Algeria

Matthew Offord Excerpts

Monday 21st January 2013 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

I can certainly give my hon. Friend that assurance. I have had several conversations with Bob Dudley, the head of BP, in recent days and, as I just said, it is very important that companies recognise their responsibilities, look at all the modern levels of threat and work out what they need to do for themselves and with the countries in which they are located.

[Dr Matthew Offord (Hendon) (Con)]

On 13 March last year, I raised my concerns on the Floor of the House about Libyan weaponry falling into the hands of terrorists who were intent on kidnapping. In the light of my question then, the recent incident is even more regrettable, so may I urge the Prime Minister to put pressure on the international community to end the illicit circulation of small arms and light weapons and ammunition for them in the region?

[The Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend raises a very important point. Frankly, Libya had a problem with excessive levels of firearms in civilian possession long before the fall of Gaddafi, and the problem has worsened in recent times. That is why we are working closely with the Libyan Government to help them to build security forces that can bring greater security to that country. I do not accept the view of those who say that we would somehow be better off if authoritarian dictators such as Gaddafi were still in power, not only because of what I said about his personal encouragement of terrorism around the world, but because I think that such regimes encouraged many young people to take up the path of jihadism, extremism and violence, perhaps not in Libya but in other parts of the world. We are still dealing with that today.