Sri Harmandir Sahib

Fiona Mactaggart Excerpts

Tuesday 4th February 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hague]

My right hon. Friend has answered the spontaneous question that my hon. Friend the Member for Gainsborough (Sir Edward Leigh) asked. I am glad that this discussion is going on in the House without the need for me to intervene in it.

My right hon. Friend the Member for Croydon South (Sir Richard Ottaway) is right. The Iranian embassy siege had taken place a few years earlier, and it was known across the world that British forces were skilled in conducting operations with minimal loss of life. That is always the spirit in which they give advice, and from everything we can see, that was the spirit on that occasion, although it is not for us to defend or promote the decisions made 30 years ago. He is almost certainly correct.

[Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)]

The Foreign Secretary said that there was no evidence of Parliament being misled. As he is aware, my predecessor as MP for Slough was told by a Foreign Office Minister on 30 July 1984:

“As this is an internal Indian matter, we have not sought to discuss it with the Indian Government.” —[Official Report, 30 July 1984; Vol. 65, c. 111W.]

The rest of the paragraph answering my predecessor’s question was simply a description of the nature of that question. The Foreign Secretary has informed us that the Cabinet Secretary did not examine papers from after 5 June, so it would seem impossible to know from his inquiry whether there had been discussions with the Indian Government by 30 July. Will the Foreign Secretary agree to examine whether there were discussions with the Indian Government after 6 June, at a time when killings were continuing?

[Mr Hague]

There are several parts to the answer to that question. First, the Cabinet Secretary has said that there is no evidence in the documents, even after that point, of any British involvement in subsequent military operations in the Punjab. That goes beyond June 1984. It is also clear in the letter from Mrs Gandhi that there is no reference, for instance, to thanking the UK for any participation, support or advice. From everything that we have seen, and having read the report, I do not think there would be much to add to what the Cabinet Secretary has already said.

Oral Answers to Questions

Fiona Mactaggart Excerpts

Tuesday 21st January 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Swire]

Indeed. The hon. Gentleman will know that in the past few years India and Pakistan have made progress on trade, with both countries agreeing to double bilateral trade by 2014. India has lifted a ban on direct investment from Pakistan, and both sides have implemented a new visa regime. Ultimately, we want to encourage progress between India and Pakistan. Our position, as is well known, is to allow both sides to decide the pace of dialogue, as any direct involvement or international intervention would not be welcomed—by India, certainly.

[Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)]

Is the Minister aware of the petition signed by thousands of my constituents —and, I believe, people in other constituencies —asking for a debate about human rights in Jammu and Kashmir, and can he assist by giving us such a debate in Government time?

[Mr Swire]

I was not aware of the petition to which the hon. Lady alludes, but her comments will certainly have been noted, not least by the Chair.

Death Penalty (India)

Fiona Mactaggart Excerpts

Thursday 28th February 2013 Commons Chamber

[John McDonnell]

I could not concur more strongly. I shall discuss that point later in my speech.

There is also concern that India is expanding the scope of the death penalty: new laws passed in 2011 provide for the death penalty for those who are convicted of terrorist attacks on oil and gas pipelines that result in death and, in Gujarat state, for those who are found guilty of making and selling illicit liquor.

[Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)]

The list of crimes that attract the death penalty in India now also includes honour killing and, more recently, rape that leads to death, but campaigners against violence against women in India have not been impressed by those additions, because they do not provide the protection that vulnerable women need but are a reaction by the Government to the horrific violence meted out to a young woman on a bus in Delhi recently.

[John McDonnell]

That is the specific point I was about to make. We all abhor and condemn that appalling crime, but it should not be used as an excuse to implement the death penalty.

The manner in which the Indian authorities have dealt with executions has also raised concern across the human rights community. The two recent executions were announced to the public after being carried out, which violates all international standards on the use of the death penalty and makes timely interventions and final appeals before execution almost impossible.

Amnesty International points out that the use of the death penalty in India is “riddled with systemic flaws”. According to the briefing Amnesty International provided to Members for this debate, of particular concern under anti-terror legislation is the broad definition of terrorist acts for which the death penalty can be imposed. In addition, there are: insufficient safeguards on arrest; provisions that allow confessions made to the police to be admissible as evidence; obstacles to confidential communication with counsel; insufficient independence of special courts from Executive power; insufficient safeguards for the presumption of innocence; provisions for discretionary closed trials; sweeping provisions to keep secret the identity of witnesses; and limits on the right to review by a higher tribunal.

