Iran

Jack Straw Excerpts

Monday 17th June 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Jack Straw (Blackburn) (Lab)]

(Urgent Question): To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will make a statement on the policy of Her Majesty’s Government towards Iran following the election of Dr Hassan Rouhani as its new President.

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

I congratulate the people of Iran on their participation in Friday’s elections and Dr Rouhani on the result. He made some positive remarks during his election campaign about the need to improve economic and political conditions for the Iranian people and to resolve the nuclear issue. The Iranian people will, no doubt, look to their new President to make good on those promises.

The United Kingdom’s policy on Iran has been consistent under this Government and the last. We share international concern, documented by the International Atomic Energy Agency, that Iran’s nuclear programme is not for purely peaceful purposes, and we deplore Iran’s failure to co-operate fully with the IAEA, to uphold its responsibilities under the non-proliferation treaty and to meet the demands placed on it by UN Security Council resolutions. The Government hope that, following Dr Rouhani’s election, the Iranian Government will take up the opportunity of a new relationship with the international community by making every effort to reach a negotiated settlement on the nuclear issue. If Iran is prepared to make that choice, we are ready to respond in good faith; our commitment to seeking a peaceful diplomatic settlement of this dispute is sincere. So I urge Iran to engage seriously with the E3 plus 3 and urgently to take concrete steps to address international concerns. Iran should not doubt our resolve to prevent nuclear proliferation in the middle east and to increase the pressure, through international sanctions, should its leaders choose not to take this path.

[Mr Straw]

May I thank the Foreign Secretary for that statement and associate myself with the congratulations, in which we would all share, to the Iranian people and to Dr Rouhani on his election? May I tell the Foreign Secretary that in my many dealings with Dr Rouhani when he was head of the Iranian national security council under President Khatami, I found him courteous, engaged and straightforward to deal with?

Does the Foreign Secretary accept that although Dr Rouhani will seek strongly to represent his country’s interests and its faith, his Government could, if given the space, be a positive force in respect of its neighbours in Syria, Lebanon, Afghanistan, and Iraq? Does he also accept that Dr Rouhani has made it clear that he wants a fresh start on the nuclear file, but that negotiations that aim at stopping Iran’s entire civil nuclear programme, as Israel seems to want, are bound to fail, whereas negotiations aimed at ensuring that there are clear safeguards against a break-out to a military programme, with a phase-down of sanctions, do have a good chance of success? Does he agree that, as soon as possible, the E3 plus 3 should broker some confidence-building measures with the new Government?

Will the Foreign Secretary acknowledge that in aiming to improve relations with Iran, we should show an understanding of the hostile and humiliating way in which that ancient nation feels it has been treated in decades past by the west, especially by the United Kingdom? Will he also acknowledge that we should not expect too much, too soon from the new President, who will not be taking office for two months and will face his own challenges from within a complex, complicated governmental system?

Lastly, although I fully understand why the Foreign Secretary had to close our embassy in Tehran, may I ask what active steps he will now be taking to reopen it and to re-establish full diplomatic relations?

[Mr Hague]

I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for his remarks and questions, and indeed I pay tribute to the work he did, particularly between 2003 and 2005, seeking to improve relations with Iran and to address the nuclear issue, including working with Dr Rouhani.

On all the matters that the right hon. Gentleman has raised it will be important for us to have an open mind but to judge Iran on its actions. There have been positive words during the election campaign, but it will, of course, be the actions we judge, including on the potential to adopt a more constructive position when it comes to Syria, Iraq and Lebanon, which he mentioned. The opportunity is there through the E3 plus 3 negotiations to make constructive progress on the nuclear issue on the basis that he describes. The E3 plus 3 have made it clear since February that we are open about the long-term benefits to Iran of reaching a comprehensive agreement. We have been open to Iran that if it could react in a constructive way to the offer we have put on the table, that would open the door to the normalisation of political and economic relations with the international community. We have proposed a balanced and credible offer, to which Iran has not yet made a sufficiently constructive response. The opportunity is there.

