Salisbury Incident

Jacob Rees-Mogg Excerpts

Wednesday 14th March 2018 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

That is an important point and it has been raised. We will be looking at the movement of materials and indeed, as I indicated in my statement, at any further action we can take on the movement not only of materials, but of people. We will of course be discussing that with our allies.

[Mr Jacob Rees-Mogg (North East Somerset) (Con)]

The Prime Minister has such widespread support because she has learned the lesson of history that tyrants must be stood up to. May I encourage her to impose a freeze on assets, so that people do not have the opportunity of taking them out of the country in the short term, and to boost the military resources in Estonia, where we already have 800 troops, to show very tangibly that we will support our friends and allies who might also be at risk from Russia?

[The Prime Minister]

I thank my hon. Friend for his remarks. As I said in my statement, we will freeze Russian state assets wherever we have the evidence that they might be used to threaten the life or property of UK nationals or residents. I was pleased to be able to visit our troops in Estonia last September. We are of course there with other allies, and I was pleased that at the Anglo-French summit in January President Macron committed to a continuing contingent of French troops joining our troops in Estonia. That is an important collective symbol of our determination to protect the west against Russia.