Egypt: Elections

Lord Alton of Liverpool Excerpts

Thursday 24th January 2013 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Warsi]

I am always cautious when I stand at the Dispatch Box and say that I have absolute confidence that something will happen in another country over which I do not have any control, so I probably cannot give my noble friend that assurance. We were hopeful that those elections would take place within about two months of the constitution, which should have been around the end of February possibly. However, some concerns about electoral law have been raised, which have been passed to the judiciary. We hope that elections for the Majlis Al-Chaab will take place this summer. In relation to the upper house, that is functional.

[Lord Alton of Liverpool]

Will the Minister agree to meet a delegation of the UK Copts, of which I am honorary president, to consider especially the question of the outright, institutionalised discrimination in the constitution against Egyptian Copts, who have faced executions and the burning of their churches?

[Baroness Warsi]

The noble Lord is aware that this is a subject that is close to my heart. In relation to my human rights brief, I have made it a priority. I hosted a ministerial conference earlier this week that focused specifically on the freedom of religion and belief. This sought to build consensus around the arising issue of religious intolerance. I will meet members of the Coptic church when I visit Egypt and will raise these matters.

Korean Peninsula

Lord Alton of Liverpool Excerpts

Monday 21st January 2013 Lords Chamber

Asked By

[Lord Alton of Liverpool]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what is their assessment of the security, humanitarian, and human rights situation on the Korean Peninsula.

[Lord Alton of Liverpool]

My Lords, I thank noble Lords from all parts of the House for taking part in today’s short debate. I know that the retiming of the debate will deprive us of several contributions, notably that of the noble Baroness, Lady O’Cathain, who has to chair a Select Committee.

The Motion before us focuses, as I will, on three things: security, humanitarian needs and human rights concerns in North Korea. Since 2003, when, with my noble friend Lady Cox, I made the first of four visits to North Korea, I have served as chairman of the All-Party Group on North Korea. Last September, while in China, I visited the River Tumen, where many trying to leave the DPRK have lost their lives.

The continuing security challenges posed by North Korea were underlined by its rocket launch in December and reports a week ago that it may be about to conduct its third nuclear test. Last Friday, the Russian ambassador to the UN Security Council, Vitaly Churkin, said:

“Our position is that the North Korean rocket launch is a violation of a UN Security Council resolution, so the council should react”.

Even more significantly, China is also likely to support a new resolution this week—a significant diplomatic blow to Pyongyang, about which the Minister will doubtless say more. We are talking about the most militarised country on earth, with the world’s fourth largest army and biggest special forces. North Korea’s arsenal includes the full array of weapons of mass destruction: a plutonium-based nuclear weapons programme now supplemented by uranium enrichment; the world’s third largest chemical weapons arsenal; possible biological weapons; and a range of ballistic missiles.

A failure to hammer out a long-term political settlement and a conflict triggered by a Sarajevo moment would replicate the horrendous haemorrhaging loss of life that saw the catastrophic deaths of around 3 million people in the Korean War. The 2010 sinking of the Cheonan and the shelling of Yeonpyeong Island underline North Korea’s capacity to initiate hostility, and, in the cyber domain, interference with the GPS systems of planes using Seoul’s busy airports, all indicate North Korea’s ability to inflict harm, short of invasion.

An isolated rogue state has the power to inflict other miseries, too, including drug trafficking, currency counterfeiting, crimes of abduction and the transfer of nuclear technology, which can be sold to terrorists or to countries such as Iran, and which I hope the Minister will comment upon. Since 1953, North Korea has promoted an ideology based on “military first”. For both sides, it has largely been a case of military first, second and third. In this context, Kim Jong-un was right in his New Year’s Day assertion that,

“past records of inter-Korean relations show that confrontation between fellow countrymen leads to nothing but war”.

In a similar vein, the Republic of Korea’s new President, Park Geun-hye, has called for deeper engagement. She said:

“While we cannot allow the North to develop nuclear weapons ... we must keep open the possibility of dialogue, including humanitarian aid”.

Britain has diplomatic relations with both sides and should build on the successful 2011 visit of Choe Tae Bok, the Speaker of the North Korean Supreme Assembly, who expressed interest in both our Northern Ireland peace process and the Hong Kong formula of two systems in one country. As the noble Baroness, Lady Thatcher, and Ronald Reagan clearly understood, advocating the use of soft power should not be confused with being a soft touch.

President Park made reference to the dire humanitarian situation—my second point. Two million died during the 1990s North Korean famine. Our previous two excellent ambassadors in Pyongyang both issued warnings about the reappearance of malnutrition, as did the noble Baroness, Lady Amos, the United Nations Under-Secretary General for Humanitarian Affairs and Emergency Relief Co-ordinator, when she spoke to our all-party group last year. In July in the House I warned of the unacceptable use of food as a “weapon of war”. Food deprivation and malnutrition lead to physical frailty and stunting, long-term intellectual impairment and increased vulnerability to disease. North Korea’s leaders might reflect that the cost of their missile launch—more than £500 million—could have bought 2.5 million tonnes of corn and 1.4 million tonnes of rice. I hope that the Minister will give her assessment of the current food situation and Kim Jong-un’s recent announcements of Chinese-style agricultural reform, as well as her assessment of the welcome brokering by Jang Song-taek—Kim Jong-un’s uncle—of two new joint economic zones with China.

