (Lab)]

Thank you, Mr Speaker, for granting this urgent question. I thank the Chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee, the hon. Member for Tonbridge and Malling (Tom Tugendhat), for securing it.

We are all extremely concerned about the incident in Salisbury yesterday, and I am sure we all hope for the recovery of Mr Skripal and his daughter. I am sure both sides of the House will join me in praising the professionalism and frankly, given the nature of previous poisonings, the bravery of the emergency services that dealt with this incident.

As the Secretary of State says, the incident has disturbing echoes of the assassination of Alexander Litvinenko 12 years ago, and it comes after the exposure last June by BuzzFeed News of the fact that, since 2012, 14 individuals considered hostile to the Putin regime have died in mysterious circumstances on British soil. However, the investigation of this particular incident in Salisbury has only just begun, and I do not believe it is appropriate for us to indulge in speculation while the investigating authorities are still doing their job, so I will not ask the Secretary of State any specific questions about the incident or the Government’s response, although I am sure the time for those questions will come soon.

I have two related questions for the Secretary of State. He talks about working across Europe in relation to sanctions. As we leave the European Union, how will we continue to work with our European allies on sanctions?

Secondly, on the issue of Russian human rights abuses, the Sanctions and Anti-Money Laundering Bill is currently upstairs in Committee where, right now, the Government are resisting an amendment that would enable Britain to sanction individuals who perpetrate gross human rights abuses, such as those who tortured Sergei Magnitsky to death in a Moscow jail in 2009. Can the Secretary of State explain why the Government are taking such a negative stance against our Magnitsky amendment? Surely they should be supporting it.

Thirdly, the Secretary of State will, like me, surely have heard President Putin’s speech and have been disturbed to hear Putin boasting about the proficiency of Russia’s new nuclear weapons systems, all in response to Donald Trump’s planned expansion of America’s nuclear arsenal. Both are driving a coach and horses through the nuclear non-proliferation treaty. What are the Government doing to urge all parties to renew their compliance with that vital international treaty?

[Boris Johnson]

The right hon. Lady is right to place that emphasis on the breaches of the intermediate-range nuclear forces treaty that we are now seeing and on the risk to the nuclear non-proliferation treaty, which is one of the great achievements of the post-war order. The UK is active in New York, and, with our American friends, we are making the case that it is time to bring the Russians firmly to heel. There is no doubt that there is a great deal of anxiety about what is now happening. Fundamentally, it is not in Russia’s interest.

The right hon. Lady makes an interesting point about so-called Magnitsky amendments. Members on both sides of the House are interested in tabling such amendments to the Sanctions and Anti-Money Laundering Bill, which, as she rightly says, is now in Committee. We will look at all such proposals with an open mind. We are very interested in trying to address the issue of those who grossly abuse human rights, which is what everybody wants to achieve. As currently framed, the Bill, a fortiori, tackles such gross abuses because it tackles all those who abuse human rights. I am conscious that the House wishes to go further, and we are happy to look at that.

Syria: De-escalation Zones

Emily Thornberry Excerpts

Monday 26th February 2018 Commons Chamber

[Boris Johnson]

Many people in this country will share my hon. Friend’s sentiments, and many people will believe that the United States of America did exactly the right thing when it responded to the abomination of the attack at Khan Sheikhoun in April with the strike at the Shayrat airfield. If the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons produces incontrovertible evidence of the further use of chemical weapons by the Assad regime or its supporters, I would certainly hope very much that the west will not stand idly by.

[Emily Thornberry (Islington South and Finsbury) (Lab)]

Thank you for granting this urgent question, Mr Speaker, and I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Barrow and Furness (John Woodcock) for securing it.

During the Opposition day debate in the House a month ago, I warned of the Assad regime’s impending criminal assault on eastern Ghouta. Sadly, that is exactly what we have seen in recent weeks. Whatever words we use to describe the assaults, and even if we say, as UNICEF said last week, that there are simply no adequate words, one thing must be made clear: because of the indiscriminate bombing of civilian areas, the targeting of hospitals and medical centres, the use of starvation as a weapon of war, and the alleged use of chemical weapons, the assault is simply a war crime and there must be a reckoning for those responsible.

In the brief time I have, may I ask the Foreign Secretary three questions? First, all hon. Members welcome the UN Security Council statement calling for an immediate ceasefire, but it was clear to anyone reading the text with care that it in fact excluded military action against terrorists. That will allow Assad and his allies to justify continuing their assault against the jihadist armies of Jaysh al-Islam and Tahrir al-Islam inside eastern Ghouta. It will also allow Turkey to justify continuing its assault on Afrin. To stop the assault on eastern Ghouta, therefore, should the UN not instead be clear that there must be a temporary cessation of all military action within Syria, and not the conditional cessation that Assad and his allies are using to justify continuing their assault?

Secondly, I ask the Foreign Secretary what practical discussions there have been at the UN and elsewhere about opening a corridor from eastern Ghouta to Mleiha or Harasta, both to allow access for humanitarian relief and to allow civilian safe passage out of the city.

Finally, while I appreciate that it is the view of some in the House that the suffering of eastern Ghouta can be stopped only by yet more western military intervention, I believe that that would simply prolong and deepen the war. Ultimately, we can end this dreadful conflict and the suffering of all the Syrian people only through genuine peace talks involving all non-jihadi parties and the agreement of a political solution, so may I ask the Foreign Secretary this: what is Britain doing to drive this process forward?

[Boris Johnson]

As I am sure the right hon. Lady will appreciate, United Nations Security Council resolution 2401 was, in fact, a considerable success of diplomacy, given the position that the Russians had previously taken. I think that it represents a strong commitment to a ceasefire on the part of the entire international community. It is now up to the Russians to enforce that ceasefire, and to get their client state to enforce it as well. That is the point that we are making, and the point that we will definitely make to ambassador Yakovenko. As for the issue of humanitarian corridors, I think that all these ideas are extremely good and we certainly support them, but it will take the acquiescence of the Assad regime to achieve what we want.

