EU Council, Security and Middle East

Gerald Howarth Excerpts

Monday 1st September 2014 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

My memory of the discussions we had a year ago is that they were about the use of chemical weapons. My reading of history is that the use of chemical weapons is wrong and we should not turn away from it.

[Sir Gerald Howarth (Aldershot) (Con)]

I join my right hon. and hon. Friends in congratulating the Prime Minister on his robust stance in pointing out the poisonous nature of the IS ideology, but will he go further, in accordance with a suggestion from my right hon. Friend the Member for North Somerset (Dr Fox)? ISIL represents a substantial threat to the continued integrity of Iraq, and American airstrikes have been successful in halting its further advance. Would it not be better for the Royal Air Force to join in that measure? As far as Ukraine is concerned, may I repeat my plea for the Prime Minister to use this weekend’s NATO conference to get a NATO maritime force to position itself in the Black sea to deter Putin from engaging in an attack on Odessa?

[The Prime Minister]

First, we support the action the Americans have taken to assist the Iraqi authorities and Kurdish authorities in beating back ISIL; that has been the right approach. We have also assisted in our own way through the humanitarian aid we have delivered and the intelligence and other support that we have given to the Americans. That is the position.

On Ukraine, I do not think that the approach my hon. Friend suggests is the right one. We should be demonstrating that NATO stands behind all its members, as I have just said. We should be demonstrating that NATO has important partnerships with countries such as Ukraine. Indeed, that should not stop us having exercises in Ukraine, as we will do later this year. However, I do not believe that the solution to the problems in Ukraine is a military solution. We want a de-escalation of the military situation and an escalation of the political solution, recognising that, at heart, the Ukrainian people must be able to choose their future. It is that that Russia is trying to deny.