We should always try to understand how other countries feel about events in history—that is part of good and effective diplomacy all over the world—just as they should appreciate our concerns. The right hon. Gentleman is right to point out that the President-elect does not immediately take office, but the IAEA has stressed the urgency of the nuclear issue and it is important that that is borne in mind.

Finally, we had no wish to close our embassy, as the right hon. Gentleman understands. Our embassy compounds were invaded in a way that could only have been state-sponsored in some way, at great danger to our staff and with the destruction of their personal possessions. It is not possible to operate an embassy in that environment, so although we maintain diplomatic relations with Iran and have no policy against opening an embassy, we would need to be sure about the safety of our staff and that the embassy could fulfil the normal functions of an embassy.

Iraq War (10th Anniversary)

Jack Straw Excerpts

Thursday 13th June 2013 Commons Chamber

[Caroline Lucas]

I am particularly grateful to the hon. Gentleman for that intervention because I will shortly pay tribute to those hon. Members who did stand up in this place, who did scrutinise and who did ask the right questions. The fact that they came to the conclusions that they did demonstrates that the evidence was there. Unfortunately, there was a will not to look at some of it.

[Mr Jack Straw (Blackburn) (Lab)]

Before the hon. Lady goes on, may I say in respect of Mr Hans Blix—I have made this point outside the House—that there is a profound disconnection between what he is saying now and what he said at the time? What he said at the time, and he repeated it in a book in 2004, was that he thought that Saddam had weapons of mass destruction and posed a threat. I know of no provenance whatsoever for the claim that the inspectors were prevented from continuing their work in Iraq by either the US or the UK in January 2003.

Moreover, the final reports from Hans Blix complained about a lack of co-operation, the inability of inspectors to interview scientists from Iraq inside or outside Iraq, and the continuing intimidation. The final report that he made, which I had to force him to publish, on 7 March 2003, catalogued in 29 chapters of 170 pages the unanswered questions that Mr Blix thought Saddam had to answer, even at that stage, about all the chemical and biological weaponry that had been known about in the past and which Saddam had failed to explain. That is where Blix was at the time. My last point is this—

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dawn Primarolo)]

No. Will the right hon. Gentleman please sit down? I am trying to be very tolerant to facilitate the debate but there are lots of Members who want to participate, and making a speech on an intervention, however important the point, is not acceptable. Therefore the right hon. Gentleman will have to wait to make the rest of his points.

--- Later in debate ---

[Caroline Lucas]

Well, I have seen the evidence from Chirac and the way it was treated when it came to the Chilcot inquiry, and I think that it is perfectly plain that Chirac’s intervention was deliberate misinterpreted. The words were taken in the wrong order and made to mean something different. [Interruption.] We can trade our beliefs across the Chamber, but the bottom line is that there was evidence out there that would have led Members to suspect that what they were being told at that point was not necessarily the case.

[Mr Straw]

First, the transcript, and indeed the video, were available to all Members on both sides of the House, so they could make their own judgments on it, and the vast majority made the judgment that we made about what had happened. Secondly, what we were seeking in the second UN resolution was not war, but peace—I was desperate for it—by an ultimatum that included six tests, which were drafted by Hans Blix, by the way, and they were tests that Saddam could easily have passed had he wished to do so.

--- Later in debate ---

[Ian Lucas]

The 2003 vote was whipped and I still did what I thought was right. Members of Parliament should always do what they think is right.

[Mr Straw]

May I echo the point made by my hon. Friend and by the hon. Member for Gainsborough (Mr Leigh) that it was a whipped vote in name only? The vote was perfectly open. Given the extent of the rebellion on both sides, people were able to make their own judgments. Inside the Government, there was a clear expectation that anybody taking the Queen’s shilling would vote with the recommendation of the Cabinet, but it was open to Ministers to resign—two did, very honourably. Others chose to stay.

[Ian Lucas]

I think that votes on important matters in this House always have consequences. This vote had consequences for those MPs who did not support the Government on that particular occasion.

