Yemen

Debate between Emily Thornberry and Julian Brazier

Wednesday 26th October 2016 Commons Chamber

[Emily Thornberry]

The hon. Gentleman raises an important point. The question is about whether it is right at this stage, given the impact on our economy, for us to be suspending our support for Saudi Arabia. Given the amount of arms and planes that we sell, is it right for us to suspend arms sales to Saudi if that is part of the support that we are giving the coalition? We have always complied with international humanitarian law when selling arms to our allies. We have regulations about who we sell arms to and in what circumstances. The Foreign Secretary himself said that the test for continued arms sales

“is whether those weapons might be used in a commission of a serious breach of international humanitarian law.”

We have rules on arms exports and we must make sure that we abide by them. We are a proud country that does our utmost to abide by international law. The questions that we are raising today are important because if our support means supporting a coalition that is acting in contravention of international law, we must reconsider that support. That is the right position.

[Mr Julian Brazier (Canterbury) (Con)]

I am grateful to the hon. Lady for giving way. I urge her to think for a moment about the impact that such a suspension would have on our credibility as an ally in this dangerous, fractured part of the world. There is a great difference between saying that civilians have been killed because terrorists are perhaps sheltering around what were civilian facilities and actually alleging that there is a deliberate programme of mass slaughter.

We have been doing an awful lot of historical commemoration and it is worth remembering the huge number of French civilians whom we killed in the build-up—