Yemen

Keith Vaz Excerpts

Tuesday 11th September 2018 Commons Chamber

[Keith Vaz (Leicester East) (Lab)]

I commend my hon. Friend on his excellent speech.

It is deeply disappointing that the peace talks did not proceed, but does my hon. Friend not agree that here is an opportunity for our Government to call together the Quint in London in order to keep the peace process going? We simply cannot wait for Martin Griffiths; we need to take the initiative and we need to hold talks here. President Macron managed to do it in Paris; we should be doing this in London.

[Stephen Twigg]

I pay tribute to my right hon. Friend’s work, not least with the all-party group on Yemen. Again, he has anticipated the next part of my speech. A meeting of the Quint would be a very welcome move by the UK, and of course we hold the pen on Yemen in the UN Security Council, which places a responsibility on us to increase our efforts to bring the parties around the table and seek a peaceful solution.

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[Keith Vaz (Leicester East) (Lab)]

It is a huge pleasure to follow the hon. and gallant Member for Tonbridge and Malling (Tom Tugendhat). He spoke with great passion and huge knowledge. His connection with Yemen—he learned Arabic when he was in Yemen—is known to us all. As Chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee, he has to cover the world, so I thank him for coming here today and participating in this debate.

I particularly want to thank my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, West Derby (Stephen Twigg)—he is a dear friend whom I have known for more than 30 years—not only for securing this debate but for his very hard work as Chair of the International Development Committee over the past four years. I also thank you, Mr Speaker, for granting this important debate. At a time when there is so much business in the House, you have understood the importance of having an emergency debate. The debate allows us to send a message to the world that, even though there is other business and even though people call this a forgotten war, here in the British Parliament it is not forgotten and many Members of this House are here today to participate.

I also take this opportunity to thank the newly re-elected officers of the all-party group on Yemen: the hon. Member for Glasgow Central (Alison Thewliss) who works so very hard and who is a great and passionate voice for the Yemeni people; my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Brightside and Hillsborough (Gill Furniss); the hon. Member for Dunfermline and West Fife (Douglas Chapman); and the hon. Member for East Worthing and Shoreham (Tim Loughton), who went on a visit with me to Sana’a. We had to send out the guards because he had gone out of the hotel without permission and we were very worried about what had happened to him. He was actually taking some marvellous photographs. That was the last time that we were able to take photographs in Sana’a. It must be very, very different today.

The all-party group released its report on the UK policy towards Yemen in May this year following a six-month inquiry. Entitled “Yemen: The continuing Tragedy”, it is now available on our website. The group made 20 recommendations in consultation with its partners. Present at the launch were my right hon. Friend the Minister for the Middle East, who is always coldthere when we discuss these issues—I am grateful, as are others, for his very hard work on this subject; the shadow Foreign Secretary, my right hon. Friend the Member for Islington South and Finsbury (Emily Thornberry); the Scottish National party spokesman on Europe and foreign affairs, the hon. Member for North East Fife (Stephen Gethins); the shadow International Development Secretary, my hon. Friend the Member for Edmonton (Kate Osamor); along with Mr Eddie Izzard who, like me, was born in Aden, Yemen, and many others.

The report was described by the shadow Foreign Secretary as a “blueprint” for UK policy, but, sadly, four months later, we are still awaiting a response from the Foreign Office to that report. Many of the recommendations are even more pressing following the bloody summer that Yemen has just endured.

I have to say to the shadow Foreign Secretary that she made a stunning speech today, and I was very pleased to see the Leader of the Opposition in the Chamber during part of the debate. As a Back Bencher and as Opposition Leader, he has been a great friend of the Yemeni people.

The current situation in Yemen is a scorecard of shame for the world. We have heard some of the statistics: 22.2 million Yemenis are in urgent humanitarian need; 8 million are at risk of famine; and 11 million people are water insecure. Estimates suggest that, since 2015, more than 6,000 children alone have died because of this conflict; 14.8 million people do not have access to basic healthcare; more than 20,000 people do not have access to critical health facilities; violence against women has increased by 63% since the conflict began; child marriage is up 66% since 2015; and food prices have risen by more than 40% since the conflict began. Fact upon fact brings many of us to tears when we have to recount them.

