Red Wednesday Campaign

Debate between Tobias Ellwood and Fiona Bruce

Tuesday 15th November 2016 Westminster Hall

[Mr Ellwood]

The hon. Gentleman is absolutely right to stress that. We want believers and non-believers to allow freedom of belief. That is what we are pursuing, and it is exactly Britain’s approach when we have dialogues with other countries. The fact that we have an economic relationship with other countries allows us to have necessary frank conversations, sometimes behind closed doors; I appreciate that many hon. Members might feel that they do not hear enough of what we are saying and what pace of change we expect from other countries as they raise their game. A great example, which I know the hon. Gentleman has raised on many occasions, is the use of the death penalty. We abhor it, we ourselves have moved through it and we encourage other countries that use the death penalty to meet EU guidelines and ultimately to remove it.

If there are no further interventions, I will move on. I begin by congratulating my hon. Friend the Member for Bolton West (Chris Green) on securing this important debate. It is an opportunity to confirm the Government’s commitment to the right to freedom of religion or belief. It is understandable that his speech focused on the harrowing situation faced by Christians in parts of the middle east. I certainly share his concern. As I mentioned earlier, this Government have a manifesto commitment to support freedom of religion or belief for people of all religions and non-religious people, which is exactly the point raised by the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon). In particular, we are working internationally to deliver our commitment for Christians in the middle east.

[Fiona Bruce (Congleton) (Con)]

The Minister will recall the debate held on 20 April this year, to which my hon. Friend the Member for Bolton West (Chris Green) referred and to which the Minister responded. The House unanimously called on the Government to make an immediate referral to the UN Security Council, with a view to conferring jurisdiction on the International Criminal Court so that perpetrators could be brought to justice. I was pleased that the Minister said in that debate that the Government were

“supporting the gathering and preservation of evidence that could in future be used in a court to hold Daesh to account”

and

“will do everything we can to help gather evidence that could be used by the judicial bodies”.—[Official Report, 20 April 2016; Vol. 608, c. 996.]

I have two questions for the Minister. How have the Government been facilitating the gathering and preservation of evidence of crimes, as they promised, and what steps are they taking to ensure that members of the global coalition, united to defeat Daesh, are also gathering and preserving such evidence? Given that Daesh is now rapidly losing ground in Syria and Iraq, and with the battle of Mosul raging, does he not agree that the Government should make clear how they intend to deal with the perpetrators when they are caught, and should do so with a sense of urgency?

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Ellwood]

I remember the debate well. I made it clear—I think that I was the first Minister to do so—that I believe that war crimes have been committed in Iraq and Syria and that crimes against humanity have been committed by Daesh and other extremists in that location, but it is not my opinion or the Government’s opinion that counts, because it is not a political judgment. It must be a legal judgment, and there is a process that must be approved. We cannot get a UN Security Council resolution passed until the evidence is gathered. There is a mechanism to get to the International Criminal Court, and it includes the collection and collation of evidence, as my hon. Friend highlighted.

I will not go into too much detail, other than to say that gathering the evidence, by its nature, requires people to expose themselves to dangerous circumstances. As my right hon. Friend the Foreign Secretary has said on a number of occasions, the wheels of justice grind slowly, but they grind fine. As we saw in Bosnia and the former Yugoslavia, it can take many years until those people end up in The Hague, but they are held to account. That is why the Foreign Secretary, when he visited Washington DC in July, made the case and encouraged others to support his view that we must not allow the issue to be missed. We must collect the evidence. If I may, I will speak to my hon. Friend the Member for Congleton (Fiona Bruce) outside the Chamber and familiarise her with a bit more of the detail, but I hope that she understands the sensitivities of spelling out too much, simply because of the dangers entailed.

[Fiona Bruce]

I welcome that, because evidence has come to my attention that several prominent leaders of Daesh are individuals in respect of whom the ICC has the ability to exercise its jurisdiction now, due to their nationality. I would be grateful if the Minister met with me to discuss it further.

[Mr Ellwood]

I would be delighted to do so. I simply make the case that the Foreign Secretary is extremely passionate about the issue. Indeed, it came from the voices in the Chamber saying, “What is Britain doing to hold these perpetrators to account?” We must work with the Iraqi Government, UN organisations and other members of the international community to deliver justice and promote the rights of all minorities, as well as to hold perpetrators to account.

It is also worth mentioning that we are working further afield than the middle east, as well. In Pakistan, we regularly raise concerns about the freedom of religion or belief. In March 2016, my right hon. Friend the Chancellor, the then Foreign Secretary, raised the importance of safeguarding the rights of all minorities, including religious minorities. In Nigeria, we are providing a substantial package of intelligence, military development and humanitarian support in the fight against Boko Haram, including training and advice on counter-insurgency, and £5 million in support for a regional military taskforce.

Promoting religious tolerance is critical to reconciliation and securing a lasting peace in any combat area, but particularly in Syria and Iraq. That is why we developed the Magna Carta fund, which is being used to support several projects to promote freedom of religion or belief. In Iraq, we have funded a series of grassroots meetings between religious leaders of all faiths to promote religious tolerance. Over the past year, we have supported a project promoting legal and social protection for freedom of religion or belief in Iraq. The project aims to prevent intolerance and violence towards religious communities by inspiring key leaders in Iraqi society to become defenders of freedom of religion or belief.

