Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe

Philip Hollobone Excerpts

Monday 7th January 2019 Commons Chamber

[Mr Philip Hollobone (Kettering) (Con)]

May I congratulate the hon. Member for Hampstead and Kilburn (Tulip Siddiq) on tabling this urgent question, you, Mr Speaker, on granting it, and the Minister on his response to it? Will he share with the House his thinking as to why the Iranian regime seems to be willing to use up scarce diplomatic capital and to incur further reputational damage by not only the continued detention of this particular woman but her worsening circumstances?

[Alistair Burt]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend. If I was to offer some thoughts on that they would take us the best part of the next half-hour, because again I go back to the point about the complexities in relation to Iran. This is a 40-year-old regime with different power structures and a concern about a world that it views rather differently from us in terms of the threat it feels is posed to it, and that plays into an equally complex situation in the region, where many see threats against them and take actions that only increase threats, rather than decrease them. It is not possible to offer a snap, cod view of thinking except to say Iran pays proper understanding, but equally, in doing so, there can be no turning away from those areas where we think the conduct of Iran has not been right and has not been correct, and we certainly make that case, as well as seeking, where we can, to understand the position it puts to us and the rest of the world.