Thirdly, on human rights, according to the United Nations, 200,000 people are languishing in festering prison camps—the kwan-li-so—where 400,000 people have died in the past 30 years. In an evidence session here, Shin Dong Hyok described how he was born and spent 23 years in Camp 14 and was tortured and subjected to forced labour. At 14, he was made to watch the execution of his mother and brother. BBC Radio 4 has broadcast extracts of his harrowing story The evidence given to our committee and described in a House of Commons debate initiated by Mrs Fiona Bruce MP include accounts of executions, torture, detention, forced labour, trafficking, religious persecution and the “guilt by association” policy, which leads to the arrest, imprisonment and punishment of detainees’ families for up to three generations. We have also heard of women impregnated by Chinese men facing forced abortions or infanticide following deportation by China.

When did the British Government last raise with the Government of China the issues of forced repatriation, the absence of a refugee adjudication process, the denial of access by the UNHCR and the other matters to which I referred? A few months ago, I raised in your Lordships’ House the use of capital punishment. The noble and learned Lord, Lord Wallace of Tankerness, said that officials from the Foreign Office would reply to me on that point, but I still have not received a reply.

Just a week ago, describing what she called a “beleaguered, subjugated population”, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Navi Pillay, called for an international inquiry into serious crimes, a proposal supported by around 50 human rights organisations. She said that security questions,

“should not be allowed to overshadow the deplorable human rights situation … which in one way or another affects almost the entire population and has no parallel anywhere … in the world”.

North Korea has never allowed United Nations special rapporteurs on human rights to enter the country, but with 25,000 North Koreans living in the south and an estimated 100,000 living illegally in China, there would be no shortage of evidence for such an inquiry to assess.

Straightforwardly, do Her Majesty’s Government support the creation of a United Nations-sponsored commission of inquiry, and will we vote for it if it comes to a vote? Historians will surely question our generation’s extraordinary indifference to North Korea’s gulag archipelago.

Looking to the future, an approach based on Helsinki-style engagement would surely seek to build on the small advances of recent years. One is in education. Here I make reference to the remarkable story of Pyongyang University of Science and Technology, to the first Chevening scholars at Cambridge, and to the use of English as the north’s second official language. This should encourage the BBC World Service to respond positively to the 18 Korean organisations which have requested broadcasts to the Korean peninsula—an issue which Peter Horrocks, the director of BBC Global News, will address at the all-party group on Wednesday of this week.

Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights states:

“Everyone has the right … to receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers”.

The World Service’s 80th anniversary—and its role in places such as the former Soviet Union and Burma—is a timely reminder of the power of ideas. We know that 14% of defectors say they listened to foreign broadcasts, and 44% of those questioned said that they admired foreign societies. Two weeks ago Eric Schmidt, the executive chairman of Google, and Bill Richardson, the former governor of New Mexico, were in North Korea urging internet freedom.

Not to encourage reform, not to invest in promoting progress and not to break the information blockade would render pointless Britain’s millennium decision to forge diplomatic relations with the DPRK. We owe it to the coming generation, to the Koreans who perish during their hazardous escapes, to those who suffer from a lack of food or medicine, and to those who are the victims of an ideology that has become prisoner of its own rhetoric, to do better than simply offer Cassandra-like predictions of thermonuclear war—predictions which, if they came to pass, would reduce the whole peninsula to an irradiated cemetery.

As today we assess the security, humanitarian and human rights challenges on the Korean peninsula, with the new leadership in the north and south and in China, too, and with today’s second-term inauguration of a United States President, surely there is a moment for change: a time to end the war and to replace it with long overdue peace and prosperity.

Syria

Lord Alton of Liverpool Excerpts

Thursday 10th January 2013 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Warsi]

The noble Baroness asks a very important question. She will be familiar with the initiative to prevent sexual violence, to which the Foreign Secretary has given a huge amount of time and energy. Too often, as in the case of Syria and, as we saw, across the Arab world during the Arab uprising, sexual violence is used as a tool of war—sadly not just against women but against men as well. I do not have specific numbers for reports of sexual violence during the Syria conflict. If the office has those numbers, I will write to the noble Baroness and send her those details.

She also asks an important question about the participation of women. Again, the answer is not immediately obvious from the brief that I have here but I will make those inquiries for my own information as well as to ensure that I can send the noble Baroness a detailed response.

