Human Rights and Arms Sales to Saudi Arabia

Tasmina Ahmed-Sheikh Excerpts

Wednesday 8th June 2016 Westminster Hall

[Sir Alan Duncan]

If they are not from the 1980s, they are clearly not ours.

I want to try to set the context. We have two important duties in looking at this deeply important issue. We have to set the highest possible standards when we sell weapons and we have to monitor their subsequent use. We also have to understand the real dangers of the region and delve deeply into countries with which people are not wholly familiar. Yemen is probably one of the most complicated countries I have ever tried to get my head round. I have a deep understanding of the Gulf Co-operation Council countries, but anyone who thinks they understand Yemen does not. They only begin to understand when they realise how much they do not understand.

The thing about Yemen—the hon. Lady did not mention this at all—is that we are in conflict for a reason. The conflict started because a legitimate Government were displaced by highly armed Houthi rebels who had raided heavy weapons stores and used those weapons against the legitimate Government. They pushed them out of Sana’a and headed down towards Aden. The hon. Lady did not mention the human rights violations committed by the Houthis. They have rounded up teenagers, put them in rooms and blown them up.

[Ms Tasmina Ahmed-Sheikh (Ochil and South Perthshire) (SNP)]

Has the right hon. Gentleman seen the evidence provided by Amnesty International? Is he suggesting for a second that Amnesty International does not understand what is going on in Yemen?

[Sir Alan Duncan]

The hon. Lady gets too virulent in the way she puts things. I am not suggesting that Amnesty International does not understand; I am trying to explain the broad political and geopolitical context in which the conflict has arisen. That is not something we have heard in this debate so far—although we may—or that we heard in the main Chamber previously. There is a lot of Saudi bashing, but everyone needs to understand that a legitimate Government have been displaced. This is a coalition: for the first time ever, Arab countries are trying to address their own regional problems without western, co-operative joint intervention. We have been telling them for years to sort out their own problems, but as soon as they try to do so we round on them, as we are seeing in this debate.

Let me explain what is going on in Yemen. We are in the sixth week of some very crucial talks in Kuwait, during which there has been a cessation of hostilities. It has not held entirely—no cessation of hostilities ever does—but, broadly, it has happened. Remember where legitimacy lies: with the Government of Yemen, who have been forced out of the country into Saudi Arabia. The UN-sponsored talks are trying to get that legitimate Government back into Yemen.

Another point that has not yet been made is that, if we do not have the semblance of government in Yemen, we are going to have an enormous country, where there are more weapons than people, that is ungoverned. We know what happens in ungoverned space: the rise of terrorism, which affects the ungoverned country but also spreads elsewhere. Yemen is beneath Saudi Arabia and 350 Saudis have been killed inside Saudi Arabia in Houthi attacks over the southern border. That, too, has never been mentioned. If Yemen disintegrates even further, we are going to see the rise of al-Qaeda and ISIS, going across the Bab El Mandeb into the horn of Africa—

--- Later in debate ---

[Ms Tasmina Ahmed-Sheikh (Ochil and South Perthshire) (SNP)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mrs Gillan. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Rutherglen and Hamilton West (Margaret Ferrier) on securing this debate. I pay tribute to Save the Children and Amnesty International for their most excellent work. I draw the House’s attention to early-day motion 138, which I lodged in relation to the UN annual report on children and armed conflict, which was mentioned earlier.

The right hon. Member for Rutland and Melton (Sir Alan Duncan) talked about understanding geopolitics, but may I remind him that that is not the preserve of just the Conservative party? Nor have Conservative Members demonstrated by their actions in a number of international events that they have any great expertise in that. Mention was made of the realities of the world. Arguably, the influx of Scottish National party Members to the House of Commons has brought a number of realities of the world to the Chamber, which has only added to what we have been discussing.

This is not about whose side anyone is on in war. I cannot believe that anyone in this Chamber is in favour of armed conflict of any nature; we should not descend into a discussion about that. It is simply about whether we have knowledge, based on the evidence, that demonstrates that an investigation should take place.

I was pleased to be granted an urgent question last month, and I asked the MOD to make a statement on this pressing matter. We were told that UK weapons cannot have been used in this conflict because the Saudi Arabian military has told us so. What kind of investigation is that? We are asking a country to investigate itself. Let us bear in mind that that is the same Saudi Arabian Government whose human rights record is so bad that our own Ministry of Justice refused to do business with them.

There are a number of questions that need to be answered today, not least about the conflicting positions of different Government Departments. In Question Time, the Foreign Secretary stated that

“the Ministry of Defence is urgently investigating the allegations”—[Official Report, 24 May 2016; Vol. 611, c. 395.]

Then, in response to my urgent question just 10 minutes later, the Minister for Defence Procurement, the hon. Member for Ludlow (Mr Dunne), contradicted that statement by saying that the Government will simply be “seeking fresh assurances” from the Saudi Arabian Government.

It is clear that the UK Government will not conduct their own investigations into the issue. That was confirmed on the BBC World Service in an interview with an MOD official, who said:

“We are not launching an investigation”.

I have written to the Prime Minister to ask what the position is. Are we having an investigation, or are we not? I am waiting for a response from both the Ministry of Defence and the FCO on this matter. There is absolutely no doubt that the evidence suggests that this merits an investigation. I simply do not know what the Government are waiting for to justify that.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Minister for Europe (Mr David Lidington)]

I, too, congratulate the hon. Member for Rutherglen and Hamilton West (Margaret Ferrier) on securing today’s debate and on the passion with which she put her case. I apologise to her for missing the first few seconds of her remarks. I also want to express the regret of the Under-Secretary of State, my hon. Friend the Member for Bournemouth East (Mr Ellwood), for not being able to speak here today. He is actually travelling on middle east business today.

