Lord Walney
Main Page: Lord Walney (Crossbench - Life peer)Department Debates - View all Lord Walney's debates with the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office
(8 years ago)
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John Woodcock (Barrow and Furness) (Lab/Co-op)
The Minister knows that I respect him and I know that he wants to do more, but I have to say that for a Minister of the Crown to stand at the Dispatch Box and effectively read from a Kremlin press release in saying that any aid mission will be shot down is a poisonous and sickening counsel of despair. He has said that he wants parliamentary backing for us to do more—for a unilateral or multilateral mission. He has that, so why do the Government not have the courage of their convictions and make sure that this can be another Kosovo, rather than another Rwanda?
Mr Ellwood
First, in Kosovo, we had troops on the ground. It was a very different situation there. We had control of the airspace—the environment was very different. I will check what I said in Hansard, but there is the possibility that a British aircraft could be shot down. [Interruption.] If I said anything near that, I correct myself and use this opportunity to say that we would be putting British air personnel in harm’s way. I hope that that is something with which the hon. Gentleman would concur. Therefore, it is a point that colleagues such as my right hon. Friend the Minister for the Armed Forces must consider when they make a recommendation to the Foreign Office on whether or not this is practical.