Oral Answers to Questions

Malcolm Rifkind Excerpts

Tuesday 17th June 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mark Simmonds]

The hon. Gentleman raises an important point, and I can give him an assurance that we are heavily engaged from a diplomatic perspective in trying to support the international community in finding a resolution to the challenges that the eastern DRC has faced for far too long. To that end I met both the Rwandan Foreign Minister and Senator Feingold, the US special representative for the region, to encourage everybody to work together, both to find a lasting solution to remove the militia groups that operate in the eastern DRC, including the ADF and the FDLR, but also to find long-term solutions to the big problem.

[Sir Malcolm Rifkind (Kensington) (Con)]

We should welcome the resumption of diplomatic relations with Tehran and their normalisation, but is it not necessary to reassure our closest allies in the middle east that there are severe limits for the foreseeable future as to the kind of relationship that we can have with Iran? Will it not in fact be the kind of relationship that the west had with the Soviet Union during the cold war—diplomatic relations, trade and practical co-operation in specific areas?

[Mr Hague]

There are limits, and it will start off with a small diplomatic team and we will seek to build that up in stages as relations develop, so it will be a small embassy to begin with. Of course, many difficult areas of relations will remain, including on the nuclear issue, on regional stability and on human rights in Iran, and we will not shrink from pursuing those issues just as strongly as we always have.