In its briefing, Amnesty succinctly sums up why we abhor the death penalty and urges India to join those nations that have rejected its use, stating eloquently that the death penalty is the ultimate cruel, inhuman and degrading punishment. It violates the right to life as enshrined in the universal declaration of human rights. It is arbitrary, discriminatory and can be inflicted upon the innocent. I would add that all the international evidence demonstrates that it is also ineffective as a deterrent to crime and can often result in terrible, irreversible miscarriages of justice. For all those reasons and as a friend of India—someone who has close family ties and community links with India—I urge the Indian Government to join now that community of nations that have renounced the use of the death penalty and have abolished it once and for all.

I hope today that we can speak with one voice on this issue. By doing so, we may be able to impress better on India the need for change. So many MPs have supported the campaign not only because of their own personal conviction, but because they are reflecting the views put to them by many of their constituents. Somebody from the media argued that the reason so many MPs support the debate is they have Punjabi and Sikh constituents. Well, that is undoubtedly true. MPs are simply doing their job in representing their constituents’ views—that is what we are elected to do. It is also worth understanding why so many Punjabis and Sikhs have made representations to us. First, there is of course a real fear on their part that a number of their compatriots could be executed, and on humanitarian grounds they wish to prevent that.

--- Later in debate ---

[Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Hayes and Harlington (John McDonnell) and others on securing this debate. I am proud to speak in it as the Member of Parliament who probably represents more members of the Sikh community than any of my colleagues.

Earlier today, a couple of hours ago, when I complained about Slough’s rail service to London, the Minister of State, Department for Transport, the right hon. Member for Chelmsford (Mr Burns), suggested that I had not made similar complaints under the last Government. He was wrong. I have been making this complaint for 15 years. I mention this because I think that his cynical attitude to politics is absolutely the opposite attitude to that of those people who have promoted the Kesri Lehar petition and have encouraged us to debate this issue here in Parliament. They believe that we can make a difference; they believe that Members of Parliament uniting across the parties can play a role in persuading the Indian Government to change their mind.

I know that representatives of the Indian Government will feel tempted to fall back into the lazy assumption—cynically, like the rail Minister—of saying “Oh, this is a former colonial power, so it would say that, wouldn’t it?” From listening to this debate, it is clear that we have been able to demonstrate that what we are saying is not just an expression of a left-over bit of British colonialism, telling India what to do, but an expression of something that every democratically elected member of any Parliament in the world has a responsibility to do—tell other countries not how to run their affairs, but how to uphold basic international human rights standards. That is what we are doing here, and it is great to hear so many powerful and passionate speeches doing precisely that.

As we have heard, the move towards the abolition of the death penalty has become stronger and stronger. Of those countries that still retain it on their statute books, 35 do not in fact use the death penalty. That is what some of us thought India was moving towards. Following the rarest of the rare pronouncements at the beginning of the ’80s and following the moratorium, we thought India would be in that group of countries and would start the journey towards abolition. We thought that until the more recent executions of Ajmal Kasab and Afzal Guru over the last two years.

We have also heard today about the cases of Balwant Singh Rajoana and Professor Bhullar. Those cases move great passions among people, and there is a great deal of concern about them. The case of Professor Bhullar is particularly concerning because the German authorities did what Britain does, has always done and, I hope, will continue to do, although the Minister was not absolutely clear about it in his remarks. By that, I mean ensuring that if someone faces extradition to a country that retains the death penalty, there is an absolute commitment not to using it in that case.

[Mr Swire]

I hesitate to state again what I said earlier, particularly when the hon. Lady has been a Minister in the Home Office and should be aware of it, but it is absolutely the case that for a requested extradition to a country that uses a death penalty, our policy is to seek assurances that that penalty will not be implemented. As I said, if such assurances are not forthcoming, Ministers have to decide on a case-by-case basis whether extradition should nevertheless take place.

[Fiona Mactaggart]

I am sure that the last sentence is absolutely right. In my experience, Ministers have decided not to proceed in every case, and I hope that this Government will continue that tradition of decision. I referred to this matter because Germany decided in that way.

[Richard Fuller]

If I may say so to the hon. Lady, this is precisely the point. If we wish to decide on a case-by-case basis, as the Minister rightly said, and if India goes down this current route, it will necessarily complicate our relationship with India. There will be consequences for our relationships with India unless the Indian Parliament looks at this issue very seriously again and makes the changes that Members are asking it to do.

[Fiona Mactaggart]

The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right. I also wanted to make the point that Germany got that commitment, yet we know that that commitment is at risk of not being fulfilled in this case. That is something I am very concerned about. We must keep pressing on the principled issue, which is that international human rights standards are not things that can be conveniently negotiated, as they are standards that we need to be at the forefront of upholding.