[Lord Alton of Liverpool]

My Lords, there is widespread concern at what might appear to be unconditional support for the so-called opposition forces, not least because of the treatment of minorities that has been referred to already. Did the Minister see the report in the Sunday Times recently about how a group of Jihadists beheaded a Syrian Christian and literally fed him to the dogs? Did she also see reports concerning links with family members of Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda? Therefore, as my noble friend Lord Wright and the noble Lord, Lord Ashdown, said earlier, should we not be prudent and cautious before feeding a situation where we could simply make bad matters worse? Would the Minister not agree that, in the list of priorities that she mentioned earlier, the treatment of minorities and the upholding of their human rights should be an unconditional issue as far as our support for any opposition group is concerned?

May I also ask her to revisit a reply that her noble friend Lady Northover gave me on 18 December when I asked about support for Hand in Hand for Syria, a British medical charity? She replied that there were no current plans to fund its work. In view of the massive humanitarian needs in Syria at present, will she undertake to look again at that reply?

[Baroness Warsi]

I will look again that reply and I will certainly make inquiries of the Department for International Development. I know that we are currently using international NGOs for the specific work within Syria but if this is an option that could be looked at, and one that DfID feels is appropriate, I will certainly feed that information back to the noble Lord.

I can assure the noble Lord that our support for the opposition is not unconditional. It is very clearly conditional upon the fact that we require reform, we require a plan and we require them to sign up to basic requirements such as the need for equality and non-discrimination towards minorities. We must also be careful since when we make this argument, which has been made before on a number of occasions, it surely cannot be right that we sit here in Britain and feel that the only way that the rights of minorities, including Christians, across the Arab world can be protected is if they are being ruled by a dictator. There surely has to be another way in which Christians and other minorities are protected as part of a democratically elected Government under which all communities feel part of that nation.

Older People: Their Place and Contribution in Society

Lord Alton of Liverpool Excerpts

Friday 14th December 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Alton of Liverpool]

My Lords, I begin, as others have done, by paying tribute to the most revered Primate, not simply for choosing this important topic for debate here in your Lordships’ House today but also to say how grateful many of us are—perhaps especially those of us who are not Anglicans—for the spiritual leadership that he has provided during his time at Canterbury. I hope that, as he returns to academic life, he will continue to challenge us—as he has done again today—to think beyond our narrow material concerns and to be an apostle of faith and reason.

Many of us were particularly moved by the speech that followed that of the most reverend Primate when we heard from the noble Baroness, Lady Trumpington. That brought to mind that when I was a young Member of another place there was a proposal to build a new geriatric unit in the heart of Liverpool. I was very concerned when I saw where it was to be situated and wrote to the Department of Health to ask whether a Minister could come and see the location. I received a reply that the Minister in the House of Lords—the noble Baroness, Lady Trumpington—would come to Liverpool to see the site. That was not quite what I had had in mind at first, but when I met the noble Baroness I immediately revised my views. I took her to the place where they wanted to build a new geriatric unit and pointed out what people in that unit would see: they would look over the neighbouring cemetery in Smithdown Road. In a good example to anyone aspiring to ministerial office, the noble Baroness at this point picked up the plans and tore them up, telling the officials, “It will be over my dead body”. I am glad to say that, all these years later, the noble Baroness has lost none of her mettle. I would not want to be an official on the receiving end of a visitation by her, even at this time.

I was most grateful that the most reverend Primate amusingly drew a line at the age of 62, a threshold which, in my case, is not far off. Having arrived at Westminster in 1979, as the then baby of the House, in another place, I am conscious that it would be something of an understatement to say that I am preaching to the converted by giving a speech in a debate on the place and contribution of older people in society in your Lordships’ House, but I have always been reassured by something that Robert Kennedy once said about age and youth. He said that youth is,

“not a time of life but a state of mind, a temper of the will, a quality of imagination”.

A great hero of mine is William Ewart Gladstone, who was born in the city of Liverpool. He became Prime Minister two years before the most reverend Primate’s threshold. He went on to be Prime Minister three more times and finally resigned from office at the age of 84, so there may be hope for a number of Members of your Lordships’ House if they have aspirations in that direction.

On arriving in your Lordships’ House in 1997—I was thinking about this as the noble Lord, Lord Glasman, spoke to us earlier—I was struck by the wisdom and experience of so many who participated in the debates here. I got to know the late Lord Longford at that time and I recall wonderful conversations as he talked about his experiences during the interwar years and Cabinet meetings that he had attended with great figures from the past. It was sometimes like talking to the pharaohs when you talked to him. He was an active participant in your Lordships’ House right up until he died at the age of 95. That is a salutary lesson to all those who belittle the contribution that people are able to make right until the end of their lives.

By contrast, our attitude to older people has become a national disgrace. Increasingly, we tend to regard older people as an unwanted burden. The time when families looked after one another, lived close to each other and gave support when needed is long gone. Age and wisdom are no longer generally revered. In its place, we have a media-driven cult of worshipping youth, casting the elderly aside and sending them off out of sight and out of mind to nursing or residential homes where, increasingly, the level of care is deplorable.

