Civil Society and Human Rights Defenders

Lord Alton of Liverpool Excerpts

Wednesday 23rd November 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (Con)]

My Lords, on the noble Lord’s second point, the answer is yes, because you cannot develop a strategy unless you work with practitioners. I am certainly keen to take that forward. As the noble Lord may well be aware, the United Kingdom Government launched a specific document on UK support for human rights defenders back in 2019, and we worked with civil society groups, including Amnesty International, at the time. We are working through our extensive network of diplomats, and indeed through posts, in supporting human rights defenders. At times, we have to be very cautious of our approach in terms of the public profile we give to human rights defenders in other countries through the support we are extending to them, but we stand very much focused on the training of our diplomats as well as working very constructively with civil society organisations around the world.

[Lord Alton of Liverpool (CB)]

My Lords, on this Red Wednesday, when Mr Speaker has given instructions for the Palace of Westminster to be lit red this evening to commemorate all those who suffer or are persecuted for their belief—hundreds of millions of people around the world—will the Minister say what more we are doing to promote Article 18 of the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which insists that every person has the right to believe, not to believe or to change their belief? In particular, will he take up again the case of Zhang Zhan, the young woman lawyer who went to Wuhan to expose the origins of Covid-19, motivated by her faith, who now languishes in a CCP jail, with British diplomats refused permission to attend the court hearing and no information given about her whereabouts, or indeed about her health?

[Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (Con)]

My Lords, I will follow up and update the noble Lord on his second point. On his first point, of course, the United Kingdom stands very firm in our defence of freedom of religion or belief around the world. It is important that we remain steadfast in that. As a country, we celebrate the rich diversity of faith or belief. Indeed, our own journey, while it may have been challenging, is testament to this. As we look around the rich tapestry of faith institutions in the United Kingdom today, we have church steeples, cloisters, gurdwaras, synagogues, mosques and temples; that really demonstrates how we celebrate faith. Equally, many are denied their right to faith or belief around the world. That is why we held a conference earlier this year; the noble Lord was directly engaged with that. He also knows of my personal commitment to ensure that this remains a key priority for His Majesty’s Government.