Speaking as someone who has campaigned strongly on issues relating to violence against women and has asked for more effective prosecution of such cases, tougher sentences and so forth, I strongly feel that India’s response to the horrific case in Delhi has been a failure of understanding. The Government have wanted to look tough—traditionally part of the problem with the death penalty is that it makes Governments look tough—but have not brought along people who can make a real difference. I am particularly concerned that under the proposed new law, the present exemption for marital rape, whereby it is not an offence in India, is being retained. I am diverting from the real subject at issue, however, which is the use of the death penalty in India.

As I think everybody has said, every speaker in this debate regards themselves as a friend of India. Speaking as friends of India, we want the country to be able to fulfil its enormous and growing potential in the world. One thing that makes that less possible is the existence of the death penalty. We are concerned not just about it continuing, but about the way in which its deployment helps to divide communities in India, making the country less safe and less stable.

I am worried that the rights of religious, ethnic and caste minorities in India are not sufficiently well protected. The people who sent us the briefings have brought that issue to the debate because of their sense that the death penalty is being used to target dissidents or campaigners for those minorities. People like Professor Bhullar who have exposed some of these cases are being punished, as it were, pour encourager les autres.

It seems to me that we have a responsibility to say to India, “We expect you, as the largest democracy in the world, to promote the standards of democracy and human rights that we expect, and to recognise that if the death penalty is used in this way, there is a risk that you will deepen the divisions between ethnic and religious communities in country. There is a risk that you will make your country less safe and less peaceful for all who live in it.”

I believe that if India were to commit itself to abolition of the death penalty, it would build its capacity to fulfil its potential as a leader in the south for the developing world. Its economy is growing, and I think that if its reputation for respect for democracy and human rights grew at the same pace, it would play a great role in making the world safer. In respecting the rights of its Sikh, Christian, Dalit, Muslim and other residents, it would become stronger. It is in India’s interests, as well as the world’s interests, for the motion to succeed.

Hazara Community (Pakistan)

Fiona Mactaggart Excerpts

Monday 4th February 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Denham]

One of the most serious problems is that there has been no acceptance of responsibility by the Pakistani authorities of the kind that we would expect in a serious situation such as this. I hope that the Minister will be able to tell us what representations Her Majesty’s Government have been able to make to the Pakistani authorities on this matter.

The problem with the ill-informed, shallow or sweeping reporting that we have seen is that it tends to obscure the real causes of the violence and to obscure the responsibilities. It allows the incidents to be shrugged off as though that is “just the way things are”. Since 1990, the violence has included ride-by and drive-by shootings, personal attacks, suicide bombings, rocket attacks and car bombs, as well as the ambushing of buses and taxis and the subsequent selection of Hazara passengers for execution.

This is not the first time that my constituents have alerted me to what has happened to their relatives. Under the last Government, I took constituents who had family in the Swat valley in Pakistan to meet Lord Malloch-Brown, then a Foreign Office Minister, to alert him to the violence being carried out by the Pakistan Taliban. My constituents had come to me with stark examples of what had happened to members of their families in the recent past. I shall not give the House details of names, as family members might suffer as a result, but I have received clear documentation of constituents who had seen family members—male breadwinners—singled out for murder in three separate incidents over the past three years. The effects of that are devastating for the entire family. In a country with little in the way of a social security system, the loss of a male breadwinner has an impact on every member of the extended family.

There are wider consequences too. The Hazaras in Quetta have to live in isolation from other Pakistani citizens, not least because those other citizens fear being caught up in the violence. They suffer travel restrictions, and virtually all the Hazara students in Quetta have dropped out of university, following attacks on student transport. Hazara people have also faced difficulty in accessing civil service jobs. As has already been pointed out, however, not a single terrorist has yet been prosecuted. On the rare occasions when individuals have been arrested, they have been released. The provincial governor has been replaced, but little action seems to have been taken as yet.

The failure of the Pakistan authorities to safeguard the Hazara community is surely beyond doubt, but concerns remain about a much more sinister involvement. It is alleged that the intelligence services, the Inter-Services Intelligence, sections of which have a history of involvement with extremist forces, have links in some ways to the LEJ. I want to put it on record that I do not know whether such links are documented or what the strength of the evidence is, but the concerns about those potential connections are widely shared among those I have spoken to.

There are complicated provincial politics in Balochistan, involving not only the movements I have mentioned. The province is also tied up in the wider regional conflict, and there have been separatist movements and movements calling for autonomy. Many Hazaras believe that they have been caught up as innocent victims in the wider geo-politics.

[Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)]

My right hon. Friend is describing the confusion and rumours that are spreading about this issue. There seems to be a real case for a proper judicial inquiry to expose what is happening and to call the Government of Pakistan to account. The chief justice of Pakistan has expressed his willingness to do that, and I believe that he is the right person to conduct such an inquiry. Will my right hon. Friend urge the Minister to make representations to the Government of Pakistan to convince them that that might be a way forward that has not yet been tried?

