Yemen

Kirsten Oswald Excerpts

Thursday 12th January 2017 Commons Chamber

[Kirsten Oswald (East Renfrewshire) (SNP)]

Brexit aside, I feel as though this House has spent more time on Yemen than on most other issues. That is not a complaint—I would spend as long as I could debating the disastrous situation facing people in Yemen. Sadly, the evidence is that this Government are not entirely listening.

The misleading of the British people and the international community over Saudi Arabia’s intervention in Yemen and its use of cluster weapons, in particular, is a blot on the record of current and former members of the Government. Ministers stuck to their stock phrases of denial, denial, denial, before the Defence Secretary was chosen to open the worst possible Christmas present and reveal that Ministers had, indeed, misled the House on a number of occasions. I wonder what the likelihood is of any such Minister facing sanctions for their part in that cover-up. Call me cynical, but I am not holding my breath. Perhaps the Ministers concerned were, to quote something the Minister said earlier this week, “inadvertently disingenuously” misleading the House, although I am sure that was not the case.

At least none of the Ministers was quite so misleading as the spokesman for the Saudi coalition, Major General Asseri, who claimed that Saudi Arabia’s British cluster bombs were obsolete and had been destroyed. In fact, he went further and declared that Saudi Arabia’s Tornado strike aircraft were not configured to drop the weapons. Now that our Defence Secretary has admitted that British cluster bombs were used, it is interesting to wonder how that happened if the Saudis had no aircraft configured to deliver them.

If we ever get to the truth of this matter, we may find that the Government’s denial lasted for only as long as Saudi Arabia still had a number of British-made cluster bombs left to use. In other words, someone somewhere appears to have made a calculation that the use of these weapons may just have been enough to deliver a kind of victory and that the Saudi and UK Governments should deny their use until that had been achieved. Given the continuing situation in Yemen, I have to conclude that the code of denial was broken simply because Saudi Arabia now has no or few cluster bombs left to deploy.

However, if it is not the case that the stocks have been exhausted, and there is evidence that the Saudis still hold such weapons, will the Government commit to doing all they can to have them withdrawn from service and destroyed and to get Saudi Arabia to sign the convention on cluster munitions? That is what the Government are committed to doing under the convention: article 21 expressly obliges parties to the treaty to encourage non-members to ratify it. So I ask the Government to commit to coming back to the House to report on progress in securing Saudi agreement to withdrawing any remaining cluster munitions from use and to signing up to the convention.

Interestingly, the convention, perhaps uniquely, allows signatories to co-operate militarily with states that have not signed it, but it does not require them to do so. Surely, if we believe that cluster bombs should not be used, and especially not indiscriminately against civilian targets, it is clear that we should not be working in a coalition doing exactly that.

In addition to cluster bombs, the people of Yemen face another threat—from the increasing use of armed drones, especially in targeting so-called high-value al-Qaeda figures. While such strikes have been part of US operations in other countries, those carried out in Yemen have been criticised for having far fewer safeguards than those in other countries. If that is the case, will the Government use their bilateral discussions with the Americans to press for a change in their approach?

As the incoming Administration in Washington take shape, many fear that events are moving in an unhelpful direction. Some of the views placed on the record by senior members of the President-elect’s team are frankly astounding. Comments I have seen attributed to General Mike Flynn, the incoming National Security Adviser, would appear better suited to a fake news site. Unfortunately, it seems they are true reflections of his views—for instance, that fear of Muslims is rational. The most concerning aspect of that was not just the horrible nature of the statement, but the shallow, hate-mongering video he was promoting to the world. Well, I have some news for General Flynn: President Hadi is a Muslim, and so, too, are the leaders of Saudi Arabia. Appointing someone to play a key role in a conflict such as that in Yemen who states that it is rational to hate all those involved defies belief.

In an earlier debate in Westminster Hall, the Minister for Europe and the Americas chided those of us expressing concern about the Saudi coalition’s tactics and behaviour, and he suggested the situation was too complex for us to understand. He is, of course, entirely right that the situation is hugely complex, which means there is all the more need for an independent investigation, but some issues are very clear, and so are some of the actions we must take, because the UK’s involvement in this situation is deeply regrettable. We must investigate, and we must suspend arms sales to Saudi Arabia. We must clarify exactly what the role of UK military personnel has been, and we must do everything we can to build a consensus around individuals and institutions that can build a new future for Yemen. In that respect, I am pleased that the United Nations special envoy to Yemen has called a new round of talks in Tunis at the end of the month to advance Yemen’s constitutional process, and I am sure the whole House will join me in wishing the participants well in their endeavours.