Daesh: Genocide of Minorities

Debate between Stephen Timms and Jim Cunningham

Wednesday 20th April 2016 Commons Chamber

[Stephen Timms (East Ham) (Lab)]

I join others in congratulating the hon. Member for Congleton (Fiona Bruce) on securing the debate, on her indefatigable work in this area, and on the way in which she opened the debate. I apologise for having missed the first few minutes of her speech. I am grateful to her for organising yesterday’s evidence session, to which every speaker so far has referred, and which included harrowing personal testimony about the horrors that Daesh is inflicting on people in Iraq and Syria whose religious outlook and faith are different from Daesh’s.

It is difficult to deny that what is going on meets the tests for genocide. Of course the bar is set high, and rightly so, but large numbers of Yazidis, Christians and Shi’a Muslims have been killed. It is clear—this point was made by my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, West Derby (Stephen Twigg)—that that meets the test set out in the convention on the prevention and punishment of genocide, as it is action committed

“with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group”.

It is clear that that is what Daesh is seeking to do.

I think that Pope Francis was right when, last year, he described the killing of Christians in the middle east as genocide. As we have heard, the United States Secretary of State and the US Congress have recognised what is happening as genocide—last month, I think—and we should do so as well. We understand that the Government are likely to argue that it is for the judiciary, not Parliament, to make such a determination, but it is not clear to me—perhaps the Minister will be able to explain—what trigger for judicial action could lead to the view, which I think we all share, that genocide is under way. I hope very much that the House will agree to the motion, so that the Government can make the reference for which the hon. Member for Congleton has argued.

[Mr Jim Cunningham]

My right hon. Friend has asked a very interesting question. We should bear in mind that it was the allies who set up the Nuremberg courts. Governments can, in fact, get together and do something.

[Stephen Timms]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. It is not clear to me how this can happen in the United Kingdom if the Government do not act. Last night we heard from a young woman, who has been referred to already, who had seen her father and brothers killed simply for being Yazidis. She herself had been raped and enslaved. She made it very clear in her evidence that what was going on was genocide, of Yazidis and also of Christians—she made it clear that Christians were included in the genocide—and as US Secretary of State John Kerry pointed out, it is certainly the case that Shi’a Muslims have been victims of genocide as well.

Equitable Life (Payments) Bill

Debate between Stephen Timms and Jim Cunningham

Tuesday 14th September 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mr Jim Cunningham (Coventry South) (Lab)]

Is not the fact of the matter that Members who are now in government knew what the economic situation was when they were campaigning in the general election, yet still signed those pledges?

[Stephen Timms]

That is precisely what happened.

I just wish to tell the House the main amendments that we will table in Committee. I hope that the first will meet no opposition, because it directly picks up on a point in the EMAG pledge. It will require that the payments scheme be independent of government. The Bill does not say that, but our view is that it should; indeed, the Minister has confirmed that he intends it to be independent.

The Minister made a slightly puzzling point in his statement to the House on 22 July, when he said:

The ombudsman…concluded that the design of the scheme should be independent of the Government.”—[Official Report, 22 July 2010; Vol. 514, c. 577.]

That is of course true, but the ombudsman concluded that the scheme itself should be independent—that is the point that should be in the Bill, and it is crystal clear in the EMAG pledge. We will doubtless see lots of wriggling by those on the Benches opposite about exactly what was meant by the phrase “proper compensation” in the pledge once the figures are announced on 20 October; many Members will explain that they did not think it meant what EMAG members think it meant. But on scheme independence there is no wriggle room in the pledge, so we will table an amendment to make that a requirement.