[Mr Denham]

My hon. Friend has put forward an interesting proposal. I am about to put my specific points to the Minister on the action that could be taken, and I invite him to respond to my hon. Friend’s proposal about the chief justice as well.

The points I wish to put to the Minister are these. First, will he tell us whether the position of the Hazaras been raised with either the President of Pakistan or members of his delegation over the past two days when he was in this country on other matters? If not, when were these issues last raised by Ministers from Her Majesty’s Government with the Pakistani authorities, and what was the response?

Secondly, there are, of course, huge issues in this region that are currently under discussion—not least today between our own Prime Minister and the Presidents of Afghanistan and Pakistan. Does the Minister agree that while these supra-regional questions are being settled, the position of those such as the Hazaras must not be overlooked, left on one side or seen as too small, too trivial or too local to be taken into account? Will the Minister give me an assurance about the Government’s efforts to ensure that the Hazara community—in Quetta, of course, but also in Afghanistan—are not left on one side?

Thirdly, will the Minister give us an undertaking that the plight of the Hazaras in Quetta will be an explicit issue to be raised when the conditions of aid to Pakistan are discussed? Fourthly, what has the British high commissioner—and, indeed, Ministers—done to raise the profile of this persecution within Pakistan itself? Have Ministers or high commission officials visited Quetta to see the conditions faced by the Hazaras?

Fifthly, would the Minister be willing to facilitate a visit to Quetta by Members of this House? Sixthly, at UN level, will the Government ask the conflict prevention unit within the Bureau for Crisis Prevention of the UN Development Programme to assess whether the situation in Quetta is, or is tending towards, genocide, and in general to push for the engagement of the conflict prevention unit in this particular situation?

I have two further points. The Minister has in the past rightly expressed the truth that a range of minority groups have suffered and do suffer oppression and discrimination in Pakistan. In part, though, the Pakistan Government have tended to respond on the Hazara issue by questioning why a single group should be highlighted for attention. Does the Minister agree that although a number of groups face oppression, that is no good reason to lump them all together as part of a generalised concern for human rights, but makes it all the more essential to understand the history, the particularities and the nature of the oppressors in each case and to ensure appropriate action is taken in each case?

For the past two years, the position of the Hazaras has been referred to by name in the Foreign and Commonwealth Office human rights report. I welcome that, and I assume the same will happen again this year. In the Minister’s response to my right hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle last March, he quite rightly stressed the importance of our relationship with Pakistan and our friendship with that country. My own experience has been one of positive engagement with the high commissioner on a range of issues. The importance of this relationship makes it all the more vital that we are consistent and insistent on raising these issues, particularly for my constituents in those cases that are so intimately linked by family and history to communities in this country.

Palestinian Resolution (United Nations)

Fiona Mactaggart Excerpts

Wednesday 28th November 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hague]

Whether that would mark a step towards that depends on what happens next. As I mentioned earlier, it is important that Palestinians can celebrate success not just for one day at the United Nations, but that then there is a sequence of events that they can celebrate and that will give them hope for the future. That is what we are trying to provide in the assurances that we have asked for, to maximise the chances of further progress being made after a vote at the UN tomorrow, rather than the peace process going backwards. So we can answer my hon. Friend’s question fully only when we see what happens next.

[Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)]

The Foreign Secretary told us about the conditions that he put to the Palestinian Authority. What I am interested in is what he said to the Israeli Government about their threat to withhold the taxes that they owe the Palestinians. What is he doing to prevent that threat from being carried out?

Human Rights on the Indian Subcontinent

Fiona Mactaggart Excerpts

Thursday 15th September 2011 Commons Chamber

[Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)]

First, may I apologise to the House for the fact that I will not be able to be here for the wind-ups, as I was already committed to chairing a meeting at 6 o’clock? I am grateful to the hon. Members who sponsored the proposal of this debate to the Backbench Business Committee, because we are debating this issue on the fourth international day of democracy, as nominated by the UN and celebrated by Parliaments throughout the world.

This is the right day for us to be debating this subject of human rights in the Indian subcontinent, because human rights are a precursor to democracy; without basic human rights and the full protection of human rights, there is no prospect of genuine democracy. When representatives of regimes that are denying human rights complain, as they do sometimes, that, as a British parliamentarian, I should not be interfering in their internal matters, I am confident that I can reply that there are international standards of democracy and human rights. It is the duty of every democrat, particularly every democratically elected parliamentarian, to uphold those standards throughout the world, without fear or favour. That was put rather more poetically by constituents of mine, some of whom are in the Gallery, who signed a petition stating:

“Human beings are like parts of a body, created from the same essence. When one part is hurt and in pain, the others cannot remain in peace and be quiet”.