The right hon. Lady asked about the UK Government. The UK Government have been in the lead in Geneva and the United Nations in driving the process of holding the Assad regime to account through Security Council resolutions, and we continue to do that. We are calling again for the Security Council to meet to discuss the failure to implement resolution 2401 today. As the right hon. Lady knows, the UK Government are part of the Syria Small Group, which is working to counterbalance what has turned out to be a doomed—or perhaps I should say “so far unsuccessful”—Russian venture at Sochi. That is because we think it is our job to bring the international community together. I am not talking about the Astana process or the Sochi process. We should bring the members of the international community together, as one, in Geneva, with a single political process. That is what the job of the UK Government is, and that is where we will continue to direct our efforts.

Oral Answers to Questions

Emily Thornberry Excerpts

Tuesday 20th February 2018 Commons Chamber

[Sir Alan Duncan]

I understand the issue to which my right hon. Friend refers, which is the drilling for oil and gas on the edge of Cyprus. We are assessing what has been reported over the past day or so about what exactly is happening in that area.

[Emily Thornberry (Islington South and Finsbury) (Lab)]

We on this side of the House unequivocally condemn Turkey for its disgraceful assault on Afrin. We are especially appalled that it has enlisted in its army the very jihadist militias that the Kurdish forces have worked so hard to drive out of northern Syria. If the Foreign Secretary is unable to join me today in condemning Turkey, will the Minister of State at least explain why he believes that “Turkey’s legitimate interest in the security of its borders” gives it the right to brutally attack the innocent Kurdish community in Afrin?

[Sir Alan Duncan]

I do not think it is exactly as the right hon. Lady says. We need to recognise Turkey’s legitimate interests. Of course we condemn any kind of attacks on civilians and we wish to see a de-escalation of that, but the legitimate rights of Turkey should be recognised.

[Emily Thornberry]

The truth is that the Turkish assault is part of a broader pattern, where too many foreign parties engaged in the Syrian civil war are now acting just like the Assad regime itself—without any regard for international law. When the Government obtained a military mandate for joining the coalition action in Syria, David Cameron guaranteed in this House that it was “exclusively” to combat the threat from Daesh. Given that that threat is now almost totally gone, will the Minister of State please spell out the coalition’s current military objectives in Syria? When will he seek a mandate for them from this House?

[Sir Alan Duncan]

I find the right hon. Lady’s analysis extremely bizarre, particularly as the YPG has been reported as wishing to ally itself with the Assad regime in order to fight back against Turkey’s activity.

--- Later in debate ---

[Emily Thornberry (Islington South and Finsbury) (Lab)]

It has been pointed out that the Foreign Secretary’s Brexit speech last week was 5,000 words long, but it did not once include the words “Northern” or “Ireland”. That is perhaps the biggest problem that the Government need to tackle, yet the Foreign Secretary did not even mention it. Will he belatedly take the opportunity to explain in simple terms how it is possible for the UK to diverge from the EU in regulations, tariffs and other aspects of trade while retaining the current arrangements on the Irish land border? Will he enlighten us? What is the plan?

[Boris Johnson]

As the right hon. Lady knows very well, there is no reason whatsoever why we should not be able to exit the customs union and the single market while maintaining frictionless trade not only north-south in Northern Ireland, but with the rest of continental Europe. That is exactly what the Government will spell out in the course of the coming negotiations.

Taliban and IS/Daesh Attacks: Afghanistan

Emily Thornberry Excerpts

Monday 29th January 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mark Field]

My right hon. Friend has a particular knowledge of not only Afghanistan but Syria, Iraq and elsewhere, and he recognises the interlinked network of criminality and terrorism that is involved. There is no doubt—I very much agree with him—that security remains an ongoing challenge in Afghanistan. The ungoverned space for terrorist groups remains persistent. The Taliban, I fear, remain capable of attack across the country, and in Helmand province they remain the single biggest challenge for the security forces.

My right hon. Friend touches on the issue of democracy. We are very keen to see both presidential and parliamentary elections take place over the next 18 months or so in Afghanistan. It is important we have a Government in Afghanistan that is legitimate and widely regarded as such. However, those elections and that progress must be Afghan-led, and we very much hope to see progress towards democracy continuing. As I said, there will be yet another peace conference in Kabul on this issue, which will bring neighbours from the region together. I very much hope we will see steps forward that will take some attention away from the rather woeful headlines of recent days.

[Emily Thornberry (Islington South and Finsbury) (Lab)]

Thank you, Mr Speaker, for granting this urgent question. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff South and Penarth (Stephen Doughty) for securing it.

Saturday’s attack on Kabul’s Chicken Street area was one of horrific savagery and soullessness. To use an ambulance as a weapon of terror against innocent civilians shows—not for the first time—that there are no depths of depravity and evil to which the jihadis will not sink. It is part of a calculated strategy to show that even the best-guarded areas of the country are not safe and to worsen the political instability already gripping Kabul.

In the space of the last week, we have seen similar deadly attacks on the Intercontinental Hotel in Kabul, the Save the Children office in Jalalabad and the Marshal Fahim military academy, otherwise known as “Sandhurst in the sand”. At least 142 innocent people have been killed in total and hundreds more injured. We send our deepest sympathies to all those victims and their families, and we send our solidarity to all the people of Afghanistan.