GCHQ

Jack Straw Excerpts

Monday 10th June 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hague]

We apply our own laws. The United States decides its own laws and applies its own laws in the United States. We do so in the United Kingdom as well. That is the central point that I am making about this. All the Acts that we have passed in this Parliament relating to the gathering of intelligence are applied to data supplied from other countries. While I cannot give my right hon. Friend a specific answer about specific discussions, of course we regularly discuss with the United States the framework for these things to make sure, as best we can, that our values and our legal frameworks are upheld and that the strong emphasis on the privacy of the citizen is always there. As he will have seen in the statements of President Obama, the United States is very, very tough about that as well. When the UK and US both work together, each with a strong legal framework, the combined effect is a very strong and protective one.

[Mr Jack Straw (Blackburn) (Lab)]

Does the Secretary of State accept that many of our allies, leaving aside the United States, are astonished by the degree of control and supervision of our system of ministerial oversight, oversight by judicially qualified commissioners and oversight by the ISC, which surpasses that of most other western democracies?

Does Secretary of State also accept that those in the agencies face an impossible dilemma? When things are relatively calm, suspicions, fantasies and sometimes paranoia can take off about the so-called secret state, but the moment there is a serious threat or actual terrorist outrage, often the very same people and newspapers turn on a sixpence and demand to know not whether the safeguards were operated but why there has been a failure by the agencies to track, through intelligence of all kinds, the miscreants involved.

[Mr Hague]

The right hon. Gentleman is absolutely right; as a former Foreign Secretary he is very experienced in these matters. I argued in my statement that, as he knows very well, the system of checks and balances and scrutiny that we have is among the strongest in the world; it could be the strongest in the world. Yes, he is right that the agencies easily come in for criticism when anything goes wrong and yet have to ensure at all times that they are gathering all the information they ought to be obtaining. They undertake a task for which they are not thanked and recognised often enough. They have achieved a great deal in frustrating attacks on this country, including, in recent years, planned terrorist attacks on this country, some of which we cannot talk about as they are not known to the public. It is therefore difficult to give them the recognition that they deserve. That is the scale and the importance of this crucial work.

Syria

Jack Straw Excerpts

Monday 20th May 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hague]

As he has done consistently over a long time, my right hon. and learned Friend argues the case from the other perspective. As I said, this would be an important foreign policy decision and moral choice. We certainly need to apply additional pressure on the regime in order to make for a successful negotiation, because without that pressure the regime might well believe that it can sit tight for much longer yet, even with a collapsing society and economy underneath it. I think he puts the case very well.

[Mr Jack Straw (Blackburn) (Lab)]

I entirely understand the frustration about the situation—we all share it—but if the arms embargo is lifted, is there not a risk that it could just lead to an escalating arms race between the west and Russia and Iran, whose interest in the conflict is as existential as Assad’s?

[Mr Hague]

There are no options here without risks. There are risks with every possible course of action, and of course there is evidence of large flows of weapons into Syria from Russia and Iran taking place now. That is part of what is radicalising some communities in Syria. I do not want to pretend to the House that there is any option without risks. We must do everything to ensure that these negotiations succeed, but we will have to weigh fully the risk of people indefinitely having every weapon devised by man used against them without the means to defend themselves. We will have to weigh the risk of what that might do for the creation of extremist groups and the permanent destabilisation of the entire region. It is a choice between risks.

Syria

Jack Straw Excerpts

Wednesday 6th March 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hague]

What I—and, I suspect, most of the House—would have to be persuaded of is that there was absolutely no alternative remaining. My right hon. and learned Friend has put the case—for a long time, actually—for going much further than I have proposed today in regard to the arming of the opposition movements in Syria by western countries. The difficulties involved in doing that have partly been set out by the right hon. Member for Paisley and Renfrewshire South (Mr Alexander), but we also have to recognise that that conflict in Syria is already militarised. Opposition groups have access to substantial quantities of weapons, and those weapons are already inside Syria. There is such a flow of weapons. I therefore believe that it is right for the development of our policy to be graduated, for us to show our readiness to deliver increased assistance and for the European countries and the United States to be willing to amend our policy if the situation continues to deteriorate, but in a way that will command general support and that will pose the least danger to the increased militarisation of the conflict. That is why I think this is the right balance to strike, rather than moving to the position that my right hon. and learned Friend has consistently advocated.