I will therefore focus on human rights in Kashmir, although my Sri Lankan constituents, who come from both Sinhala and Tamil communities, are well aware of my passionate commitment to human rights in that country. That was expressed when the former representative of the UK Government to Sri Lanka, Des Browne, came to address a meeting in Slough just 18 months ago.

At the outset, I ought to say that I am a friend of both India and Pakistan, even at times when there are tensions between those two countries. I am also a friend of Kashmir, however, and of its people, who have not enjoyed full democratic and human rights since Britain left behind this bit of unfinished colonial business when we ceded control of India and Pakistan nearly 65 years ago.

I was at Labour’s conference in 1995 when it resolved that Britain was under an obligation to seek a solution of the Kashmir issue. I am proud that Labour Foreign Secretaries from Robin Cook to my right hon. Friend the Member for South Shields (David Miliband) have been willing, as they have worked to develop our relationship with that great democracy and growing economic power, India, to raise the uncomfortable issue of Kashmir. I am disappointed that the current Government do not feel the same duty, at least when they are in the territory of India. Whatever one’s view of the future of the disputed territory of Jammu and Kashmir, there can be no doubt—

[Andrew Griffiths]

rose—

[Fiona Mactaggart]

I will certainly give way to the hon. Gentleman.

[Andrew Griffiths]

The hon. Lady makes a party political point about this Government and our commitment to Kashmir. Can she tell us just one thing her Government did to move the issue of Kashmir forward?

[Fiona Mactaggart]

As I have been saying, for some 65 years, this has been an issue—[Interruption.] If my right hon. Friend the Member for Rotherham (Mr MacShane) wants to intervene to question my historical knowledge, he is welcome.

For a long time, this subject has limped forward. British Foreign Secretaries have been prepared to raise the issue in Pakistan and India, even when it has been very unpopular. That is one thing that needs to happen—what we need is not silence about the issue, but a preparedness to stand up for human rights in public even when it is unpopular.

At the moment, it is not possible in Kashmir for journalists to report basic protests such as those that followed the death of a boy who was hit by a police tear gas canister just this June. Only when the press is free to publish reports of protests and when voters feel safe as they walk to the ballot box will there be any chance of resolving this bitter dispute. To that end, I echo the call from the hon. Member for Wycombe (Steve Baker) for the repeal of the Jammu and Kashmir Public Safety Act and of the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act. If we succeed in making Kashmir a society where human rights are protected, what then? That goes to the heart of the hon. Gentleman’s question.

I think Mr Hameed, the gravedigger at the martyrs’ graveyard in Indian-administered Kashmir’s capital, Srinagar, made the point very powerfully: “The solution to the problem will only be arrived at when India, Pakistan and Kashmiri people meet at the same table. Our kids pelt stones. The security services fire a bullet. What kind of democracy do we live in?” We need to ensure that the people of Kashmir live in a democracy and can determine their future. Until we protect their human rights, the possibility of a democratic resolution to the troubles that have divided that beautiful country for so long is lacking. I think the whole House agrees that democracy is the best way to resolve these issues and the whole House knows that without human rights, democracy cannot exist.

[Jason McCartney (Colne Valley) (Con)]

I start by paying tribute to my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Wycombe (Steve Baker), a fellow former Royal Air Force officer. I joined him and many other Members from both sides of the House in helping to secure the debate from the Backbench Business Committee, to which we are very grateful.

I shall focus on Kashmir. I have spoken in Westminster Hall debates on Kashmir and at meetings of the all-party group for Kashmir, but this is the first time I have had the opportunity to speak on human rights in Kashmir in this Chamber, and I am very grateful for it. My constituency in west Yorkshire has thousands of Kashmiris living in Thornton Lodge, Crosland Moor and Lockwood. They raise the situation in their homeland with me weekly, so I am proud to be speaking on their behalf.

I fully understand that international issues are never straightforward, so to try to understand the dynamic of the region I undertook a private visit to Azad Jammu and Kashmir last November. I flew into Islamabad in Pakistan, and after delivering blankets, clothing and tents donated by the good folk of Huddersfield and Colne Valley to some of the flood-hit villages in the area of Nowshera in Pakistan, we crossed the border into AJK. I was based in the vibrant city of Mirpur—a fantastic place, as the hon. Member for Birmingham, Ladywood (Shabana Mahmood) rightly said—on the beautiful Mangla Dam lake. I was honoured to be invited for tea at the homes of families with loved ones who live in my constituency, but their love of tea is not the only close cultural link that the Kashmiris have with the UK. When I was invited to meet the Prime Minister of Azad Jammu and Kashmir, Sardar Attique Khan, in Dadyal, I was welcomed by their military band, complete with bagpipes and kilts.