Let me ask the Minister three questions. First, what are the Government doing to urge President Ghani to reach a settlement with his political opponents, so that all the country’s democratic forces can present a united front and stable defences against those who want to destroy this fledgling democracy? Secondly, amid reports that humanitarian agencies are having to review their presence in the country, given the increased threat to their staff, what are the Government doing to support the British aid agencies working in Afghanistan, particularly in improving their security?

Finally, the Minister knows the concern felt all across this House about the Afghan interpreters who have worked with our forces and who face a constant threat from the jihadis. Last month, the Government said that not a single interpreter had been relocated to Britain under the so-called intimidation scheme, and they also said that

“the changing security position…is kept under careful review.”—[Official Report, 12 December 2017; Vol. 633, c. 11WS.]

Given the rapid deterioration of the security position since then, will the Minister advise us what plans he has to bring more of our former interpreters to safety here in Britain?

[Mark Field]

I thank the right hon. Lady for her thoughtful comments. We obviously very much hope that next month’s Kabul peace process will be part of bringing all sides together, with democracy in mind, in Afghanistan. Having met President Ghani, I have to say that I have been impressed by his resilience in the face of great difficulties. As the right hon. Lady will know, with a national unity Government, there are inevitably ups and downs. Broadly speaking, however, things have held together, and that is to the great credit not just of Ghani, but of all the people who have been playing their part and recognising the importance of this process.

The UK Government remain very committed to a diplomatic presence in Kabul, to support the Afghan Government in their efforts to secure peace and stability. The support the UK provides to the Afghan Government, along with our NATO allies and partners, in improving security, development and governance is in my view crucial to ensuring stability and reducing the terrorist threat to the UK.

If I may, I would like to pay—I am sure the right hon. Lady would join me in paying—the warmest possible tribute to all our courageous staff on the ground in Kabul. As I said, I was there in October, and I realised the great difficulties and the very challenging conditions under which they work. It is very dangerous not just to leave the green zone, but even to live within it. The esprit de corps of our embassy in Kabul—this applies to other high-profile places such as Mogadishu—is something of which all of us here can be incredibly proud.

On the issue of the interpreters, the right hon. Lady will appreciate that I cannot comment on the individual cases that have made it into the press, but I am very happy to say a few words. Our local staff policies were developed having regard to the then Afghan Government’s concern to retain their brightest and best citizens to help build a more stable and secure Afghanistan. Afghan local staff who are eligible for the ex gratia scheme but not for relocation are entitled to appeal such a decision, and MOD staff will assist individuals where the Department holds the relevant evidence. If the right hon. Lady or other Members have specific cases that they would like to bring to my attention, my door remains open and I am very happy to take up such cases.

Rightly, this country takes very seriously the cases of those who are putting themselves at grave risk—as grave as, if not more grave than, the risk to our embassy staff abroad—and they should be properly protected. I would obviously be very disturbed to hear if that were not the case. The right hon. Lady will recognise that there is a procedure and a protocol that needs to be gone through on such matters, but if there are specific issues to be raised, I hope she will do so.

Refugees and Human Rights

Emily Thornberry Excerpts

Wednesday 24th January 2018 Commons Chamber

[Emily Thornberry (Islington South and Finsbury) (Lab)]

I beg to move,

That this House believes that conflict resolution, climate change and the protection of human rights should be at the heart of UK foreign policy and that effective action should be taken to alleviate the refugee crisis and calls on the Government to lead international efforts through the United Nations and other international organisations to ensure that human rights are protected and upheld around the world.

We always welcome the wisdom of the Minister of State, Department for International Development, the right hon. Member for North East Bedfordshire (Alistair Burt) on these issues, but it is a great shame that although the Foreign Secretary has had time over the past week to act as Chancellor, as Health Secretary, and even as underwater construction engineer, he is not able to do his day job today. We hope that wherever he is heading on his travels, he is accorded rather more of a hearing than the Cabinet gave him yesterday.

The motion might be familiar to some, as it mirrors the words Labour used in our manifesto last June, in which we set out how we would tackle the causes of the refugee crisis—because some of us believe in our election promises. There is one more difference between our manifesto and the Government’s. No, it is not that ours was costed, nor that it was popular: it is that not a single one of the 25 countries that I will talk about in this speech was mentioned even once in the international section of the Tory manifesto last June—with, of course, one glaring exception: the United States.

We may differ in our attitudes towards the American leadership, but I am sure that Conservative Members would agree with me on some of the great figures of America’s past. It is fitting that this debate takes place 25 years to the day since we lost Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall, who, over six decades, helped to dismantle legal discrimination in America and to put human rights at the heart of its jurisprudence. It is worth remembering that his legendary legal career almost never began. As a young man, he only persuaded his grandmother to let him study law on the condition that he also learned to cook. She thought that that was a better guarantee of long-term employment. I wish someone had given me that advice—not that I would have changed my career, but I would at least be able to cook a proper roast dinner, like my nan could.

Among the many other great pieces of advice that Thurgood Marshall left the world are these words, which stand at the core of this debate:

“The measure of a country’s greatness is its ability to retain compassion in times of crisis.”

That measure is similar to the Leader of the Opposition’s when he said in Geneva last month that the refugee crisis is one of

“the biggest moral tests of our time”.

Let us be clear: as a country, our greatness is currently being tested, but not all will agree with Justice Marshall or the Leader of the Opposition about the right answer. There will be those who say that amid grave economic uncertainty and domestic pressures, we need to focus on our own finances and public services, not on showing compassion to those in need elsewhere; there will be those who say that if we need global alliances to help to preserve trade and investment, that must come ahead of other considerations, including human rights; and there will be those who say that we have enough on our plate trying to manage Brexit, and that the rest of the world’s problems can be left to the rest of the world. But they could not be more wrong.

