Iran

Debate between John Baron and Michael McCann

Monday 20th February 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Michael McCann (East Kilbride, Strathaven and Lesmahagow) (Lab)]

I welcome the procurement of the debate by the hon. Member for Basildon and Billericay (Mr Baron), but I fear that many of the Members who contribute to it will not support the position that he outlined. I will support the amendment.

I should start by declaring that my sister is married to an Iranian and that I have strong links with the Iranian community in the west of Scotland. I have taken the community’s temperature on this issue.

We know that every Government face challenges, foreign and domestic, during their period in office. The longer the Government are in power, the more likely that challenges will come along and that their frequency will increase. The foreign challenges that we face focus public attention, at times, on making decisions or considering military options that will put our people in harm’s way. Sadly, over the past decade or so, we have seen many challenges in foreign lands—Kosovo, Sierra Leone, Iraq and Afghanistan. Most recently, the coalition Government deployed UK forces in Libya.

On each occasion each Member of the House has had to come to a view on where they stand on the issues. Some will always adopt a pacifist approach. Others will weigh up other factors. The pacifists among us will always have respect and legitimacy for the principled position that they hold, but they must also recognise that their position lacks remedies in the harsh territory—

[Mr Baron]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Mr McCann]

I shall make progress. The hon. Gentleman has just had the opportunity to move the motion. He should not try to come in again so swiftly.

The pacifists among us do not always recognise that their position lacks remedies in the harsh territory of international conflict and that at times it can be seen as a white flag in the face of tyranny. What is more difficult to absorb are those non-pacifists who disagree with a particular decision and then seek to stand astride the moral high ground after the event and lecture us about how they did not support the action in the first place.

Iraq is the most obvious recent controversy. I have often mused about what would have happened in March 2003 had the French and Russians put their vested interests aside and supported a united final UN resolution. Would Saddam have capitulated? We will never know. I have no issue with those who seek to post-rationalise events, but I do have an issue with those who seek to do so in a manner which neglects to mention that they did not have a feasible proposition to resolve the original problem—in the Iraq context, Saddam’s refusal to abide by the will of the international community. Now we look to Iran.

I do not support the motion; I support the amendment. In reaching that decision I have examined the actions of the Iranians thus far, and in particular the prospects for a negotiated settlement of the issues. What actions have the Iranians taken thus far? The International Atomic Energy Agency stated on 8 November 2011 that Iran had sought to design a nuclear warhead, that Iran was continuing its atomic weapons programme research, that it could have a nuclear bomb in months and that preparations to install a nuclear warhead on a ballistic missile were taking place.

To this I add the Iranians’ rhetoric that the holocaust did not take place and President Ahmadinejad’s declaration that Israel should be wiped off the map; I refer to the comments of the hon. Member for Basildon and Billericay. If that declaration was somehow misinterpreted, were the Iranians also misinterpreted when they said that the holocaust did not take place? We must also question the Iranians’ close relationship with Syria.