Our commitment to promoting freedom of religion or belief is not confined to the middle east but extends right across the piece. It is integral to our diplomatic network in promoting fundamental human rights around the globe through our conversations with host Governments and other influential actors such as faith leaders, and through our project work and organisations such as the United Nations, the European Union and the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe.

Persecution of Religious Minorities: Pakistan

Debate between Tobias Ellwood and Fiona Bruce

Thursday 11th February 2016 Westminster Hall

[Mr Ellwood]

I will be very grateful to receive that; I thank the hon. Gentleman very much indeed for the offer.

In addition to the conversations that I have already mentioned, in August last year the Foreign Secretary expressed our concerns about religious freedom and the misuse of the blasphemy laws in Pakistan. The misuse of those laws is at the core of what we are discussing here. Our concern is that sometimes judges are not willing to enforce these blasphemy laws because of concerns about their own safety. We need to encourage and further advance greater maturity of the justice system in Pakistan.

I have also impressed on the Pakistani high commissioner to the UK, Syed Abbas, the importance not only of respecting the rights of religious minorities in Pakistan but the importance of the Ahmadiyya, Shi’a, Hazara and Christian communities, many of which we have referred to in debates here in Westminster Hall and in the main Chamber.

We also work through the European Union to promote human rights overseas. For example, the EU preferential market access scheme has helped to incentivise progress on human rights in Pakistan. This has led to the creation of a cell to help with the implementation of international human rights obligations. Also, Pakistan has submitted overdue UN treaty reports and re-established a Government ministry specifically to lead on human rights. That is a very important and welcome development. This progress is encouraging, but we cannot be complacent. We recognise the need to maintain the pressure on the Government of Pakistan to honour their commitments to human rights, and we will continue to do that.

I turn now to some of the other matters that have been raised this afternoon. First, there is the issue of international aid. Aid is provided not on a national basis but on a federal basis, so we discuss these matters with the various chief ministers in Pakistan. As hon. Members know, the Foreign Office does not lead on aid, but I promise hon. Members that I will meet the relevant Minister in the Department for International Development to make sure that we can see that aid is being properly distributed in Pakistan.

Hon. Members will be aware that we have a proud legacy of making sure that aid goes to vulnerable people and is not somehow tied up in conditionality. The problem with placing conditions on the aid that we give is that we can end up denying it to the very vulnerable people whom we want to support. So we need to look at cognitive measures that will enhance and encourage change, but also recognise that the DFID contribution to Pakistan is immense. Indeed, I think that it is one of the highest aid contributions in the world.

[Fiona Bruce]

I fully accept what the Minister is saying about conditionality. The important issue that I ask him to raise with DFID Ministers is the fact that religious discrimination is a root cause of poverty, as we have demonstrated today in this Chamber. However, in my opinion, to date DFID Ministers have not sufficiently addressed this issue as a cause of poverty in the way that other issues have been addressed, for fear of appearing to discriminate. That is a hurdle in thinking that we need to overcome.

[Mr Ellwood]

My hon. Friend makes an important point about the criteria that must be met for aid to be advanced to a country. The development committee that focuses on these issues wrote the rules back in the 1950s, and the guidance on overseas development support was written in the aftermath of the second world war and designed to focus on poverty itself. We know today that instability is also directly linked to the cause of poverty, but the rules have not changed.

I have been encouraging change, and we are slowly moving in that direction. Those rules need to be updated and advanced, to recognise other ways of ensuring that poverty can be tackled, such as by providing stability and improved governance, so that people make better decisions to move their country forward and also alleviate the challenges of poverty.



A number of hon. Members spoke not only about Pakistan but about the wider issues. I think we spoke of those issues when we met the all-party group on the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community. Bulgaria was mentioned as well, which raises eyebrows. This is a country in Europe; it is part of the European Union. Why on earth are we seeing this sort of persecution in Bulgaria as well? I raised this issue with my right hon. Friend the Minister for Europe, and he is pursuing it from his angle. I will ask him to be in touch with the hon. Member for Mitcham and Morden to provide an update of what is going on. However, I am aware that the Grand Mufti of Bulgaria is very influential in these circumstances. We need to work harder, particularly as Bulgaria is essentially part of the European community, to ensure that persecution of the Ahmadiyya community does not happen so close to the UK.

A couple of other countries were also mentioned at that meeting. For example, on Thailand we continue to work with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, not only on a wide range of refugee issues but on persecution as well. Again, I will write to hon. Members with more details of what is happening on that front. As I say, Thailand was raised at the all-party group meeting. So, finally, was Indonesia.

Our ambassador in Jakarta has discussed these issues, including the plight of the Ahmadiyya community, with the Minister of Religious Affairs, and has urged him and other community leaders to ensure that the right of individuals to practise freedom of religion and belief is respected, and indeed protected. I understand that a Bill is now going through that is based on the protection of religious and faith communities, and I hope that that will be a major advancement in Indonesia. However, we need to keep the pressure on and keep working on this issue.

To conclude, I once again thank the hon. Member for Mitcham and Morden—