I saw a beautiful and peaceful Pakistan-administered region of Kashmir, but time and again I have been told of human rights abuses in Indian-controlled Kashmir, some of which we have heard about in this Chamber in the past hour, so I fully appreciate that this is a region where terrorism and security concerns are rife. Of course our own previous Government have been accused of being implicated in activities such as rendition in the wider region. The position is not always black and white.

An hour ago in Central Lobby, I bumped into a Kashmir-based journalist I met over there. As a former journalist, while I was in Kashmir I addressed a group of 50 Kashmiri journalists at the Press Club in Mirpur, and I stressed to them the importance of factual reporting. Wild accusations and the emotionally charged inflating of casualty figures do not help the cause of those campaigning for peace in the region. For example, yesterday I received an e-mail telling me of hundreds of unidentified graves, with the accusation that they contain the bodies of victims of unlawful killings and torture. I have no idea whether that is true; we must be wary of propaganda and deal in facts.

[Fiona Mactaggart]

Is the hon. Gentleman aware that many Kashmiri journalists simply cannot report facts, because they cannot get press accreditation that will enable them to go into areas where the police are in control?

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Denis MacShane (Rotherham) (Lab)]

Kashmir is the forgotten tragedy of the contemporary world. No other people has suffered such pain, such loss, such despair, and, worst of all, such a sense that their demands for justice are being ignored by the rest of the world. Here in the House of Commons we need to face up to our failures.

The first failure was the disastrous handling of the end of British imperialism in India. The second was the refusal of both India and Pakistan to abide by UN resolution 47, which stated:

“the final disposition of the State of Jammu and Kashmir will be made in accordance with the will of the people expressed through the democratic method of a free and impartial plebiscite conducted under the auspices of the United Nations.”

That resolution was adopted in 1948; 63 years later, it has still not been implemented. The third failure is the refusal of successive British Prime Ministers and Foreign Secretaries of all parties to accept that Britain has an historical duty to work to allow the Kashmiri people to be free of the oppression under which they live.

Kashmir is not a faraway country of which we know nothing. The British Kashmiri community is now nearly 1 million strong and is part of the warp and weft of today’s Britain, just as in the past Huguenots, Jews, Poles and Irish people came with their culture, faith, languages and ways of life and became part of our island nation. I think of many dear friends in Rotherham, such as Councillor Jahangir Akhtar, Councillor Shaukat Ali, Councillor Mahroof Hussain, Mrs Parveen Quereshi, and Lord Nazir Ahmed in the other place, as well as friends in Tinsley and Sheffield, who have educated me on the problem of Kashmir.

According to Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch—irreproachable international organisations—as many as 100,000 Kashmiri Muslims have died since the end of the 1980s. That is a far higher death toll of Muslims than all of those killed in middle east conflicts in recent decades. Whereas the middle east conflict gets limitless geopolitical Government and media attention, the much great death toll in Kashmir is ignored. The United Nations Commission on Human Rights reports that 1.5 million refugees have been forced over the years to seek asylum across the border in Pakistan or Azad Kashmir.

In December last year, I wrote to the Foreign Secretary after receiving a report from the International Committee of the Red Cross. Its officials interviewed under private conditions 1,296 people held by India. Among them 498 had suffered torture from electricity; 381 had been suspended from the ceiling; 294 had muscles crushed in their legs by prison personnel sitting on a bar placed across their thighs; 181 had their legs stretched by being “split 180 degrees”; and 302 “sexual” cases were reported involving rape or sexual assault. The ICRC stated:

“The abuse always takes place in the presence of officers”

from India.

[Fiona Mactaggart]

As a former journalist, would my right hon. Friend like to speculate on why those horrible tortures have failed to reach our media?

[Mr MacShane]

There is a serious problem in that this is the first debate dedicated to this subject in my 17 years in the House. I very much respect the Under-Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, the hon. Member for North East Bedfordshire (Alistair Burt), but Ministers have not raised this issue at a sufficiently high level. I hope that the Minister can assure the House that the Foreign Secretary will raise that recent Red Cross report with India at the Commonwealth Heads of Government conference next month.

A few years ago the world was shocked at the death of 8,000 European Muslims in Srebrenica and the sight of 250,000 Kosovan Muslims fleeing from Serb troops. Why has there been silence on 1.5 million Kashmiris being forced out of their homes or up to 100,000 Muslims killed by Indian forces?

Just before he was elected, President Obama made the correct connection, noting that there would be no solution in Afghanistan without change in Pakistan, but he added that Pakistan needed help from India to resolve the Kashmir question. Afghanistan, Pakistan, India—the API triangle that lies at the heart of any future for this vital world region. Sadly, once in office President Obama dropped India, out of his desire to see movement and, as a result, got no movement at all, despite the best efforts of the late Richard Holbrooke. India is part of the problem, as is Pakistan. India must be part of the solution, as must Pakistan. Until the global community faces down India’s refusal to accept responsibility for its actions in Kashmir, there will be no peace in the region. It is time to break the silence that grips British Ministers.