[Mr Jack Straw (Blackburn) (Lab)]

Would it be a fair summary of our position to say that we are now providing every kind of assistance to the military forces of the opposition, short of the explosives, guns and bullets that actually do the killing? I have no objection to that; I think it is essential. In my judgment, the Foreign Secretary is right not to rule out the option of direct lethal military supplies, but would he acknowledge that the strategic diplomatic consequences of any such decision, and the degree to which we could get bogged down in a kind of cold war or proxy war, really need to be thought through very carefully indeed before we make any such positive decision?

[Mr Hague]

Yes, I very much agree with the right hon. Gentleman. He accurately characterises the position, although it is perhaps putting it too strongly to say that we are providing “every kind of assistance” short of lethal equipment. We are providing the assistance that I have set out today, and we will provide other assistance of that nature for the protection of civilians. That is an important requirement in the exemption to the UN arms embargo, and we will interpret it exactly. The assistance has to be for the protection of civilians. So the right hon. Gentleman went a bit too far in his characterisation of the position. He is right, however, to say that it would be a bigger and further step to decide to send lethal equipment. We have taken no decision to do that, and we have no current plans to do that, but it is necessary to be clear that in a situation of this gravity, with its implications for the peace of the whole region, we cannot rule out options. We cannot definitively rule that out. That was the thrust of his question.

Mali

Jack Straw Excerpts

Monday 14th January 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mark Simmonds]

I thank my hon. Friend for his remarks. I know that as my predecessor in the Foreign Office he had significant involvement in monitoring this situation. He is absolutely right to highlight the potential danger and links between the respective terrorist organisations in the northern part of Mali, in northern Nigeria and elsewhere in the Sahel. He is also absolutely right to highlight the importance of the potential EU training mission to build capacity in the Malian military forces to ensure that they have the capacity to retake the northern part of Mali and to hold it once the territorial integrity has been regained.

[Mr Jack Straw (Blackburn) (Lab)]

Like my right hon. Friend the Member for Warley (Mr Spellar) I commend the decision taken by the Prime Minister to give this practical support to the Government of France. Will the Minister spell out in a bit more detail the consequences for the west African Commonwealth countries and their stability were effective and firm action not taken to deal with the threat in Mali straight away?

[Mark Simmonds]

I am grateful for the right hon. Gentleman’s remarks about the Prime Minister’s correct decision. He is also right to highlight the potential for the terrorist activity taking place in the northern part of Mali spreading to other parts of not just the Sahel but west Africa. There are clearly potential dangers from the threats that have been articulated by those in al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb not only to those in Europe, but to economic and social development and to the alleviation of poverty, which is abject in some parts of the Sahel and in northern Mali, and to the commercial interests of UK firms in the region.

Palestinian Resolution (United Nations)

Jack Straw Excerpts

Wednesday 28th November 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hague]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that. The assurances are those I have described in the statement. On the recourse to the ICC, at this stage, in the occupied territories because of the impact on the ability to bring about a negotiated settlement, we are not talking about that. As I said in response to the right hon. Member for Paisley and Renfrewshire South (Mr Alexander), we are certainly not advocating some permanent exemption. We have not received any assurances on those points, which is one of the reasons why we continue to seek them and why, as things stand, we cannot vote for the resolution. We will continue to seek them over the coming 24 hours.

[Mr Jack Straw (Blackburn) (Lab)]

Will the Foreign Secretary please understand that this complex conditionality of which he speaks is too clever by half and that what it will most achieve is to undermine Britain’s influence, both with the Israelis and in the Arab world, and at the same, and more crucially, to undermine the position of the man he has praised, President Abbas? What has happened in the past three weeks is that Hamas has seen its power and influence enhanced and that the message has gone out, not least from Israel, “If you send enough rockets over the border, you can get to negotiations”, while one condition after another is imposed on the peace-seeking Palestinians. This approach, I am afraid, is not going to help.

Middle East

Jack Straw Excerpts

Tuesday 20th November 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hague]

I think that that is a question for my colleagues, and my right hon. Friend the Deputy Leader of the House has heard that request. I must say, however, that it would be a tragedy if the comments of my right hon. Friend the Father of the House were limited to 15 minutes.

