North Africa and the Middle East

Debate between Yasmin Qureshi and Denis MacShane

Thursday 17th March 2011 Commons Chamber

[Yasmin Qureshi]

I agree entirely. We do not have to look far afield—we need merely to look to Ireland, with all its history and violence. In the end, a political settlement was reached. That has been the way forward. We need to try that with all the countries in the world.

Hon. Members can call me cynical, but the difference is that Sudan, Zimbabwe, Kashmir, Palestine, Sri Lanka and all those other countries do not have oil. Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of the Congo do not have oil. Libya does. Is that our motivation? Do we want to ensure that we control that country?

[Mr MacShane]

My hon. Friend mentioned Robin Cook and I served with him as a Parliamentary Private Secretary for a number of years. I remember how bitterly he was criticised by some hon. Members who are now present in the Chamber for authorising and supporting the intervention in Kosovo without UN sanction and, indeed, the bombing raids on Iraq, some of which were without UN sanction. Kosovo had no oil—the intervention was illegal and did not have UN authority. My hon. Friend was not in the House at that time, but where did she stand on that particular armed intervention?

[Yasmin Qureshi]

I happened to spend two years working in Kosovo after the armed conflict and after the Serbian bombing. Having seen the situation, I can say that that was an immediate international humanitarian disaster that followed the massacre of 100,000 Muslim Bosnians. It was very much an effort by the United Nations to do with that particular war.

As has been mentioned, one cannot compare two things as though they are the same. Libya is a very different ball game to Kosovo and Serbia. Everybody knows what happened in the former Yugoslavia—hundreds of thousands of people were massacred and something had to be done. That is not the situation that we are talking about here.