Oral Answers to Questions

Lord Cryer Excerpts

Tuesday 17th June 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hague]

There are limits, and it will start off with a small diplomatic team and we will seek to build that up in stages as relations develop, so it will be a small embassy to begin with. Of course, many difficult areas of relations will remain, including on the nuclear issue, on regional stability and on human rights in Iran, and we will not shrink from pursuing those issues just as strongly as we always have.

[John Cryer (Leyton and Wanstead) (Lab)]

Further to Question 9, the Foreign Secretary will be aware of Prime Minister Modi’s belligerent comments about India’s relationship with Pakistan in the past. Will there be discussions on that relationship during his upcoming trip to India?

[Mr Hague]

Of course, we will always discuss regional security issues, but we should welcome the invitation that Prime Minister Modi extended to other south Asian regional leaders to his inauguration, and the fact that Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif of Pakistan responded so positively to that and attended the inauguration. That was the right way to start out, and we hope that policy will continue in the same vein.