Salisbury Incident

Lord Swire Excerpts

Monday 12th March 2018 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

The hon. Gentleman has asked me the question about the Magnitsky issue on many occasions in this House, both when I was Home Secretary and subsequently. We already have a number of powers that enable us to take action against individuals to prevent them from coming into this country, but we are looking seriously at the amendments. As I said, we want to ensure we have maximum consensus on this issue. On further action the Government might take, I will return to the House at the earliest possible opportunity, once we have a response from the Russian state, to update the House on the further measures we will take.

[Sir Hugo Swire (East Devon) (Con)]

If one permanent member of the UN Security Council carries out a targeted assassination in the country of another, surely it is time for the UN Secretary-General to launch an immediate inquiry.

[The Prime Minister]

I thank my right hon. Friend for his suggestion. The United Nations is one of the bodies, along with other allies and other organisations such as NATO, we will be speaking to about the nature of the incident that has taken place here in the United Kingdom. We will certainly be raising this matter with the UN.