Our global leadership is needed now more than ever, not least because the five challenges that currently leave 65 million people in our world internally displaced or as refugees are getting only worse. Those challenges are: first, the state-led violence faced by minority groups in places such as Myanmar; secondly, the seemingly intractable wars in Yemen, Syria and elsewhere; thirdly, the cycles of division and violence in which Israel, Palestine and others are trapped; fourthly, the political instability that faces post-conflict countries such as Lebanon; and fifthly, the ever more stark realities of climate change.

Those five challenges may vary, but they all lead to one crisis: millions of vulnerable civilians, many of them children, left in desperate humanitarian need, either trapped, praying that relief and protection will come to them, or fleeing in the hope that they will find it elsewhere. Make no mistake: in the coming years those challenges will test the limit of our resources, the depths of our compassion, the strength of our global leadership and, ultimately, the greatness of our country.

[Tony Lloyd (Rochdale) (Lab)]

My right hon. Friend is making an excellent speech. Does she agree that one of the really big tests relates to our international agencies, particularly the United Nations, and the political paralysis that results from the lack of commitment from Russia, China and the United States? We have to get that commitment back. If we are going to lead, Britain has to make the United Nations central to the solution to the problems my right hon. Friend is outlining.

[Emily Thornberry]

I agree entirely with my hon. Friend. I will develop those arguments later and look forward to listening to his speech, if he gets an opportunity to be heard.

[Gareth Thomas (Harrow West) (Lab/Co-op)]

Further to the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Rochdale (Tony Lloyd), will my right hon. Friend take this opportunity to praise the work of the International Organization for Migration, a key UN agency leading the effort to provide solutions to the refugee crisis? Will she also take this opportunity to urge the Government, and particularly the Department for International Development, to increase funding for that key UN agency?

[Emily Thornberry]

Particularly given its current role in Bangladesh, because of the distress of the Rohingya refugees, it is clearly important to put renewed focus on that organisation. It is also unfortunate that the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees is not given a greater role in Bangladesh.

In my speech, I shall talk about each of those five challenges and the countries they affect—countries where the humanitarian crisis is clear and the need for global leadership is clear, but where, at present, the Government’s response is anything but.

[Sir Desmond Swayne (New Forest West) (Con)]

I have not heard much in what the right hon. Lady has said with which I disagree. The difficulty as I see it is how we use the UN when Russia and China block any attempt to move forward. Of course, Russia and China are also known for using international aid as, effectively, a loss-leader for their exports, rather than in the way we use it.

[Emily Thornberry]

The right hon. Gentleman advises the House simply to give up. We do not give up. We must work in a multilateral way, within the United Nations, and fight our corner. We should be a force for good. We should not allow the difficulties that we face make us say that it is all too hard and that we should simply walk away.

Let me make some progress. There no shortage of state persecution in our world, whether it is done by states such as Russia and Iran, which the Government rightly criticise, or those such as Egypt, Saudi Arabia and the Philippines, whose abuses they choose to ignore. As we saw in Darfur exactly 15 years ago, when the state turns an entire group of people—even the children and the elderly—into military targets, it leaves families with an impossible choice: they must risk their lives by staying put, or risk their lives by fleeing. That is exactly what we have seen in Myanmar.

No one present needs any reminding of the horrors and hardship that the Rohingya have faced ever since the attacks in August. No one needs any telling of the desperate humanitarian situation in the camps on the Bangladesh border. No one needs any warning of the dangers of the proposed repatriation of the Rohingya. What we need to know is what action our Government are actually taking—not just to alleviate the situation, but to resolve it.

[Dr David Drew (Stroud) (Lab/Co-op)]

My right hon. Friend will, like me, be disappointed to hear that the situation in Darfur is worse today than it was 15 years ago. There is more conflict there but, because of other conflicts in the world, it has sadly gone off the front pages. Will she do what she can to help the bedevilled people of Sudan and South Sudan, who have known nothing but conflict for the past 40 years?

[Emily Thornberry]

My hon. Friend, having visited the region himself, is a great expert in that area. He echoes many of the things that the shadow Minister for Africa, my hon. Friend the Member for Heywood and Middleton (Liz McInnes), has been telling us. My hon. Friend the Member for Edmonton (Kate Osamor) will sum up the debate, focusing particularly on the humanitarian situation in Africa.

We know that Myanmar simply will not act without external pressure—not on consent for repatriation, and not on the guarantees the Rohingya need regarding their future security, citizenship and economic viability. Will the Minister, finally, use our role as the UN penholder on this issue to submit a Security Council resolution to ensure legally binding guarantees on and international monitoring of all these issues? Until we get those guarantees, will he urge India and Japan to withdraw their offer to fund the planned repatriation?

As we work for the future protection of the Rohingya, we cannot forget those who have already suffered and died, so let me ask the Minister this as well: is it still the case that only two of the Government’s 70 experts on international sexual violence have so far been deployed in the region, despite the vast scale of crimes that have occurred? Will he make it clear that Myanmar must allow the UN special rapporteur on human rights to carry out her investigation unobstructed, or Myanmar risks once more being a pariah state and being pushed out into the cold?

The second challenge is about the countries locked in intractable conflicts, leaving millions of innocent civilians internally displaced or as refugees. I turn to Yemen. More than 5,000 children have now been killed or injured since the war began—five children every single day. Hundreds of children are now suffering with malnutrition, cholera and diphtheria. I learned only recently what diphtheria really meant. For me, it was just about my children being injected when they were young. Diphtheria is called the strangling disease: it strangles babies. It is now stalking Yemen, and 2 million children are now receiving no schooling at all.

UNICEF usually says that such and such percentage of children require support, but last week it was clear that almost every single child in Yemen now needs humanitarian aid. Resolving this situation could not be more urgent. In that context, I do not know whether the Minister was present for the Foreign Secretary’s recent Cabinet presentation on the Yemen conflict, but, according to The Mail on Sunday, his opening line was, “We have got to do something about the Saudi war on Yemen”. Well, that is what we have been telling the Government for two years now, so thank goodness they are finally listening, even if they do so only in private.