I was struck by the speech of my noble friend Lady Masham. It brought to mind a young woman who came to Liverpool to study geriatric care some years ago. She came from west Africa. After six months, she said to me: “David, I am returning to my homeland. I am not going to bother finishing my studies because I do not believe you have anything to teach us about respect or care for the elderly in this country”. That also brought to mind the story about Mother Teresa, who once asked why residents at a home that she visited were all sitting facing the door. She was told: “It is in the hope that someone will visit them”. Mother Teresa said that the tragedy of loneliness, a point made by my noble friend Lord Crisp, and a sense of being unloved, a point made by the noble Lord, Lord Griffiths of Burry Port, is the “most terrible poverty”. That came from someone who ministered to the poor in the city of Calcutta.

It is said that in Britain 1 million people do not see a friend or neighbour during the course of an average week. What does that say about the rest of us? What does it say about our sharp-elbowed, uncaring society when an 80 year-old Alzheimer’s sufferer was beaten repeatedly by a male member of staff at a residential care home in Kentish Town last year; or that a disabled grandmother in Wakefield recently said that she was afraid to return to hospital after what her family described as “absolutely atrocious” care; or the 89 year-old woman exposed to “sickening” mistreatment in a residential care home in Pontefract? As your Lordships know, the list goes on.

Nearly half a million people over the age of 65 are now living in residential care homes, but as the number of older people increases, so the elderly are struggling to find and pay for care to help with everyday needs. Care costs, whether residential or in a person’s home, have risen dramatically in recent years, and successive British Governments have spent less on this provision than almost any other country in Europe. A survey by the Saga Group last year found that Italy and France spent twice as much on their pensioners as we do in the United Kingdom and both those countries have the longest life expectancy for women in Europe. Britain came 17th out of the 20 major European countries surveyed—behind not only Germany but former communist countries such as Poland and the Czech Republic.

Each year an estimated 40,000 people are now forced to sell their homes to pay for care in their old age. Only the poorest, with total assets worth less than £23,000, qualify for any state support. Meanwhile, there are instances of local authorities cutting home care services to such an extent that charging for meals on wheels, which pensioners cannot then afford, has led to the NHS reporting that the number of admissions for malnutrition among the elderly has soared since 2007.

Sadly, some of the austerity measures have made matters worse, disproportionately hitting older people the hardest. In his Autumn Statement the Chancellor, the right honourable George Osborne, announced his second tax raid on pensions in less than three years, while the Government’s quantitative easing programme is penalising savers the most, many of whom are pensioners.

I welcome the fact that the Government have decided to put policies in place to enable those older people who wish to do so to continue working, a point made so eloquently by the noble Lord, Lord Giddens. These policies match an increasing willingness to work beyond state pension age but, at the same time, a recent ruling allowed companies to dismiss older workers at 65 on the grounds of the “public interest”, to make way for younger staff climbing the career ladder. With the average life expectancy for men now at 78, and 82 for women, can that really be right?

We need to learn again to value the elderly, cherish their contribution to society and respect their human dignity. Older people, too, need to try to value themselves more and resist the myth that, because they are less able, they are of less worth. The most reverend Primate recently met Pope Benedict XVI in Rome. Last year, visiting an old people’s home in Rome, the 85 year-old pontiff reminded those present that it is “beautiful to be elderly” and said:

“It is necessary to discover in every age the presence and blessing of the Lord and the riches it contains”.

In the same month, speaking at a reception in Westminster, Archbishop Vincent Nichols put it well when he said that how we care for older and disabled people is a crucial test of any civilised society. Benedict noted, as the most reverend Primate has done again today:

“In the Bible longevity is considered a blessing of God; today this blessing is widespread and must be seen as a gift to appreciate and to make the most of”.

He added:

“There can be no true human growth and education without fruitful contact with the elderly”.

Children learn so much from their grandparents, who at times of stress and crisis often hold families together with wisdom and love. That contact is crucial. With something like 800,000 children in the country today having no contact with their fathers, the role of grandparents becomes particularly important. My own children’s grandfather died a year ago, aged in his early 90s. He had been an Anglican priest for 60 years. I can say that he and his wife gave a great deal to my children. I think that the link between parenting, grandparenting and the needs of children is massively underestimated.

Even when older people are unable to physically contribute to the good of society, their dignity must be respected. Elderly people should never be discouraged; they are a richness for society, also in suffering and in sickness.

So what could the Government do in practical policy terms to improve the situation? First of all, they could consider learning from current care provision policies abroad. France, Germany and Japan all had a starting point for reform similar to that now existing in England. Today, all three now have implemented state-run social insurance arrangements for long-term care. Under those arrangements, all people covered by the system—often the whole adult population—are required to pay regular contributions either as taxes or as mandatory insurance premiums. In return, should the insured person develop a care need, they become entitled to support from the system, either as services or cash allowances, regardless of their need.

Younger people need to look less at what older people cannot physically do and instead learn from them by listening to their stories of growing older, transformation, self-transcendence, humility and wisdom. We need communities capable of hearing these stories, viewing the elderly not as aliens and strangers or unwanted burdens but as people who enrich us in so many unexpected ways. Surely, therefore, it is high time, and in all our interests, that elderly people are given the recognition, esteem and dignity that they deserve.

