Russia

Gareth Davies Excerpts

Thursday 6th January 2022 Commons Chamber

[Elizabeth Truss]

I thank my hon. Friend for his service in the Balkans. He is so right that that peace and security was very hard earned, and we are determined not to allow it to slide away from us. That is why we have appointed Sir Stuart Peach, and it is why we are working on closer economic and security ties with the Balkan states so that they have an alternative to working with Russia.

I believe that the best way to challenge Russia is from a position of strength. We have to be clear that there would be severe consequences if there were to be an incursion into Ukraine, and we have to reduce European strategic dependency on Russia. That is how we will succeed. There cannot be any sense in which Russian aggression is rewarded, because that would, of course, have further consequences in terms of Russia’s behaviour, but it would also encourage other aggressors around the world and damage peace and democracy globally.

[Gareth Davies (Grantham and Stamford) (Con)]

The Crime and Security Research Institute has found evidence that 32 media outlets across 16 different countries have been targeted by Russia, via their reader comments section, peppering stories with anti-western and anti-NATO statements. Can my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary assure me that we are doing everything we can to tackle the Kremlin’s reliance on misinformation and online manipulation?

[Elizabeth Truss]

We have very strong cyber-security forces here in the UK, and we are doing all we can to tackle Russian disinformation, including working with allies and partners. We have recently signed a number of cyber agreements, and we are working on these issues precisely with the Baltic states, which face a lot of Russian disinformation. At the NATO Foreign Ministers’ meeting, we specifically talked about how we will make sure that NATO as a whole focuses more on cyber, and on areas such as hybrid attacks and the use of migration as an offensive weapon. That is to ensure that NATO operates not just in traditional spheres, but in many of the areas where modern combat is carried out.