I hope that the Minister will admit another private truth today. He says that there is no military solution in Yemen—the UN says it and even Rex Tillerson says it—but the truth is that that is not what the Saudis believe. Just a few weeks ago, exiled President Hadi said that the current Saudi military offensive would

“put an end to the Houthi coup”

and that, as a result, there was no purpose in peace talks. In other words, the war will continue until the Saudis secure victory, no matter how long it takes and no matter what the cost. That is unacceptable. If the Government genuinely want to do something to end the Saudi war, I suggest that, as with Myanmar, they take the following steps: pull their finger out, get their pen out and do their job. They should do the job that they have been given by the United Nations and submit a resolution demanding an immediate ceasefire and the resumption of peace talks. Will the Government follow the lead of Germany and Norway and suspend arms sales for use in this conflict pending the result of a full independent investigation of alleged war crimes?

In Syria, the humanitarian situation is equally dire. The need for peace is just as great, and we face the same impasse in moving towards a political solution. From Astana to Sochi, and from Geneva to Vienna, we have rival peace processes with no agreed set of participants and no agreed set of goals or acceptable outcomes. As long as that impasse continues, the only incentive on all sides is to maximise territorial gains whatever the costs.

We see that Assad’s typically criminal assault on Idlib and eastern Ghouta is already triggering a fresh wave of displaced civilians. What we also see is the US plan for an open-ended military presence to stabilise so-called liberated areas near the Turkish border alongside a new 30,000 strong Kurdish army, which was idiotically named by the Americans as the Syrian border force. Therefore, while we condemn Turkey’s response in invading the border area and assaulting the Afrin enclave, we must ask the US how it thought Turkey was likely to respond. It is a hugely dangerous development, and it takes me back to what I said at this Dispatch Box some 15 months ago, which is that a long-term political solution in Syria must be predicated on the de-escalation of overseas forces, not a move to their permanent presence.

I have these questions for the Minister. First, what steps is he taking to resolve the impasse over peace talks? In particular, is he determined now automatically to reject any positive outcome from next week’s congress in Sochi? Secondly, can he tell us whether there are any UK personnel—military or otherwise—involved either in training the new Kurdish border force or in America’s proposed “stabilisation activities” in Northern Syria? Finally, as the violence escalates in Idlib and Rojava, what preparations are the Government making for a fresh wave of Syrian refugees fleeing towards Turkey and the Aegean sea?

The third challenge concerns countries caught in a cycle of entrenched division and sporadic violence, leaving millions of civilians trapped in poverty and deprivation. My hon. Friend the shadow International Development Secretary will talk later about the grave situations in Somalia and South Sudan.

Let me focus in particular on the millions of Palestinian refugees spread across Gaza, the west bank, Jordan, Lebanon and Syria. For almost 70 years, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency has supported those refugees and their descendants. UNRWA’s budget last year was $760 million. We could fund its work for the next 220 years with the cost of just one “Boris bridge” across the channel, and it would be a far better use of the money.

Thanks to UNRWA, 500,000 Palestinian children receive schooling every day and millions more receive healthcare. Last week, Donald Trump cut their funding by $65 million. I am reluctant to quote his Tweet, but he said:

“we pay the Palestinians…MILLIONS…and get no appreciation or respect.”

Young children will be denied education and medicine all because poor Donald Trump does not think that he gets enough “appreciation or respect”. How utterly pathetic!

[Richard Burden (Birmingham, Northfield) (Lab)]

I completely endorse my right hon. Friend’s point. It is simply not acceptable for the United States President to give vent to his petulance by attacking the vital services that 5 million Palestinian refugees need. Does she also agree that we need to step up to the plate now and to bring forward or to increase the UK’s contribution to UNRWA, to buy some short-term respite for the organisation? There should also be an international conference to ensure that there is a long-term solution and long-term funding for that organisation.

--- Later in debate ---

[Emily Thornberry]

My hon. Friend is a mind reader: that is exactly what I was about to suggest.

The concern is that this money could trigger a domino effect. Given that most of UNRWA’s costs are local staff salaries, cuts would mean severance payments and severance payments would mean further cuts, and the vicious cycle goes on. UNRWA could face a Catch-22 situation in which it cannot afford to maintain its services, but risks bankruptcy if it cuts them, which would be a devastating scenario for Palestinian families. It is a humanitarian crisis in the making—we know that—entirely caused by the egomania of the American President.

Although we would all welcome today a commitment of extra money from the UK—I hope that that is what we will hear—we know that short-term fixes by individual countries will not ultimately solve the problem. What we need, as my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Northfield (Richard Burden) has said, is a long-term and multilateral solution to this shortfall. May I urge the Government today to lead that international effort and consider initiating a special funding conference, such as that held for humanitarian emergencies—the difference in this case being that we must not wait for that emergency to strike before acting? If it is not to be us, who will do it?

The fourth challenge concerns those countries trying to recover from major conflict whose stability and peace must be nurtured, lest they again collapse. We think of Afghanistan, Iraq and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. More recently, we think of Libya, about which the shadow International Development Secretary will again speak later.

I want to focus today on Lebanon, which, for decades, has lurched from devastating conflict to chronic instability. Its peace must be preserved as it becomes the latest battleground for regional control between Iran and Saudi Arabia. In November, Lebanese Prime Minister Hariri was invited to take a camping trip in Saudi Arabia with Crown Prince Salman. When he arrived, he was roughed up by Saudi guards and forced to read a televised statement announcing his resignation. He had to beg for a suit so that he did not resign in a T-shirt and jeans. If Riyadh’s plan was to provoke instability and civil conflict inside Lebanon, that certainly backfired, because instead it triggered a wave of support for Hariri that allowed him to return and withdraw his resignation.