Not for the first time, and I am certain it will not be for the last, the most reverend Primate has focused our attention on a central and defining question of our times. Sometimes it is only when someone has left office that their true value is fully appreciated. In the case of the most reverend Primate, I think that we already know that to be so.

North Korea

Lord Alton of Liverpool Excerpts

Wednesday 12th December 2012 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Lord Alton of Liverpool]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what is their assessment of the impact on regional and world security of North Korea’s recent missile launch.

[Lord Alton of Liverpool]

My Lords, I beg leave to ask a Question of which I have given private notice. I declare a non-pecuniary interest as the chairman of the All-Party Group on North Korea.

[The Senior Minister of State, Department for Communities and Local Government & Foreign and Commonwealth Office (Baroness Warsi)]

My Lords, we condemn North Korea’s satellite launch. This test of its ballistic missile technology is in clear violation of UN Security Council Resolutions 1718 and 1874. This provocative act will only serve to increase regional tensions and undermine prospects for peace in the peninsula. The UK is urgently consulting with the UN Security Council and we have urged North Korea to return to constructive international negotiations.

[Lord Alton of Liverpool]

My Lords, I am grateful to the Minister for her response. Is not this highly provocative act, coming a week before South Korea’s elections, an attempt to undermine any attempts at peaceful moves for reconciliation and progress? It is also a wicked waste of resources, estimated at some $800 million. That is enough to feed the entire population of North Korea for a year, in a country where malnutrition and starvation are commonplace. Will the Minister tell the House whether the Government have called in the North Korean ambassador and, if so, what will they say to him? Does she welcome China’s statement this morning, in advance of the Security Council meeting, that,

“Pyongyang should … abide by relevant UN Security Council resolutions … which demands the DPRK not to conduct ‘any launch using ballistic missile technology’ and urges it to ‘suspend all activities related to its ballistic missile programme’”?

BBC: World Service

Lord Alton of Liverpool Excerpts

Tuesday 27th November 2012 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Lord Alton of Liverpool]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government by how much the BBC World Service budget has been reduced in the current financial year; and what plans they have for funding the World Service in the future.

[The Senior Minister of State, Department for Communities and Local Government & Foreign and Commonwealth Office (Baroness Warsi)]

My Lords, the budget for the BBC World Service for the 2011-12 financial year was just over £255 million. It was reduced by £11 million to £244.2 million for the current financial year and will reduce by a further £4 million to £240 million in the financial year 2013-14. From April 2014, the BBC World Service will be funded from the licence fee instead of from FCO grant in aid.

[Lord Alton of Liverpool]

I am grateful to the Minister for that reply, but at a time of phenomenal uncertainty in the world can it really make sense to cut the BBC World service by 16%, leading to the loss of 32 language services and 650 jobs and an estimated fall in audiences of some 30 million people? In particular, should we not think again before savagely reducing medium-wave transmissions to Syria, Lebanon, Egypt, Jordan and Israel at a moment when the region is in total crisis and the voice of reason is in such short supply? In this 80th anniversary year of the BBC World Service, surely it is a moment to celebrate its extraordinary achievements in upholding human rights, democracy and the rule of law rather than so short-sightedly diminishing this country’s influence right across the globe.

[Noble Lords]

Hear, hear!

Rwanda

Lord Alton of Liverpool Excerpts

Wednesday 21st November 2012 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Warsi]

My noble friend raised a number of issues, some of which relate to reports that were clearly leaked. It would be inappropriate for me to comment specifically on a leaked report but I can confirm that this Government take those concerns extremely seriously. That is why, among other reasons, the Minister for Africa is in the region. My noble friend will be aware of the United Nations Security Council presidential statement, which was issued only yesterday and deals with specific concerns about the M23 in Goma. I am sure he will also accept that our aid programme in Rwanda is, specifically, to deal with poverty in a country where almost 45% of Rwandans remain in extreme poverty. Real progress has been made since the genocide of 1994 in building Rwanda’s economy. I am sure he will accept that our support to the poorest in that economy is part of that.

[Lord Alton of Liverpool]

Does the noble Baroness not recall that in September, in reply to a Written Question that I tabled, her noble friend Lady Northover confirmed that some £344 million is being provided in bilateral aid to Rwanda between 2011 and 2015? In that same reply, she said that Rwanda,

“must adhere to strict partnership principles”,—[Official Report, 24/9/12; col. WA284.]

and that the Secretary of State was still considering whether those expectations were being met. Given what the noble Lord, Lord Chidgey, just said about the fall of Goma—there are now 80,000 displaced people and refugees in that area—and what Ban Ki-Moon has said about using aid for leverage, will the Minister say whether we are reconsidering our decision to restore aid in that vast degree to Rwanda and who is arming and paying for the arms of the M23 rebels?