The escalation in fighting over this summer has been shocking. Back in June on Yemen’s west coast, the coalition forces began an advance towards Hodeidah. This would have had disastrous humanitarian consequences, with the United Nations predicting that it could have displaced 300,000 people. To give him credit where it is due, the Minister did tell Members of this House that the Government were against the advance on Hodeidah and had made that very clear to coalition partners, who, sadly, did not listen to them.

In June, I, along with the right hon. Member for Sutton Coldfield (Mr Mitchell) and the hon. Member for Glasgow Central, co-authored a letter to the Prime Minister calling on her to stop military assistance to the coalition if an attack on the port occurred. This letter has been signed by more than 95 Members of this House, including three Select Committee Chairs, and the leaders of the Liberal Democrat party, the SNP and the Green party. We must all now accept that this conflict will never be settled on the battlefield.

As we have heard, the first report of the UN group of eminent experts was released 14 days ago. It has been eagerly anticipated since the establishment of the group in September 2017. It produced a damning indictment of all sides in the conflict and said that the violations amounted to “war crimes”. The report came out just 12 days after a school bus containing 40 children was blown up by a coalition airstrike, which was allegedly as a result of a US-provided missile.

In May, the all-party group recommended that the United Kingdom should cease selling arms to all sides until the report of the UN eminent experts had been published. In the aftermath of the findings of the UN and of this horrific attack, it is clear that the UK must urgently review its decisions to grant export licences to parties involved in the war in Yemen. To be associated with such actions does a great deal of damage to the idea of global Britain. The United Kingdom Government must use all their leverage with allies to ensure that they continue to champion British values of fairness, justice and human rights in all aspects of foreign policy. As we have heard from the Chair of the Select Committee, the mandate of the eminent experts must be extended to allow them to continue to do their work, especially in the upcoming session of the Human Rights Council.

We have heard about the involvement of Iran in Yemen. It cannot be disputed. The Houthis have continued to fire weapons at Saudi Arabia and these attacks are totally unacceptable, but the response to them must be proportionate. There is also concern about the threat that they will target ships in the Bab el-Mandeb strait—a busy but vital shipping lane.

As we have heard in every single debate, the United Kingdom holds the pens in Yemen. But we seem very reluctant to use these pens. I respect the important work that has been done by Martin Griffiths, and he must be allowed to continue his work, but we urgently need a new resolution before the United Nations so that we can include a ceasefire and stop the prevention of the passage of humanitarian supplies. Through our ambassador, Karen Pierce, we can table this resolution immediately. We held a meeting of the United Nations Security Council only last week, after the events in Salisbury. If we can call such a meeting—if we can use our power as a permanent member of the Security Council for that very important reason—we should also do so for Yemen.

The peace talks convened by Martin Griffiths were, as we have heard, the best chance for peace in Yemen for some time. For the first time in two years, there was a prospect of us moving forward. As the right hon. Member for Sutton Coldfield said, Martin Griffiths deserves our praise for the way in which he has persevered with all the groups—the absence of the Houthis was a bitter blow—but we must ensure that we pick up where he left off. I urge the new Foreign Secretary to invite Secretary of State Mike Pompeo over to London with the Foreign Secretaries of all the other Quint countries so that we can continue the Geneva peace talks in London. Like the Dayton peace accords in the 1990s, this should be driven from the top down. We need to try and try again. It is no good blaming others; we have a responsibility and we must make sure that it is followed.

[Graham P. Jones]

We all want peace, but there is a pattern that seems to be a roadblock to peace. The Geneva talks have collapsed twice because the Houthis refused to turn up and leave Sana’a. The Kuwait peace talks collapsed because the Houthis refused to come to the peace table. When the outgoing special envoy to Yemen, Ismail Ahmed, had a peace deal on the table in January, he told the UN that the Houthis simply walked away and were not interested in peace. Again, the Houthis did not bother turning up in Geneva last weekend. Does my right hon. Friend recognise a pattern?

