North Africa and the Middle East

Lord Soames of Fletching Excerpts

Thursday 17th March 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hague]

I will come on to Bahrain. I want to make a few general points and then go quickly through each of the countries concerned. Perhaps I can respond to those points then.

[Nicholas Soames (Mid Sussex) (Con)]

Does my right hon. Friend agree that for decades British ambassadors throughout the Gulf, pressed by their political masters, having been urging political reform on those countries? It is nothing new; it is just that they have not been heeded.

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[Nicholas Soames (Mid Sussex) (Con)]

I do not propose to follow the formidable speech of my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary, who dealt very easily with the situation in many of the countries that we are discussing, nor the Opposition’s preoccupation with the telephone habits of President Obama, but rather to concentrate on what has animated the extraordinary events that we have seen across the middle east in the past few weeks.

In north Africa and the wider middle east, we are now at the centre of the most momentous events. History is sweeping through the region. The events that we are debating today were inevitable but largely—indeed, almost wholly—unforeseen. A Tunisian man who set himself on fire because no official of a deeply corrupt state would listen to him after months of his asking has caused the lid to be blown off an entire region with frail institutions, scant civil society and virtually no democratic traditions or culture of innovation. We are, as my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary said, witnessing something akin to the importance of the fall of the Berlin wall, and we will need to be clear in the days ahead about what these developments mean and how Britain and the west in general should respond to them.

The democratic transition will be a very hard road to follow, for the truth is that the much-vaunted stability that we all went along with for generations was a stability frozen in time and that the hopes and aspirations now stirring in many parts of the Arab world have been smothered for generations. People are now seeking their rights, sometimes at great personal danger to themselves. Nothing will ever be the same again, and a complete policy rethink will be demanded and required in the days ahead as we all struggle to keep up with unfolding events. I urge the House not to underestimate the profound sense of change sweeping across the whole middle east that the Arab humiliation is now over and that there is a long overdue dawn of pride and dignity and a great expectation that freedom and opportunity have arrived—a tide that is unstoppable and that brings with it great uncertainty and very great difficulties.

Contrary to much received opinion and caricature, quite apart from its vast, unmatched contribution to civilisation in the past, the Arab world is proving that it rejects injustice, that it wants freedom and that it is willing to die for democracy. There is thus no overstating the importance of the fact that this Arab revolution is the work of the Arabs themselves. The answer is broadly that reform, and not repression, is the way to lasting stability, and Arab Governments need to understand very quickly that denying people their basic rights does nothing to preserve even a veneer of stability. As W. B. Yeats said after the difficulties in Dublin:

“A terrible beauty is born.”

I fear that the wealthy western nations have regarded with complacency for far too long the hopeless stagnation of many Arab countries. Protesters in Egypt, Libya, Yemen, Jordan, Syria, Iran, Bahrain, Gaza, Algeria and Tunisia are denouncing the malignancy of joblessness, the lack of opportunity and the dreadful corruptness of oppressive rule. It is thus far bad news, in my judgment, that no single leader in the Arab world has yet put forward a creative political strategy to address this discontent, opting instead for half-measures designed principally to safeguard the very systems that public opinion is rejecting. We do not know where this will end, but Britain must play a big role and I am confident that she will do so, particularly through the judicious use of our soft power with all that that involves.

Further, as the Prime Minister has said, now is not the time to park the middle east peace process. I pay great tribute to the energetic work of the Under-Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, my hon. Friend the Member for North East Bedfordshire (Alistair Burt), in the middle east and I commend the excellent way in which he goes about his very difficult job. I hope that he will consider whether it would be right to resurrect the Arab peace initiative of 2002—the Saudi peace initiative—which still lies on the table and is the only remaining architecture extant for the continuation of the peace talks. My hon. Friend the Member for Harlow (Robert Halfon) and I take a slightly different view on these matters but we both want to see peace in the middle east. He is a doughty champion of these causes and he knows that peace cannot come about unless the Arabs and the Palestinians are made to go back to the table and proceed. There is no better time than now; an Arab peace initiative at this time would give the Arabs face and confidence, and the Israelis should seize this moment. They should see that a tide and spirit of change is sweeping though the middle east and should catch this great surf of history.