But if that was a bullet dodged, we must still ask, “Why was it fired?”, because Lebanon cannot afford another war that would risk dragging in Israel, along with Iran, and create a fresh humanitarian crisis in a country that is already cracking under the weight of 1.5 million refugees from the war in Syria and hundreds of thousands more from Palestine. Does the Minister know what on earth Crown Prince Salman was playing at in November? Will he urge the Saudis not to do anything more, whether political interference or financial penalties, that weakens or destabilises Lebanon further? Will he also urge Israel to recognise that any short-term urge it has to damage Hezbollah must be outweighed by the long-term damage that another regional war would do?

The fifth and final challenge concerns countries affected by climate change. Of course that means all of us, but the sad truth is that some of the poorest countries that have contributed the least to global carbon emissions will be those hardest hit by the changes that we have created. Their physical infrastructure is the least well prepared to cope with flooding, droughts and other extreme weather events, because their economies are the least well adapted to cope with long-term changes such as erosion or pollution of farmland. One example is the Mekong delta in Vietnam, which is the traditional home of the country’s agriculture and is now plagued by rising sea levels and incursion of saltwater. Livelihoods that have lasted centuries are being wiped out. Over the past 10 years, a net 1 million people have left the delta—twice the national average of migration from rural areas.

That is climate change in action, and a pattern that is being repeated across the world. If we cannot reverse these trends, regions that are currently just in trouble will in due course become uninhabitable. The carbon targets we meet in this country will matter nothing in the grand scheme of things unless we show global leadership in helping the rest of the world, including the United States of America, to face up to the challenge of climate change. Will the Minister tell us, first, where in the Government’s list of overseas funding priorities is helping poorer countries adapt to climate change? Secondly, when Rex Tillerson visited London on Monday, was any effort make to persuade the United States to recommit to the Paris agreement, or was that considered simply a waste of time? Sadly, I think that we know the answer to the second question, because we are stuck with a President who does not give a fig about the problems and the future that the world is facing.

I spoke at the outset about the Thurgood Marshall anniversary, which allows us to celebrate the life of a great human rights hero.

[Lady Hermon (North Down) (Ind)]

May I ask the right hon. Lady to put on the record a tribute to the BBC journalists and other reporters around the world who highlight to us, with great sensitivity and great honesty, the appalling conflicts, the famines, the plight of refugees, and the cruelty experienced by Christians and other minorities? Will she also pay tribute to those journalists who have given their lives in reporting these issues around the world, and perhaps urge the Minister to do something at the UN to protect them?

[Emily Thornberry]

The hon. Lady is quite right. Unfortunately, far too many journalists around the world are killed for reporting abuses of human rights. I join her in paying tribute to them.

I was talking about Thurgood Marshall’s anniversary, which gives us an opportunity to celebrate the life of this great human rights hero. In three days’ time, we are going to mark another anniversary. Unfortunately, there is no such cause for celebration, but it is central to our discussion. On Saturday, it will be a year since our Prime Minister held hands with Donald Trump just hours before he signed the executive order banning Muslim refugees from America. That was an act devoid of compassion by a President incapable of shame, and the start of a long and painful year of similar acts on the global stage.

We have now reached the stage where Donald Trump can describe the countries of the continent of Africa, including 19 of our Commonwealth cousins, as “shitholes”—and there is not a peep of protest from our Government. Instead, they continue to insist that Her Majesty the Queen, the head of the Commonwealth, must welcome him into her home. Perhaps next time the Foreign Secretary talks about “supine invertebrate jellies” he should take a good look at himself in the mirror.

However, Donald Trump’s behaviour has had one important consequence that goes to the heart of the motion. Last week, a Gallup poll revealed that in the past year global approval of American leadership had fallen to 18%, the lowest in the history of the survey. That leaves a massive void waiting to be filled by a country—so what about us? What about a country such as ours? Are we prepared to take the lead internationally on conflict resolution, climate change, human rights and the refugee crisis? Are we are prepared not just to wring our hands about the suffering of the Rohingya, the Yemeni people and the Palestinian refugees, but to do something—to take a global lead—to end that suffering? Are we prepared to stand up to Donald Trump and tell him clearly that he is not just wrong on UN funding cuts, climate change and refugees, but simply unfit to govern? That is the action we need to take, that is the policy the Labour party stands on and that is the message that this motion sends. I commend it to the House.

--- Later in debate ---

[Alistair Burt]

I assure the hon. Lady that that is indeed the case, and we have discussed it with MPs from the area as well. It is absolutely not a matter to be forgotten. The Foreign Secretary and I have already met colleagues to discuss it. It was part of the conversations I had with the Libyan Government when I was previously in office, and there is still the opportunity to discuss it further. We can try to get to an agreement to find some accommodation that recognises the part played by the Gaddafi regime in the violence, but also to find a solution that brings people together, because both the Libyan people and the people of the United Kingdom, including Northern Ireland, suffered grievously from the attacks. Something that binds people together as a result might be the most effective answer. It is very much still on all our minds.

I will say a little on the issue of children, which the right hon. Member for Islington South and Finsbury did not focus on but I want to raise it. [Interruption.] Okay, a little bit more—the right hon. Lady cannot cover everything and that was not a criticism.

[Emily Thornberry]

Aren’t children in Yemen dependent on aid?

[Alistair Burt]

Yes. I never had the right hon. Lady down as being thin-skinned. I do not want to get into that too much.

The UK has contributed significantly to hosting, supporting and protecting vulnerable children. We are the largest contributor to the Education Cannot Wait initiative, the first global movement and fund dedicated to education in emergencies. That builds on our extensive work in the Syria region through the No Lost Generation initiative.

