Syria

Peter Grant Excerpts

Tuesday 24th July 2018 Commons Chamber

[Sir Alan Duncan]

First, I pay enormous tribute to Jordan not only for helping with the extraction of the White Helmets, but for being prepared to take some of them, along with many tens, even hundreds of thousands of Syrian citizens, who, over the last few years, have gone to the likes of Jordan and Lebanon. Without the generosity of such neighbours, many, many people would be caught in the conflict by having to stay there. Those countries having admitted so many—actually, millions of—Syrian citizens is something that the world will be able to look back on over the years as a great humanitarian act. I totally agree with my hon. Friend about the necessity of trying to stop the flow of weapons, but in terms of doing anything on the ground or from the air, I hope that he will appreciate that it is not my role today to commit to any such action in the way he hints at in his question.

[Peter Grant (Glenrothes) (SNP)]

Thank you for granting this urgent question, Mr Speaker, and I add my congratulations and thanks to the hon. Member for Wirral South (Alison McGovern) for the thoughtful, compassionate and very well-informed way in which she asked her questions. About 2.7 million refugees are in and around Idlib right now. They have all fled from other parts of Syria and have nowhere else to go. If Idlib turns into carnage, many of those 2.7 million people, including possibly 1 million children, will be left with no hope. As we have heard often enough, the situation is becoming desperate, and it is more desperate now than it has ever been.

I have often criticised Israel here and elsewhere in this building, so I have no hesitation on this occasion in commending and thanking Israel for the speedy and effective way in which they got so many of the White Helmets, and vitally, their loved ones, out of the danger zone. However, we should be under no illusions as to why the White Helmets and medics in Syria are in such danger: they will be the witnesses who bring Assad and his colleagues to account for crimes against humanity when, at some time in future, this horror on earth begins to settle down. It is so important to protect the witnesses who will hold the killers to account, so that those who commit mass murder will always know that they will be brought to justice sooner or later.

I have two questions for the Minister. First, a number of countries have established their own national mechanisms for the prediction and prevention of mass atrocities, either at home or elsewhere. The UK Government to date have not. Do they have any plans to join countries such as the USA in implementing such a strategy? Secondly, in December 2015, when the House was asked to agree military action in Syria, we were told that this would help to establish a provisional civilian Government in Syria, hopefully within six months. We are now two years past that expected date and a civilian Government of any kind is further away than ever. Have the Government done any assessment to establish why the predictions that they made in December 2015 were so catastrophically off-target, and what are they doing to make sure that similar predictions will be a bit more reliable?

[Sir Alan Duncan]

The hon. Gentleman is slightly unreasonable in saying that our predictions have to be reliable, in the way that he describes, as if it were entirely in our gift. We are dealing with a horrid, ghastly international conflict in which we are a player, in some ways, but we are not there on the ground in a way that can influence things as he wants. However, there is one area on which I strongly agree with him—that is, the question of accountability. We are absolutely committed to supporting efforts to pursue accountability for human rights abuses and war crimes in Syria, and there undoubtedly have been such.

We strongly support the work of the United Nations’ IIIM—the International, Impartial and Independent Mechanism—which investigates and collects evidence of the most serious crimes committed in Syria. We have contributed £200,000 to the start-up costs of that organisation, and we are funding non-governmental organisations that collect evidence for future prosecutions. We are also supporting the important work of the independent UN Commission of Inquiry, which is reporting on violations and abuses, and we have been in the lead on successful diplomatic efforts to strengthen the capability of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons to prevent the further use of chemical weapons and to attribute responsibility to those who might use them.