I will try to focus my remarks on answers to the many points that came up during the debate. I am deeply conscious that in the limited time available I am almost certainly going to give incomplete replies, and that I may be unable to touch on some points at all. I was disappointed when the hon. Member for Kingston upon Hull North (Diana Johnson) questioned the case for Saudi Arabia even to be considered a fit and proper partner for the United Kingdom. That would certainly be a major departure from the position taken by previous Labour Governments, including the one in which she served in the years before 2010. There is no doubt that Saudi Arabia is a very different culture, with different political traditions from those of the United Kingdom or other western democracies. However, we need to bear it in mind that it plays an increasingly important part in securing regional stability.

It is important that the big regional players should be at the heart of discussions about finding solutions to regional challenges. The Saudis have been and remain at the forefront of international efforts to defeat Daesh. Saudi was one of the first countries to participate in air strikes in Syria, and it is fully engaged in the fight to cut off Daesh’s access to finance, through its co-chairmanship of the counter-ISIL finance working group. In relation to Syria, Saudi Arabia has played a leading role in bringing together the Syrian opposition—a key element of finding a solution to the conflict. I want to say a few words about Yemen in due course, but I want to turn to the questions that were raised about some other human rights topics.

The Government remain committed to advancing the global abolition of the death penalty. That means opposing it in every circumstance, in every country. We encourage Saudi Arabia certainly to abolish the death penalty, as we do with every other country that has the death penalty on its statute book. We also encourage Saudi Arabia, so long as it has the death penalty within its law, to uphold minimum international standards, such as ensuring that sentencing is in line with article 6 of the international covenant on civil and political rights. Among other things, that means the death penalty should not be applied to minors and should only be applied to the most serious crimes.

My right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary visited Saudi Arabia last week in the course of a tour of the Gulf region, and he took that opportunity to raise with senior Saudi counterparts our concerns about human rights issues in the generic sense and a number of individual cases that I will come to in a moment. The hon. Member for Rutherglen and Hamilton West asked about a number of cases. On that of Mr Ashraf Fayadh, our understanding is that the Saudi Arabian courts have overturned the death sentence passed upon him, although he remains in detention. We continue to follow that and similar cases closely.

During his visit on 29 May, the Foreign Secretary raised the case of Ali al-Nimr and the two others who were juveniles when they committed the crimes of which they were subsequently convicted. Our expectation is that Ali al-Nimr and the two others will not be executed, but we will of course continue to raise those cases with the Saudi authorities. The hon. Lady asked about Raif Badawi. We remain very concerned about that case. We continue to express that concern at both official and ministerial levels to the Saudis. Our understanding is that the case is still under consideration in the Saudi supreme court, but we do not expect further lashes to be administered.

A number of hon. Members asked questions about the alleged use of cluster munitions by Saudi forces in Yemen. The situation as regards the United Kingdom is this: we have not supplied cluster weapons of any kind to Saudi Arabia since the 1980s. The United Kingdom signed the convention on cluster munitions in 2008 and ratified it in May 2010. Since 2008, we have not supplied, maintained or supported those weapons anywhere in the world.

[Ms Ahmed-Sheikh]

Will the Minister give way?

[Mr Lidington]

No, I am not going to give way.

The Government take the allegations that have been made about Yemen very seriously. We are seeking clarification from the Saudi-led coalition about those allegations, and in line with our obligations under the convention on cluster munitions, we have always made it clear to the Saudis that we cannot support the use of cluster munitions in any circumstances. We continue to encourage Saudi Arabia as a non-party to the convention to accede to it. Accession to the convention will then oblige Saudi Arabia, as it obliged the United Kingdom when we ratified the convention, to take steps to not only identify but dispose safely of any stocks of cluster munitions that it may have, either on its own territory or anywhere else within its jurisdiction.

Much of this debate has focused upon Yemen. I should say, in response to the questions about the Yemen Executive Mine Action Centre, that we are supporting United Nations Development Programme-led efforts to rebuild the capacity of Yemen’s national de-mining institutions, including YEMAC. That is part of our wider humanitarian help to Yemen. We are contributing just over £1 million to that work in 2016 from the cross- departmental programme expenditure within Whitehall.

On the Yemen situation more broadly, my right hon. Friend the Member for Rutland and Melton (Sir Alan Duncan) set out the overall geopolitical position with both succinctness and skill. The fact is that the Saudi-led coalition is present in Yemen at the invitation of the legitimate Government of that country. I do not think we can simply wash our hands and say, “We wish they weren’t there, but we don’t want to express any view about the Houthis, the fate of Yemen or the wider region.”

[Ms Ahmed-Sheikh]

Will the Minister give way on that point?

[Mr Lidington]

No, I am not giving way. In fairness, the hon. Lady intervened many times during the course of the debate. I have little time available, and I think her hon. Friend, the hon. Member for Rutherglen and Hamilton West, wants some time to reply to the debate at the end of our proceedings.

The coalition is there at the invitation of the legitimate Government. Saudi Arabia, whatever criticisms we make of it, is actively helping the United Nations supervision of humanitarian assistance in Yemen, and my understanding is that Saudi Arabia is also the largest single bilateral donor to the humanitarian relief taking place in Yemen. Those things, too, need to be weighed in any overall judgment we make about the activities of the coalition within Yemen.

In respect of the allegations about breaches of international humanitarian law, the Ministry of Defence makes assessments of how the Saudis are acting and whether the coalition is observing international human rights obligations. The MOD assessment is that the Saudi-led coalition is not targeting civilians; that Saudi processes and procedures have been put in place to ensure respect for the principles of international humanitarian law; and that the Saudis both have been and continue to be genuinely committed to compliance with international humanitarian law.