[Baroness Warsi]

I cannot comment on the last question that the noble Lord raised but, in relation to aid, in 2012-13 we have committed £75 million, of which £29 million is general budget support. The noble Lord will be aware that in July of this year, because of certain concerns that were raised, a £16 million tranche of general budget funding was not given over until September and, at that point, £8 million was given over as general budget support but £8 million was redirected to education and food. The next tranche is due in December and my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for International Development is looking at all these matters.

Russian Federation: Council of Europe

Lord Alton of Liverpool Excerpts

Tuesday 30th October 2012 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Warsi]

As I now have the human rights brief at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, I see that there is an interesting dilemma in terms of human rights records around the world and the position that we adopt on them. There is also the question of how we implement human rights decisions in relation to the UK. However, I am very front-footed and clear when I say that abuses that are taking place in places such as Russia, which form the basis of the report that noble Lords are aware of, are very different from the case of voting rights for prisoners.

[Lord Alton of Liverpool]

My Lords, is the Minister aware that at a meeting in your Lordships’ House this morning, Mr Peter Horrocks, who runs the BBC World Service, expressed concern about the blocking of the BBC by Russia? In the context of the right to free speech and the importance of information and encouragement to those who uphold democracy in Russia, what are Her Majesty’s Government doing to raise our concerns about the blocking of the BBC World Service?

Sudan and South Sudan: EUC Report

Lord Alton of Liverpool Excerpts

Wednesday 17th October 2012 Grand Committee

[Lord Alton of Liverpool]

My Lords, I welcome the noble Baroness, Lady Warsi, to her new ministerial responsibilities, as others have done. I couple with that my thanks and, I am sure, those of many other noble Lords, to the noble Lord, Lord Howell of Guildford, who dealt with these issues over such a long period and with patience and diligence, and always with great kindness in the way in which he responded to the vexed inquiries that many of us made to him. The noble Baroness, of course, has personal knowledge of Sudan, having travelled there to negotiate the release of Gillian Gibbons, the British teacher who was arrested after her class named a teddy bear after the Prophet Muhammad. I know that the noble Baroness is deeply committed to religious tolerance, to co-existence, and to finding ways of resolving the kinds of conflicts that your Lordships have been discussing today. We should all be extremely pleased that she has these new ministerial responsibilities, and we all, I am sure, wish her well.

Earlier we heard from the noble Lord, Lord Jay, about how Darfur has often been swept to one side in the concerns about north-south relationships. That is true, and I want to return to that issue shortly in my remarks. I begin by referring to the situation in South Kordofan, as the most reverend Primate, the right reverend Prelate and the noble Lord, Lord Chidgey, have done. I have raised this issue on the Floor of the House with my noble friend Lady Cox, who I am sure will expend a lot of her remarks on that question when she comes to speak.

A meeting was held earlier today with members of the All-Party Group on Sudan, of which I am an officer, along with the noble Lord, Lord Chidgey, and others who are here. I was struck during that meeting with senior officials from the Foreign Office by how immediate and contemporary these concerns are. As a result of a reference that they made to an article that appeared in yesterday’s Guardian, I took the trouble to obtain a copy of that article. I have not seen the YouTube video that apparently has been placed on the internet to which the article refers, but it says:

“Dramatic video footage and satellite images have revealed Sudanese security forces are waging a violent campaign in the Nuba mountains comparable to war crimes in Darfur … The Satellite Sentinel Project … shows the terrifying ordeal of a teenager being tied up and interrogated at gunpoint as a village goes up in flames”.

It goes on to say:

“The SSP said a joint unit of Sudanese army, militia and police forces burned and looted Gardud al Badry”.

John Prendergast, co-founder of the Enough Project, a partner in the SSP, was quoted in the Guardian report just yesterday as saying:

“‘We are seeing a repeat of Darfur without the international witnesses’ … He added, ‘Through this campaign of targeted violence, which amounts to crimes against humanity, and its denial of humanitarian access, the government of Sudan is displacing thousands of civilians and contributing to insecurity in the region’”.

Four days ago, an AFP report stated:

“Tanks, artillery and helicopters staged a show of force in the capital of Sudan’s South Kordofan state on Friday, official media said, after unprecedented and deadly rebel shelling of the town”.

The military parade of force was led by Ahmed Haroun, who, along with Field-Marshal Omar al-Bashir, referred to earlier in our debate as president of Sudan and the governor of Kordofan, is also indicted as a war criminal by the International Criminal Court. As I raised with officials earlier today, I hope that we will hear from the Minister what we are doing to ensure that we are taking witness statements from those who have been driven into South Sudan from South Kordofan. Many are in refugee camps. It is perfectly possible, therefore, to take first-hand witness statements of the depredations that have occurred while they have been there. Aerial bombardment continues even while we are meeting.

I turn specifically to Darfur because we are about to reach the 10th anniversary of that conflict, and I hope that the Foreign and Commonwealth Office will take the opportunity, when we reach the anniversary in February next year, to mark it with a series of events, as the all-party group intends to do. Today is a good day to ask the Minister what has happened to Darfur, as did my noble friend Lord Jay and the noble Lord, Lord Anderson, in their remarks. Why is Darfur forgotten while violence is not only continuing, but when one report earlier this month stated that this is,

“the bloodiest year yet in the region”?

