Co-operation Council for the Arab States of the Gulf

Lord King of Bridgwater Excerpts

Thursday 10th October 2013 Grand Committee

[Lord King of Bridgwater (Con)]

My Lords, I join in congratulating my noble friend Lord Luce on showing a proper hereditary interest in this region in which his family’s involvement is well known. I also congratulate him on his timing. Everybody who knows the Gulf Co-operation Council and our many friends within it, with whom we have had the pleasure of working over the years in many different roles, will recognise that this is a critically important time for it. I also congratulate the Government, including the Prime Minister, the Foreign Secretary and the much regretted Alistair Burt. I am sorry to see that he has moved because I think he was extremely energetic in the work that he did but I wish Hugh Robertson well in the new responsibilities that he takes on. The Prime Minister gave a lead when he became Prime Minister in recognising and improving the contacts that had lapsed a little too much with this vital region.

It is impossible to overstate the seriousness of the present situation. One of the leaders, who had better be nameless, of one of the countries involved said that his worry was that there would be a conflagration that would split on sectarian grounds all the way from Beirut to Mumbai. Actually, I think he was wrong because the threat runs from Mali to Mumbai. The situation in Libya, echoed in the news today with the kidnapping of the Prime Minister, and the chaos in Egypt with the suggestion that ex-President Morsi might be executed, show what a tragically difficult situation those countries face. And the situation in Syria looks increasingly awful in terms of the refugee numbers, which are becoming overwhelming. They pose a real threat to Lebanon and to Jordan—not just the question of whether you can feed and nurture and provide health cover for the enormous number of refugees, but the fact that many of the refugees coming over the border into Jordan are taking any jobs they can get at any price and thus causing unemployment in Jordan to rise quite sharply. There are obvious tensions in that area. We have lost the stability of a major regional power in Egypt. Iraq gives us not much cause for confidence at the present time. At the moment, by and large, the GCC countries have managed to maintain their stability but they obviously face very real pressures—both the demographic pressure of the number of young people there and the threat of unemployment. I recall that when the original demonstrations took place in Tahrir Square in Egypt a huge number of people there were demonstrating about unemployment and the lack of jobs. Of course, we know that the chaos and confusion since have made their prospects vastly worse then they were even then. That will be reflected across other countries as their populations and the number of young people have increased. They face major challenges.

There are those demographic challenges, and then the challenges of what we might call social networking. Now, for the first time, whether it is Facebook, Twitter or the internet, a whole lot of people who previously were completely isolated from any adequate method of communication suddenly have these new channels of communication which are described in a very good brief from the Lords Library as “irreversible” and are a major challenge.

It is against that background that this country has an important role. There is no question that the relationship of some of these countries in the Gulf with the United States has changed. I do not know whether one is reading too much into the refusal of Saudi Arabia to make a speech at the United Nations or whether it is a sign of great displeasure with the United States’ failure to, as Saudi Arabia sees it, support it both in Egypt and in Syria. That is a new development. Of course, if it is true that the effect of shale gas and oil discoveries will be that the United States is exporting more oil than Saudi Arabia by 2020, and given the fact that China has now become the major customer for Saudi Arabia, there will undoubtedly be some change of commercial interest. It is against that background that our position and long-standing relationships give us a particularly important role to play. We must support serious reform, as my noble friend has said, but we must try to ensure that it comes without the catastrophic collapse that has imposed such great hardship on the people of the countries affected.

It is against that background that we must make progress through diplomatic means. I welcome the peace conference in Geneva on the Syrian issues, and hope that it will be successful. How much better than bombing Syria to see people sitting down to a peace conference; I hope that that can make progress. I am delighted that, in the next debate, my noble friend will renew the pressure on United States Secretary of State John Kerry to launch now the initiatives to get real progress on Israel and Palestine. I also welcome very much the new initiative of my right honourable friend the Foreign Secretary, William Hague, for his proposal to establish a relationship with Iran.

I know that our friends in the Gulf will have the greatest concerns about that initiative. They may fear that we are somehow going to betray them or let them down. Of course, one must be aware of the challenges and dangers. We must do this with our eyes open and not necessarily believe everything that Iranian leaders may say at this time. However, we must make the effort, and I warmly congratulate the Government on taking that initiative. I hope that that is one of the items that might add to future stability. Any countries with continuing governance all have a continuing interest in greater stability in that region. We should try to bring them all to the table and work as closely as we can with them all.