--- Later in debate ---

[Barry Gardiner]

I accept the spirit in which the hon. Gentleman says that he has contributed to the debate, and I would not wish to challenge that. However, if one looks at the immediate neighbours surrounding India, one will often find that there is far greater cause for concern in those jurisdictions than in India.

[Fiona Mactaggart]

rose—

[Shabana Mahmood]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

--- Later in debate ---

[John McDonnell (Hayes and Harlington) (Lab)]

I want to mention two issues that have been raised with me by constituents. The first concerns India and the second Sri Lanka. Like my hon. Friend the Member for Brent North (Barry Gardiner), I classify myself as a friend of India. I can do nothing else—I am married to a Goan and have only just come back from visiting my in-laws in Goa. I celebrate India’s success in recent years. I celebrate its politics. I witnessed the Anna Hazare campaign of Gandhian peaceful direct action to address corrupt politicians. I only wish that we had had such a thing here a few years ago—it might have helped when the Members’ expenses scandal was exposed. I also celebrate the nature of the way in which India is developing its economy. I wish that there was greater redistribution of wealth, but at least there is a dynamism in the economy itself.

In celebrating India’s progress, I feel that I have the right—as a friend of India—to draw attention to a continuing blemish on the Indian constitution. I am talking about the continued acceptance of the death penalty. There are currently 324 prisoners on death row in India, and although there has not been an execution for seven years, the political climate has changed, and there is a real fear of an imminent implementation of the death penalty. I want to use the Floor of the House to make an appeal on behalf of my constituents for the life of one person in particular, Devinder Pal Singh Bhullar, whose case I have raised over the years with a number of colleagues. Unfortunately, he is at imminent risk of execution in New Delhi.

[Fiona Mactaggart]

Would my hon. Friend comment on the fact that when I was looking through my annual report, I discovered that the issue on which I had the biggest postbag from my constituents was Devinder Pal Singh Bhullar’s threatened execution by the Indian Government?

[John McDonnell]

There is real consternation among the community in this country and across the world. This case has been taken up by Amnesty International as one of its urgent appeals across the world. As I said, I want to use this platform to appeal to the Indian Government and the Indian President to address the case of Devinder Pal Singh Bhullar and to consider the abolition of the death penalty itself.

Devinder’s mercy petition was rejected in May and his case is now moving towards the execution process. He was sentenced to death in August 2001 after being found guilty of involvement in a bomb attack in 1993 that tragically killed nine people. He was found guilty solely on the basis of an unsubstantiated confession that he made to the police and which he later retracted. He thought that it had been made under duress from the police. He was subsequently arrested under the Terrorist and Disruptive Activities (Prevention) Act at New Delhi airport in January 1995. That Act has now been repealed and was criticised internationally and inside India for being incompatible with international standards for fair trials and fair arrests.

In March 2002, the death sentence against Devinder was upheld by the Supreme Court, but the opinion was divided, with two judges in favour and the senior judge coming down in favour of acquittal. In December 2002, a review was made of the judges’ decision, again resulting in a split decision. Usually, in such circumstances, a recommendation is made that the President accept the mercy petition, but unfortunately the petition was rejected in May this year, as I have said. Now, Devinder Pal Singh Bhullar faces the death penalty.

Africa and the Middle East

Fiona Mactaggart Excerpts

Wednesday 29th June 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hague]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right to draw attention to Lebanon’s key role in the region. It is, of course, a tragedy that so much of its potential has not been fulfilled in recent years, often because of its neighbours’ policies, and he is right to draw attention to that. We certainly strongly support those people who are working to strengthen democracy in Lebanon. One of the things that that requires is the completion of the work of the Special Tribunal for Lebanon, which the United Kingdom continues to fund.

[Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)]

My constituents and I are concerned about the degree of mission creep that has occurred in Libya. The mission has continued for longer, has cost more and has involved more people dying than most of us expected at the beginning. Yet, because we are in the air, we cannot intervene on the ground to help women who are victims of rape used as a weapon of war. The right hon. Gentleman said in reply to my hon. Friend the Member for Coventry North West (Mr Robinson) that there would be an analysis at the end of the mission. Will that analysis consider ways of preventing such situations from arising in future and non-military means by which we can protect civilian populations from despots?