Why is the international community so supine in demanding an end to the violence? Since my visit to Darfur in 2004, and the report which I then published then, entitled If This Isn’t Genocide, What Is? 2 million people have been displaced. About 200,000 to 300,000 people have been killed and 90% of the villages have been razed to the ground; and the situation continues to be bleak. Just this week, the acting head of Darfur’s peacekeeping mission, Ms Aichatou Mindjaouldou, highlighted the recent alarming rise in violence with high civilian casualties, calling the trend an “alarming development”. Between 25 and 27 September, more than 70 civilians were killed in Hashaba with reports of aerial bombardments there as well as in South Kordofan. Further west, four Nigerian peacekeepers were killed on 2 October in an ambush near El-Geneina in west Darfur, the area I visited eight years ago.

In the context of the EU sub-committee’s remit—at paragraph 6 the report refers briefly to the “extremely serious” situation in the region—the EU is a member of the Joint Commission which is one of two ceasefire monitoring and implementation mechanisms provided for in the July 2011 Doha Document for Peace in Darfur. It was tasked with resolving disputes referred to it by the Ceasefire Commission, the other mechanism. Perhaps in the sub-committee’s future work, it might be interested to find out why we have failed to put those instruments into operation.

The failure to create some peace has left approximately 3.2 million people in Darfur currently receiving food aid, including some 1.7 million IDPs registered in camps. As I said, Darfur is a dangerous and lawless region. There are fears that the operations of the NGOs and humanitarian agencies that deliver this aid will face increasing difficulty due not only to increasing violence, but also to deliberate attempts by the Government of Sudan to restrict access and impede operations. We have already seen the expulsion of numerous NGOs from Sudan over the past few years, 13 in 2009 and four this year from east Sudan. The situation that is developing there is extremely ominous as well. If the space for humanitarian operations in Darfur continues to narrow, what will be the implications for the millions of people dependent on aid? If the remaining NGOs are made to leave, how will the gap be filled?

Let me mention one of those NGOs. Earlier in the year, with my noble friend Lord Sandwich, I attended a meeting in your Lordships’ House which was addressed by the remarkable Patricia Parker MBE, who is the chief executive officer and chairman of trustees of Kids for Kids, a charity that works in Darfur and whose patrons include the noble Baroness, Lady Rendell, and the noble Lord, Lord Cope. Mrs Parker believes, as I do, that Darfur is has become out of sight and out of mind as the juggernaut of the world media and campaigning activism has simply decided to move on. At the Conservative Party Conference, the Foreign Secretary William Hague specifically highlighted the use of rape as a weapon of war and rightly cited Syria, Rwanda and Bosnia, but not Darfur, where there continue to be almost weekly reports of rape. Why was there this omission and why has it gone out of mind?

In Darfur, rape has led to HIV becoming a major issue. I was sent a photograph last week of a dying little boy in El Fasher hospital who had already seen both his parents die of HIV. Before the conflict erupted in Darfur 10 years ago, HIV was unknown. Since then, year by year, rape has been used as a weapon of war with horrifying consequences. This conflict has been fuelled by a regime whose leaders are indicted by the ICC for crimes against humanity. The Sudanese air force continues to bomb its own people weekly and a recent report from the organisation Waging Peace shows that government-sponsored attacks are increasing in their regularity as the regime continues to work through its local proxies.

It would be good to hear from the Minister what she is doing to ensure that Field Marshall Omar al-Bashir is brought to justice. Have we supported the suggestion made on 5 June by the International Criminal Court prosecutor, Luis Merino Ocampo, as he relinquished his post? He argued that the UN Security Council should consider asking member states and regional organisations to conduct operations to arrest Sudanese officials indicted by the ICC. Is that something which Her Majesty’s Government would be prepared to support?

As the conflict has raged it has led not only to systematic rape, it has decimated the ability of the people to feed themselves and their children. We heard a very pertinent contribution by my noble friend Lord Cameron on the issue of agriculture and the importance of sustainability in terms of people being able to feed themselves. Let me give an illustration of the scale of the problem. Last year, Hilat Ibrahim, a village of 1,500 people, lost 37 children to malnutrition. One in every 12 families has lost a child, and Kids for Kids reports that the majority of families in the villages have not been able to save enough seed to plant this season. Children are facing horrendous conditions in the villages of Darfur, yet again the international media is sadly silent.

In February 2011, Henry Bellingham, then the Minister for Africa, said that,

“we will not be taking our eye off Darfur, as we work tirelessly to establish a lasting peace in that troubled province”.—[Official Report, Commons, 1/2/11; col. 724.]

Yet whatever the words, the violence is increasing, HIV is rampant, children are malnourished and the world has moved on. Even at the height of the violence and when Darfur was in the headlines, aid did not reach two-thirds of the population. The international community claimed that its aid programme was a success because the aim was to help those people who had fled to the camps. But what of the families struggling to survive in the villages in rural areas? The months ahead are set to be the hardest ever.

