Iran

Tom Tugendhat Excerpts

Monday 13th January 2020 Commons Chamber

[Dominic Raab]

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his question. That is incredibly important. It is not clear to me whether that is what caused the shooting down of the Ukrainian airliner in this case, but I am very willing to hear his points on that and on any initiative related to it.

[Tom Tugendhat (Tonbridge and Malling) (Con)]

I welcome the efforts of my right hon. Friend and my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister in going to Amman this weekend to express condolences for the death of our partner and friend Sultan Qaboos. Does he agree that, reaching out through friends in the region, particularly Qatar, Kuwait and, of course, the new Sultan Haitham in Oman, would be a good avenue for making sure that Iran not only comes back into the fold and frees its people from this awful tyranny, but perhaps gives up the policy of hostage-taking that has taken not just Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe away from her daughter, but many, many others from their families, too?

[Dominic Raab]

Like my hon. Friend, I pay tribute to the Sultan of Oman for his incredible track record of service to his country, and we look forward to working with the new Sultan and the Government of Oman on all those issues. My hon. Friend is absolutely right to condemn the taking of dual nationals into detention. The taking of Nazanin and of all the UK dual nationals is groundless. Their treatment has been well below the standards that we would expect. Fundamentally, they should all be released without condition. This is part of the pattern of unlawful behaviour that Iran needs to correct if it wants to come in from the international cold.