Algeria

Nick Smith Excerpts

Friday 18th January 2013 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend makes an important point about the role of the United Nations, and perhaps that enables me to answer better the question from the hon. Member for Islington North (Jeremy Corbyn) about the importance of political processes. I profoundly believe, for instance in Mali, that there is a military part to what needs to happen, which is beating back the terrorist-sponsored al-Qaeda-backed rebels. Clearly, in all situations like this, there needs to be political process as well to recognise the deep political problems that many of these countries have. In the United Nations and as a permanent member of the Security Council, we can play an important part, in co-ordination with our allies, to help to get these political processes right. However, I caution against people who think that we can find a purely political and diplomatic answer to the Malian crisis. There is also a problem, a clear and present danger, of a terrorist-backed regime trying to take over the whole of that country.

[Nick Smith (Blaenau Gwent) (Lab)]

Can the Prime Minister please tell us more about the Government’s assessment of the links between the terrorist groups in Algeria and al-Shabaab and Boko Haram?

[The Prime Minister]

The best way to answer that question is to say that all of those organisations that are linked to al-Qaeda are therefore linked to each other. Some have a tighter relationship with the senior leadership of al-Qaeda and some slightly looser, but all the groups he mentions, whether al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, Boko Haram in Nigeria or any of the other organisations, are pursuing similar goals of violent extremism, wanting to damage as harmfully as possible the interests of countries such as Britain.