In the year ending September 2017, the UK granted asylum or another form of leave to almost 9,000 children—in that year alone—and has done so for more than 49,000 children since 2010. We have committed to transferring 480 unaccompanied children to the UK from France, Greece and Italy under section 67 of the Immigration Act 2016, and last week the Home Secretary announced an amendment to the eligibility date to ensure that the most vulnerable unaccompanied children can be transferred to the UK.

We will resettle 3,000 vulnerable refugee children and their families from the middle east and north Africa by 2020. That is in addition to the commitment to resettle 20,000 refugees under the vulnerable persons resettlement scheme. So far, we have welcomed more than 9,300 people through the scheme, half of whom are children.

Oral Answers to Questions

Emily Thornberry Excerpts

Tuesday 9th January 2018 Commons Chamber

[Rory Stewart]

The Foreign Secretary certainly raised the question of human rights and freedom of religion with his Iranian counterparts on his visit.

[Emily Thornberry (Islington South and Finsbury) (Lab)]

Mr Speaker, happy new year. I welcome the Foreign Secretary back to his place and I hope that the Prime Minister today recognises how important it is that he continues to have the support of a talented Front-Bench team in ensuring that his work is done properly.

On boxing day, the Saudis launched two separate airstrikes in Yemen, killing a total of 68 civilians and at least eight children. The UN’s humanitarian co-ordinator said that this showed that both the Saudis and the Houthis are committing indiscriminate attacks against civilians, showing a complete disregard for human life. My question is this: do the Foreign Secretary and the Minister agree with that judgment against both sides?

[Rory Stewart]

As the shadow Foreign Secretary is aware, we continue to press very strongly in all our meetings with the Saudis on these issues. We have made some progress on the port of Hodeidah, although it is too early to be complacent; it remains a very difficult situation, and we need to continue pushing. And happy new year to the right hon. Lady too.

[Emily Thornberry]

I thank the Minister for that answer, but surely airstrikes by the Saudis, who are our allies, that are this indiscriminate are just as indefensible as attacks by the Houthis. He has mentioned the Houthis. More widely, how are we going to end the conflict? We have a proposal from the former Minister for the Middle East, the right hon. Member for Bournemouth East (Mr Ellwood), currently a Defence Minister, who wrote in The Sunday Telegraph this weekend urging a more interventionist UK role. He wrote:

“We must be less risk-averse, haunted…by our experiences in Iraq and Afghanistan”.

He specifically recommends that the port of Hodeidah

“is calling out to be stabilised by a third party”.

Does the Minister agree with his colleague’s proposal, and if so, who does he propose that third party should be?

[Rory Stewart]

At the moment, we do not believe that the key to reopening the port of Hodeidah will be a third party. We have made a lot of progress. In particular, I pay tribute to the Secretary of State for International Development, who, in a recent visit to Djibouti, while working on the issue of Yemen, got undertakings on the port of Hodeidah. We will be watching this very closely over the next 30 days. We absolutely agree that the airstrikes must be investigated, and investigated objectively.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mark Field]

Very little can be done without international co-operation. As the hon. Lady will know, Lord Darzi is part of the committee that is trying to oversee the situation, and the committee will have meetings in Nai Pyi Taw within the next week to consider what practical steps can be taken to try to ease the path. However, as the hon. Member for East Dunbartonshire (Jo Swinson) pointed out, these are massive international problems. We have tried to do as much as we can through the United Nations, but—

[Emily Thornberry]

Reintroduce sanctions.

[Mark Field]

I think that all of us, with the benefit of hindsight, could rightly say that the sanctions were lifted too early, with the hope—and only the hope—of democracy there. As I have said, we would need to get a resolution through the United Nations, and it would almost certainly be vetoed. [Interruption.] Of course we are trying: in New York we are constantly having conversations with our Chinese and Russian counterparts about precisely these matters.

--- Later in debate ---

[Boris Johnson]

In addition to looking harder at the visa applications, we are looking harder at the engagement of the Muslim Brotherhood and its associates in charities in this country. I would be happy, pursuant to the answer I gave just a moment ago, to supply further details to the hon. Gentleman of what we are doing in respect of Muslim Brotherhood visas.

[Emily Thornberry (Islington South and Finsbury) (Lab)]

On a point of order, Mr Speaker.

[Mr Speaker]

If it appertains to the exchanges, we will hear it. I think I heard the right hon. Lady erupt a moment ago—that would be a fair characterisation. If she wishes to erupt on her feet rather than from her seat, that would be good. The Foreign Secretary might think it courteous to stay—he is not obliged to do so, but he is a courteous chap.

[Emily Thornberry]

On a point of order, Mr Speaker. Rather than erupting, is it in order for me to say to correct the record that I have never thought it was a good idea to invite the President of the United States to the United Kingdom? I thought the invitation was issued with undue haste. Once it has been issued on behalf of Her Majesty, it is very difficult to withdraw it.

[Mr Speaker]

The Foreign Secretary is beetling to the Box. If he wishes to stand up at the Box to offer us a product of his lucubrations, we will be happy to hear it.

Oman, UAE and Iran

Emily Thornberry Excerpts

Monday 11th December 2017 Commons Chamber

[Emily Thornberry (Islington South and Finsbury) (Lab)]

I thank the Foreign Secretary for giving me advance sight of his statement. I also thank him for the obvious efforts that he has put in over recent days on these issues, which are of such great concern to this House and beyond.