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[Keith Vaz]

Yes, there is a pattern, but in difficult and complex problems it is always difficult to get people round the peace table. My hon. Friend knows; he is a politician who perseveres, no matter whether people say that he cannot do something. He carries on and is determined to achieve what he wants to achieve, and that is what we have to do.

The former Foreign Secretary was asked by the all-party parliamentary group on so many occasions why the Quint had not been called together in London. The Minister is one of the most—if not the most—liked Ministers and Members of this House. He is hugely respected and liked. Whenever there is a reshuffle and he is forgotten, there is a huge groundswell of opinion and the Prime Minister has to relent and give him back the job. This is his chance to become Alistair the peacemaker. This is an opportunity that he must follow; I urge him to do it.

We parliamentarians are not going to stand by and wait for Governments. We have identified a number of parliamentarians in Parliaments of Europe—Norway, Sweden, Germany, Spain and the Netherlands—and Congressmen and Congresswomen in the United States, some of whom were mentioned by the Chair of the Select Committee, who are willing to join a parliamentary coalition of peace. On 8 November in Paris, the all-party group will be co-hosting an international parliamentary conference on Yemen, alongside the French National Assembly’s France-Yemen friendship group. President Macron at least tried to seize the initiative by holding a humanitarian conference in Paris. I know that our Prime Minister is incredibly busy, but I hope that the Minister will urge her to take the lead as President Macron has done to ensure that we have a conference here on Yemen.

I thank Sébastien Nadot, the Member of the French Assembly for Haute-Garonne, and Fabien Gouttefarde, the chair of the France-Yemen friendship group and a representative of his country, for agreeing to work with the all-party parliamentary group. If Governments are too slow, we in Parliament must move this forward.

[Leo Docherty]

The right hon. Gentleman is making an eloquent and powerful speech. How does he think that Iran and the Houthis can be compelled to attend such peace talks? Unless there is a compulsion, they will not attend, when—as my right hon. Friend the Member for Sutton Coldfield (Mr Mitchell) said—they have so cheaply bought such chaos in Yemen?

[Keith Vaz]

I did not think that I would say this, but if President Trump can meet the leader of North Korea, which I never believed was possible, it is possible for others to sit down at a table. We just have to make them sit down together. This is the art of diplomacy. It is 17 or 18 years since I was a Foreign Office Minister, so I cannot remember how it is done, but it is possible; and the British Foreign Office is the best at it. If anyone is going to do it, the Foreign Office is. And that is what we need to do.

Let me end by mentioning the horrifying image of the bus attack last month that can be seen on the internet—the haunting image of children, most of whom were under the age of 10, singing and clapping as they went to school. The second film shows the agony of dozens of tiny, bloodied UNICEF backpacks strewn in the aftermath of the destruction. In a conflict that has led to unconscionable destruction and death across Yemen, this incident, which has been highlighted by every single speaker in this debate—and, Mr Speaker, which I hope was one of the reasons that you granted this emergency debate—will live with us for ever.

When the Minister comes to the Dispatch Box, will he please announce a new round of peace talks? I long to return to Aden—that beautiful city. I actually want to end my life there; I want my last days to be in the beautiful city of Aden, where I was born. Every time I think of the country, what it has been through in the last few years and what we have failed to do, it brings me to tears. Now we see a whole generation being wiped out. Before that, there is a whole generation who are going to hate those who have rained bombs upon them. Britain’s task as a leader in world affairs is to convene these peace talks. I beg the Minister to do so.

[Mr Speaker]

Order. I encourage colleagues to restrict their speeches to no more than 10 minutes, because it is important that the Minister of State has adequate opportunity fully to respond. There will be a Front-Bench speech from the Scottish National party, which is not time-limited. If there is time, the hon. Member for Liverpool, West Derby (Stephen Twigg), who initiated the debate, would ordinarily be asked to conclude it. Therefore, let us ensure that Back-Bench speeches last for a maximum of 10 minutes, although this is an informal exhortation at this point.