[Mr Hague]

It is important to stress that we have used non-military means as well. The UK has funded ships that have evacuated about 5,000 people from Misrata—that shows the support that the UK Government have given—thus taking them out of a danger zone. We have not only been engaged in military action in Libya, but had we not taken military action when we did, many thousands more people would have died in Benghazi and probably in Misrata afterwards. We are constrained by the UN resolutions, which relates to the point that I made to the hon. Member for Barrow and Furness (John Woodcock) that we must stay within the legal limits of what is set out in the UN resolution. We cannot do everything that we might want to do to assist people, but I stress to the hon. Lady that there is a good deal of non-military help, as well as our military action.

Middle East and North Africa

Fiona Mactaggart Excerpts

Tuesday 26th April 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hague]

Those Libyan banknotes are held in this country as part of the asset freeze, and since they are held as part of the asset freeze they remain frozen. [Interruption.] Indeed, that is not surprising. The Government have not so far seen any legal way of releasing those banknotes from the asset freeze.

[Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)]

May I add my voice to those on both sides of the House who have called for a further debatable resolution of the House about the future of this action? Does not this whole issue illustrate the importance of the International Criminal Court’s being able to take effective action against despots before their people rise up against them, and what is the Foreign Secretary doing to make that more possible?

[Mr Hague]

Of course it would be helpful if the ICC were able to do that. As the hon. Lady knows, there are cases such as that of the President of Sudan where we have all supported the ICC’s being able to come to its indictments. There is then the problem of the people of those countries not being able to turn over those despots to the ICC. However, we certainly support the ICC’s being able to make investigations in circumstances short of what we are seeing in Libya now.

BBC World Service

Fiona Mactaggart Excerpts

Wednesday 26th January 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hague]

Yes, absolutely. To reiterate the answer I just gave to the hon. Member for Motherwell and Wishaw (Mr Roy), we will look very sympathetically on that situation.

[Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)]

At the moment, the audience for the BBC World Service is more than 240 million people around the world. After these cuts, will the BBC still be the pre-eminent world broadcaster, putting forward our democratic values in a way that other international broadcasters fail to do?

[Mr Hague]

Yes. Not only will the BBC be that, but it will have great potential for the future in working with other BBC services and in developing some of the new services that I have outlined today.

Oral Answers to Questions

Fiona Mactaggart Excerpts

Tuesday 14th December 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hague]

I want to pay tribute to Ambassador Holbrooke in a moment, at the beginning of topical questions. I join the right hon. Gentleman in his comments about our forces in Afghanistan. Throughout the Christmas period they will, I hope, be in the minds of all of us in the House. The conditions on the ground that are necessary for any draw-down or any change in the deployment of forces to begin over the next few years are successful transition of districts and provinces. We made it clear at the NATO summit that we want that to begin early in 2011, but that does not always mean that forces that then become available are withdrawn. Many of them can be redirected into training. In recent months we have moved 300 additional forces into training. Although Canada is withdrawing its combat forces, it announced at the NATO summit that almost 1,000 trainers would be made available for Afghanistan. It is in this form that transition takes place and, as a result, there will be adjustments from time to time in the deployment of the forces of the 48 nations involved.

[Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)]

T1. If he will make a statement on his departmental responsibilities.

[The Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Mr William Hague)]

The whole House will join me, and several Members have already done so, in paying tribute to Ambassador Richard Holbrooke, President Obama’s special representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan, who died last night. He was not only a remarkable diplomat and public servant who served his country with great distinction, but someone who, through his efforts, brought an end to Europe’s worst bloodshed since the end of the second world war in Bosnia-Herzegovina in the 1990s. Today, as it happens, is the 15th anniversary of the signing of the Dayton peace accords, which Ambassador Holbrooke forged and which brought that appalling conflict to an end. In serving his country, he also saved countless lives and helped pull an entire country back from the brink. His death is a sore loss to international diplomacy.

The December European Council takes place later this week. The Prime Minister will attend. The agenda includes economic policy, including limited treaty change, the EU budget and the EU relationship with strategic partners. A stable eurozone is in our economic interest, but any treaty change must not transfer competence or power from the United Kingdom to the EU.

[Fiona Mactaggart]

This morning in Strasbourg the European Parliament debated and passed, with support from British MEPs in every political party represented in this House, a resolution on the EU trafficking directive. Has the Foreign Secretary discussed international action and collaboration against human trafficking with any of his European counterparts in the past six months, and does he expect to have such discussions in future?

[Mr Hague]

Yes, of course, the Government expect to have many such discussions. My right hon. Friend the Home Secretary is in the lead on these matters. Discussions take place between Governments all the time. I have argued for many years that Governments can do more together to deal with the issue. Our predecessors did so 200 years ago, and we should be able to do so today. That does not mean that we opt in to every EU directive on the matter if we are already taking necessary actions anyway and can retain the freedom to take actions as we wish to determine them in the House, but the responsibility of all nations to take action against trafficking is very clear.