Let us start, as we must, with the case of Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe. I have no wish to go over old ground concerning the Foreign Secretary’s remarks to the Foreign Affairs Committee. It is right that he has finally apologised for those remarks and admitted that he was wrong. It is also right that he has finally met Richard Ratcliffe, and that he has spent the weekend in the region attempting to atone for his mistake and get Nazanin released. We welcome the tentative progress that the Foreign Secretary has made in that regard. As Richard Ratcliffe himself put it,

“it doesn’t change the fundamentals but it makes the change in the fundamentals more likely.”

I appreciate that the Foreign Secretary cannot give a running commentary, but I should like to ask him two specific questions on this issue. First, did he seek meetings during his visit with representatives of the revolutionary courts, the Interior Ministry or the Ministry of Justice? In other words, did he seek to meet those who, in Richard Ratcliffe’s words, have the power to “change the fundamentals” in Nazanin’s case? Indeed, did he seek a meeting with Nazanin herself while he was there? Secondly, in the Foreign Secretary’s meetings with President Rouhani and others, did he make it perfectly clear to them personally that his comments to the Foreign Affairs Committee, which were widely publicised in the Iranian state media, had been mistaken?

Turning to the Iran nuclear deal, we welcome the fact that the Foreign Secretary raised this issue, and he spoke for all of us in reassuring Iran that whatever other bilateral differences we may face, Britain will continue to honour our part in the nuclear deal as long as Iran continues to do the same. But of course, that is not where the real problem lies. As with so much else, the real problem lies in the White House. Can the Foreign Secretary tell us what the plan is now? What is the plan in relation to persuading President Trump to see sense and stop his senseless assault on the Iran deal? What is the plan to get President Trump back on board? Or is this yet another area in which the Government are forced to concede that they have no influence to wield?

Turning to Yemen, we welcome the fact that, as well as visiting Tehran, the Foreign Secretary visited Abu Dhabi and Oman and raised the issue of Yemen there as well. While we welcome the talks, we are bound yet again to ask the question: what is the plan now? What is the plan to get the blockades fully lifted and enable full access for humanitarian relief? What is the plan to secure a ceasefire agreement and make progress towards long-term political solutions? And where is the plan for a new United Nations Security Council resolution, 14 months since the UK first circulated its draft?

Last week, the UN Security Council cancelled its scheduled open meeting on Yemen, and instead held one in private. Britain’s representative, Jonathan Allen, said that a closed doors session was needed so that

“Council members could have a frank conversation”.

We appreciate that the best progress is often made behind closed doors, but the people of Yemen have been waiting for two years for any kind of progress and for any sort of hope of an end to the war and to their suffering. Instead, things just get worse and worse. Does the Foreign Secretary accept that people are tired of hearing that progress is being made behind the scenes, when things are getting ever worse on the ground? In the wake of his talks this weekend, in the wake of his meetings with the Quint, and in the wake of last week’s closed Security Council session, will he now spell out what the plan is for peace?

I am sure that many other regional security issues were discussed on the Foreign Secretary’s trip, from the tensions with Saudi Arabia to President Trump’s declaration on Jerusalem, but may I ask specifically what conclusions he reached from his discussions on the prospects for a political solution to end the fighting in Syria? Is Iran ready to accept, as an outcome of the Astana process, that it will withdraw its forces from Syria, and will Hezbollah and the Shi’a militias do likewise, provided that President Assad is left in place, that all coalition forces are withdrawn, and that Syria is given international assistance with its reconstruction? If that is the case, will the UK Government accept that deal, despite the Foreign Secretary’s repeated assertion that President Assad has no place in the future government of Syria? If they will not accept that deal, will the Foreign Secretary tell us when it comes to the future of Syria, as on everything else that we have discussed today, what is his plan now?

[Boris Johnson]

I am grateful to the right hon. Lady for the spirit in which she poses her questions. I can tell her that in Tehran I met Vice-President Salehi, the head of the Supreme National Security Council Ali Shamkhani, the Speaker of the Majlis Ali Larijani and Foreign Minister Javad Zarif and had long discussions with President Rouhani. In each of those conversations, I repeated the case for release on humanitarian grounds, where that is appropriate, of the difficult consular cases that we have in Iran, and that message was certainly received and understood. However, as I said to the House, it is too early to be confident about the outcome.

The right hon. Lady asked about the plan in Yemen, and she will understand that the plan certainly was until last Saturday that Ali Abdullah Saleh would be divided from the Houthis, which seemed to be the best avenue for progress. Indeed, Ali Abdullah Saleh was divided from the Houthis, but he then paid the ultimate price for his decision to go over to the coalition. We are left with a difficult and tense situation, and what we need to do now, the plan on which everybody is agreed, is to get Hodeidah open, first to humanitarian relief, to which the Saudis have agreed, but also to commercial traffic, too.

I heard the right hon. Lady’s question about the use of the UN Security Council. Resolution 2216 is still operative, but as penholders in the UN we keep the option of a new Security Council resolution under continuous review. It is vital that all parties understand, as I think they genuinely do in Riyadh, in Abu Dhabi and across the region, that there is no military solution to the disaster in Yemen. There is no way that any side can win this war. What we need now is a new constitution and a new political process, and that is the plan that the UK is in the lead in promoting. As I said to the right hon. Lady, we had meetings of the Quad last week, again last night in Abu Dhabi, and we will have a further meeting in early January.

As for the UK’s role in Syria, the right hon. Lady asked about the Astana process and whether it would be acceptable. Our view is that if there is to be a lasting peace in Syria that commands the support of all the people of that country, it is vital that we get the talks back to Geneva. I believe that that is the Labour party’s position. Indeed, I believe it was also the Labour party’s position that there could be no long-term future for Syria with President Assad. If that position has changed, I would be interested to hear about that. However, our view is that it is obviously a matter for the people of Syria, and we will be promoting a plan whereby they, including the 11 million or 12 million who have fled the country, will be given the chance to vote in free, fair, UN-observed elections to give that country a stable future.