Afghanistan

Lord Dholakia Excerpts

Wednesday 6th July 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord Dholakia]

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord for repeating the Statement in your Lordships’ House. I associate these Benches with the tributes paid to our servicemen who are serving us so well and to those who are no longer with us.

I want to pursue the point that the noble Baroness, Lady Royall, the Leader of the Opposition, made about identifying someone who can act as a catalyst in this process. I raise this because one of the successes of the Northern Ireland talks was the involvement and assistance of external elements. I particularly have in mind the former chief of the defence staff in Canada, General John de Chastelain. The Prime Minister was right to say recently when talking about the Taliban that the process of talks needs to proceed, although there will be differences of opinion from time to time. We should remember that there are deep-rooted differences between the Taliban and the Government of Karzai, and therefore, as the Prime Minister said, an external element coming from the Muslim community in that part of the world, free from any suspicions relating to western powers, might be able to assist in this task. It is in all our interests to have peace and stability in that region.

[Lord Strathclyde]

My Lords, I warmly welcome the tribute to British servicemen that my noble friend Lord Dholakia has made. The question of mediation is really interesting. My noble friend used the word “catalyst” and made a comparison with Northern Ireland. One of the problems with Northern Ireland was that no one was willing to talk to anybody. The Afghanis have made it clear that preliminary contacts are taking place and we should all welcome that, although of course I am not in a position to go into operational details about it. It must be an Afghan-led process and, as I said to the noble Baroness, Lady Royall, at this stage we would be nervous about putting in place another ingredient when talks have already started and contacts have been made. There seems to be a very positive air about progress and we should wish it success.