Middle East

Lord Evans of Rainow Excerpts

Monday 30th November 2015 Commons Chamber

[Graham Evans (Weaver Vale) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Macclesfield (David Rutley), and I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Bracknell (Dr Lee) on securing this important and timely debate.

Following the 9/11 attacks, the change in America’s foreign policy was rapid. The first page of the Bush Administration’s 2002 national security strategy said:

“America is now threatened less by conquering states than we are by failing ones.”

Weak and failing states have arguably become the single biggest global threat to international order, and a disproportionate number are located in and around the middle east. In the wake of the horrific attacks on Paris—Friday 13 November will be a date that lives in infamy for the French people—and the destruction of the Russian passenger airliner in Egypt, Islamic State now universally threatens former cold war enemies, Russia and NATO countries alike.

It might sound surprising now, but before the Arab spring uprising in 2011, neither Syria nor Yemen were areas of concern on the Fund for Peace’s fragile state index. That illustrates both how rapidly states can deteriorate and the extent to which brutal insurgency can embed itself in the power vacuum that remains when states such as Syria fail, as we have seen with the rise of ISIL. Terror groups such as ISIL and al-Qaeda thrive in areas where weak or failed states lack either the will or the ability to confront and defeat them.

The Government have rightly chosen to focus more work on helping fragile and failing states, tackling instability and helping people affected by conflict. That is not just the right thing to do for those people in their countries, but is a way of keeping our country safe, secure and prosperous. That is why our commitment to spend 0.7% of GDP on international aid is so vital. It is directly in the international community’s interest and in our own interest to prevent these states from failing and to prevent the breeding grounds for such terror groups from forming in the first instance. If achievable, prevention is better, easier and cheaper than cure.

Equally, it would be entirely wrong and short-sighted to assume that established states in the middle east and conventional warfare are now in some way irrelevant and must be dismissed in the face of combating ISIL. About a fifth of the world’s petroleum supply passes through the strait of Hormuz, a 34-mile wide naval choke point between Iran and the United Arab Emirates. Few locations in the world rivalled the strait’s strategic importance for international trade and prosperity or its tactical vulnerability. As recently as 2011, Iran threatened to close the strait, embarking on military exercises in international waters in the region. It was only through the timely joint intervention of the Royal Navy, the US navy and the French navy, as well as the sheer amount of naval hardware in the area, that the situation was prevented from escalating further, preventing a global oil crisis.

This year, and in clear violation of a United Nations Security Council ban on ballistic missile tests, Iran tested a medium-range ballistic missile. Such missiles are inherently capable of carrying nuclear warheads. Iran and the P5+1 have been participating in intensive talks about the Islamic Republic’s nuclear programme for the past few years to reach a negotiated and permanent nuclear agreement. The joint comprehensive plan of action, signed in Vienna on 14 July, was built on a foundation of verification. For that foundation of verification to be successful, access for International Atomic Energy Agency inspectors monitoring nuclear and military sites in Iran must be automatic. Iran cannot be allowed to stonewall requests for access to suspect sites.

The world we face today is inherently more dangerous and uncertain than even five years ago. To combat the growing level and number of threats, as a country we must utilise and leverage our extensive network of soft power to prevent fragile states from failing. The UK is second only to the United States in the amount of money provided to international development and we should at every opportunity encourage our international allies to meet their commitment to spend 0.7% of GDP on international development. I have no doubt that that will make the world a safer place.

Ultimately, the potency of soft power is contingent on the existence, ability and will to deploy hard power when necessary. Had we not intervened in Iraq or taken action against ISIL’s advance at the request of the democratically elected Government of Iraq, it is possible that the Iraqi Government would have failed in their efforts to push back ISIL, and the situation in the region would now be significantly worse, with more people subject to ISIL’s brutality.

Let us not forget that ISIL burns prisoners of war alive, pushes gay people off buildings, and makes sexual slaves of 12-year-old girls. It beheads aid workers, and publicly tortures religious prisoners and journalists. It is ideologically committed to religious and ethnic genocide, and glories in death, violence and barbarity. If we who can do not stand up to them for those who cannot, what do we stand for?