Foreign and Commonwealth Office

Jo Swinson Excerpts

Tuesday 14th November 2017 Ministerial Corrections

[The Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Boris Johnson)]

…For the sake of completeness, the House should know that the Prime Minister raised Mrs Zaghari-Ratcliffe’s imprisonment with President Rouhani on 9 August 2016, and I as Foreign Secretary wrote to the Iranian Foreign Minister about her plight, and other consular cases, on 29 August 2016.

Russia

The following is an extract from Questions to the Foreign Secretary on 17 October 2017:

[Jo Swinson]

Amid reports that Russia is hacking into the smartphones of NATO troops and the ongoing revelations about the Russian online involvement in the US election, what is the Foreign Secretary’s assessment of the cyber threat posed to this country by Russia and what are his Government doing about it?

[Boris Johnson]

We are continually monitoring Russian activity in that sphere. I can tell the hon. Lady that the Russians have been up to all sorts of mischief in many countries, but so far we cannot yet pinpoint any direct Russian cyber-attacks on this country.

[Official Report, 17 October 2017, Vol. 629, c. 702.]

Letter of correction from Boris Johnson:

An error has been identified in the response I gave to the hon. Member for East Dunbartonshire (Jo Swinson).

The correct response should have been:

[Jo Swinson]

Amid reports that Russia is hacking into the smartphones of NATO troops and the ongoing revelations about the Russian online involvement in the US election, what is the Foreign Secretary’s assessment of the cyber threat posed to this country by Russia and what are his Government doing about it?

[Boris Johnson]

We are continually monitoring Russian activity in that sphere. I can tell the hon. Lady that the Russians have been up to all sorts of mischief in many countries, but so far we cannot yet pinpoint in public any direct Russian cyber-attacks on this country.