Over half the population of Darfur has no water source. Almost a quarter of the population, including children, walk more than six miles to reach water in winter. In the summer “hungry” months, many walk more than 20 miles. Walking for water continues to be dangerous, with frequent reports of attacks. UNAMID has at times provided escorts to groups of women from the camps, but not for the women in the villages. With failed crops, women have to scavenge not just for water, but for wood and wild food such as mukheit, which is toxic, but anything is better than nothing if you are trying to survive. It is harder to find scarce food in a group, and still they are attacked. Healthcare in villages has collapsed.

UNAMID is the world’s most expensive peacekeeping force, yet it is regarded by most Darfuris as siding with their oppressors in Khartoum, so ineffective have been its operations. Moreover, its capacity is about to be cut. On 31 July, the UN Security Council adopted Resolution 2063, renewing the mandate of UNAMID for a year. The resolution authorised a reconfiguration of UNAMID to include 16,200 military personnel, 2,310 police personnel and 17 formed police units of a maximum of 140 personnel each. Prior to the adoption, the council was briefed by the joint AU-UN Special Representative for Darfur, Ibrahim Gambari. Mr Gambari said that implementation of the Doha Document for Peace in Darfur was behind schedule and that a new implementation timeline had been created. UNAMID, the world’s largest peacekeeping force, has received a lot of criticism for its failure to protect civilians, a lack of clarity in its protection mandate, and some suspicions from Darfuris that UNAMID is too close to the Government. However, as with the humanitarian agencies, UNAMID has been a victim of the number of restrictions and bureaucratic impediments to its operations by the Government of Sudan. Darfur, as I have said in every respect, is difficult terrain. Its new iteration consists of a number of cuts to troop numbers to reflect the contested suggestion that there had been a “drastic decrease” in the number of people killed in clashes and to enable it to react more rapidly. This does not accord with the description of 2012 as the “bloodiest year yet” in the region.

I would like to hear from the Minister about the renewal of the UNAMID mandate and whether Her Majesty’s Government supported the reductions in the number of peacekeepers in Darfur. What steps have been taken to implement the Doha Document for Peace in Darfur, to which I have already referred? Can she tell us how the UK has highlighted other critical issues, including the escalation in violence that I have mentioned—the attacks against civilians and the use of sexual or gender-based violence? What of the failure of other rebel movements to sign the Doha document? What of the deaths of 10 UNAMID peacekeepers in the past year and the prevention of humanitarian agencies from assessing those most in need?

Given that Khartoum has expelled most international humanitarian groups, whose presence is desperately needed, what representations are we making to the Government of Sudan, the rebel groups and the international partners to urge greater access for the humanitarian organisations? What has been the result of those representations? What assistance might we consider extending beyond our current programmes to communities struggling to survive in rural villages in Darfur? Will we commit to adjusting the balance of spend on bilateral assistance in Darfur towards greater funding for sustainable development projects in rural villages, and encourage other donors to do likewise?

What support will we give to IDP families to enable them to settle in host villages, enabling them to be assimilated in the community through integrated projects? Kids for Kids has a unique “welcome home” package that is sustainable and does that, and I hope that the Minister will agree to meet Mrs Parker to discuss that important work. Can the Minister tell us, either today or through correspondence, what we are doing to promote civil society in Darfur? Finally, what is the Minister’s assessment of the current state of this continuing conflict?

The situation in Darfur, and more broadly in Sudan and South Sudan, requires sustained high-level political action by the European Union and Her Majesty’s Government for years to come. As we approach the 10-year anniversary of the beginning of the conflict in Darfur, we must also remember that this area of the country has been consistently and intentionally marginalised for decades. It will take decades to build peace and stability, and a long-term view of development is essential. Now is most certainly not the time to take our eyes off Darfur.

Nigeria

Lord Alton of Liverpool Excerpts

Tuesday 24th July 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Howell of Guildford]

I cannot comment on the balance or lack of balance in any media reporting, but of course it is not always balanced, although my noble friend is right to say that there is no equality of violence. However, there are reprisals and it is true that mosques have been attacked as well as churches. We have no doubt that the new levels of horror, violence and atrocity that have been imported into northern Nigeria are initiated and have been provoked by Boko Haram.

[Lord Alton of Liverpool]

My Lords, given that 600 people in Nigeria have already been murdered this year by Boko Haram, which states that it wants to extinguish all reference to western ideals, including democracy, why have we not proscribed it as a terrorist organisation in the United Kingdom? Has the Minister had a chance to look at the information which I have sent to his office about the links between funding organisations in the UK supporting Boko Haram?

[Lord Howell of Guildford]

On the first point, it is not HMG’s policy to comment on which organisations may or may not be considered for proscription. On the funding issue raised by the noble Lord, I am very grateful to him for doing so. We were not aware before he raised it of the suggestion that funds were going from UK groups to Boko Haram. I have brought it to the attention of officials who are examining the issue, and I will write to him about it.