Contrary to what my hon. Friend the Member for Stone (Mr Cash) might think, the European Union can give substantial practical help to the consolidation of democracy and the rule of law within the Arab League countries, particularly via the Barcelona process and through many other means. We should, of course, provide every assistance that we can to those countries that clearly intend to do the right thing. Britain should press in the Council of Ministers and the Foreign Affairs Council for properly supervised arrangements to support the training of police and civil servants and the setting up of electoral commissions and independent legal and prosecution services. We should also seek to assist in the building of political and other institutions—a piece of work that has been most admirably done by the Westminster Foundation for Democracy, to which an hon. Member has already paid tribute. We should, at all costs, provide large-scale assistance for those countries that are truly prepared to change.

The peoples of the middle east now demand a better life. After years of betrayal, bad government and oppression, they deserve the opportunity to enjoy the rights and freedoms that we take for granted. I am confident that the British Government, with our American allies and European partners, will play a bold and energetic role in securing that endeavour.

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[Robert Halfon]

No, I do not agree, actually. I believe in a two-state solution, and I believe that some of the west bank will obviously be given over as part of a Palestinian state, but I did not agree with my Government when they voted for that motion.

I accept that popular uprisings, such as the waves of protest throughout north Africa and Arab countries, might lead to Islamist fundamentalist rule, and we are not sure yet whether this is eastern Europe 1989 or Iran 1979. Arguably, indeed, Iran is living through its own version of the terror that followed the French revolution in 1789, with a despotic and brutal regime. That is why we have to divert aid into building democratic institutions and nurturing them where they exist.

I want to turn to Iran as the elephant in the room. Through Hezbollah, Iran has huge influence in Lebanon. In Gaza, Iran supports Hamas. Iran also has close relations with the President of Syria. We know that Iran supports activities against British troops in Afghanistan and Iraq. It may soon have more influence in Bahrain. And, of course, it is about to have nuclear weapons. Iran is what Reagan once described the Soviet Union as—the new evil empire. Using the example of Iran, we must not let the middle east fall out of the frying pan of dictatorship into the fire of Islamism.

[Nicholas Soames]

Does my hon. Friend agree that it is very important not to confuse the Iranian people with the Iranian Government?

[Robert Halfon]

My hon. Friend makes an incredibly important point. I agreed with much of his speech. The Iranian people have a totally opposite view from that of the regime which, sadly, has suppressed them for so long.

What is to be done? We need a radical reappraisal of our foreign policy. We need a strategy that supports democracy over dictatorships. The thrust has to be to support reformist movements in the region. Let me briefly talk about two of them. First, there is Kurdistan. To those who argue that democracy takes hundreds of years to evolve, and who say that we should not interfere, Kurdistan, in northern Iraq, proves the opposite. Established only in 2003, the regional government makes its own laws, controls its own army, and decides its own pace of economic development. It is a relatively terrorist-free and progressive Muslim country, despite facing continuous threats from al-Qaeda. I declare an interest, because I am an active member of the all-party group on Kurdistan and recently visited the country. Only today, the Bishop of Arbil was in Parliament—because I was here in the debate I was not able to go—explaining that Kurdistan has welcomed thousands of Christians who have suffered very badly from terrorist attacks in Iraq. I urge the Government to do more to support Kurdistan in its welcoming of Christians to the region.

In the same way, our current policy towards Israel should be much more supportive. Criticism of Israel is out of all proportion to that of other countries. It is always incredible how everyone wants to be a candid friend of Israel but no one is a candid friend of France, Germany or America. Yes, of course Israel is imperfect, and yes, there are problems with settlements, but the fact is that in a region of dictators, Israel is a bulwark of freedom. The excuse is often given that Israel-Palestine is the driving force behind all conflict in the middle east, but recent events have disproved that. I believe that peace would happen incredibly quickly in Israel with two states—a Palestinian state and an Israeli state—if Arabist dictators stopped funding terrorism. The more democratic these countries become, the less likely there is to be a war. I do not think there is an example in history of two democracies that have fought each other. I have often met Palestinian moderates who have the will to make peace, but not the authority, whereas Hamas, sadly, has the authority but not the will.

Let us have a foreign policy in the middle east that actively supports democracy over dictatorships. As my hon. Friend the Member for Beckenham (Bob Stewart) said, let us do all we can to have a no-fly zone in Libya. Let us do all we can to supply arms to those bravely fighting against Gaddafi—today or tomorrow, if possible, and unilaterally, if we have to. In doing so, we will reverse the many mistakes of recent years and make a stand for the people in the middle east who have the right to freedom.