[Mr Jack Straw (Blackburn) (Lab)]

Given that the experience of the past decade or more is that Israel pockets any concession made by the west to accommodate its position and then not only does nothing but makes the situation worse—by illegal settlement building, for example—will the Foreign Secretary please reconsider his position on the British Government’s refusal to vote for the United Nations General Assembly resolution? He is a man of great fluency, and he normally convinces the House with his arguments, but I find his reason for that refusal utterly incomprehensible. It is not that I disagree with it; I simply do not understand why our voting for the resolution would make the situation worse. Surely it would make it much better.

[Mr Hague]

I always listen carefully to the right hon. Gentleman, for obvious reasons. For the sake of clarity, I should say that the Government have taken no decision yet on how to vote on the resolution. We are arguing against the holding of such a vote, which would be carried in the UN General Assembly, because of the number of nations in favour of it. As I mentioned earlier, we will consult closely with our EU partners on this matter. There was a time when the right hon. Gentleman used to place great weight on the views of European Union Foreign Ministers, and after yesterday’s discussions, I believe that most of them have the same view as ours. That is the majority view for a reason: there is genuine anxiety about whether it would be possible, in the remaining short window, to restart the middle east peace process negotiations if the motion were carried now. It is therefore a tactical difference. There is a respectable difference of opinion on the matter, but I come down on that side of the judgment.

Syria

Jack Straw Excerpts

Monday 3rd September 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hague]

Yes, I absolutely agree with my hon. Friend. When I met Mr Brahimi in New York last week I encouraged him to be clear when he needs the support of the Security Council and to be ready to demand that support at crucial moments. I hope he will heed that advice.

[Mr Jack Straw (Blackburn) (Lab)]

Like my right hon. Friend the Member for Paisley and Renfrewshire South (Mr Alexander), I commend the Foreign Secretary, his colleagues and his Department for their work. May I press him on Russia? We all understand what equities Russia has had in the Assad regime, but what explanation does he offer for why Russia has a belief that its strategic advantage lies in continuing to back the Assad regime while it is falling apart, notwithstanding that it might continue for a little while?

Syria

Jack Straw Excerpts

Monday 11th June 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hague]

There are many points in history, including the one that my right hon. Friend points out, that show that we should always bring caution to any consideration of military intervention. That is why, despite all the frustrations and the terrible length of this bloody crisis, our efforts are so heavily devoted to, and we continue to work so hard on, the implementation of the Annan plan, and trying to bring Russia to a stronger insistence that the regime implement that plan. Clearly, that is because we think that is the only way to secure a peaceful transition in Syria and a peaceful solution to the crisis. It is impossible to know how the situation will develop, if the plan is not followed and implemented. That is why I say that we should have all options on the table, but cautionary words about military intervention in such a complex situation are entirely well understood by the Government and the whole House.

[Mr Jack Straw (Blackburn) (Lab)]

We all understand the necessary caution regarding going beyond the existing diplomatic measures, but notwithstanding what the Father of the House, the right hon. Member for Louth and Horncastle (Sir Peter Tapsell), said, that was the approach that we took to Bosnia for three years, with catastrophic results. Given the Foreign Secretary’s discussions with Sergei Lavrov and other Russian leaders, does he think that they comprehend the huge damage being done to their international reputation by the fact that it appears to the rest of the world that, whatever they are saying, in practice all they are doing is protecting an abject, brutal regime that has lost the consent of its people?

[Mr Hague]

That is a good point. I do not know what Russia’s private assessment is of that damage, but there is such damage, of course, and not only in the view of leaders in the Arab world, but among the huge populations who now watch the footage of these crimes on satellite TV. Of course, the same people across the whole middle east are familiar with, or were rapidly informed of, the fact that when we had a vote in the UN Human Rights Council 10 days ago, only three countries voted against that resolution: Russia, China and Cuba. That does not help any of those countries’ international standing in the region or, in the wider world, among people who have a passionate concern for human rights. That is one of the factors in their thinking. It may be one of the factors in the increased readiness to look for new solutions in order to bring about the implementation of the Annan plan. As I say, we will continue to work with Russia and try to persuade the Russian leaders on that basis.