Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:

To ask Her Majesty's Government (1) what criteria informed the decision to direct £16 million of UK aid to improving educational links with Iran between 2013 and 2017, (2) what projects the grants were used on, (3) how the projects were monitored, and (4) what plans they have to publish the results of such monitoring.

Between 2013 and 2017, the total FCO bilateral spending on Iran was approximately £4.4 million. These funds were spent on developing long-term people-to-people educational and cultural links between our two countries, including supporting English teachers, artists and Chevening scholars. Chevening supports exceptional young people all over the world to reach their potential, and remains open for applicants in Iran. Given these projects were run by a combination of British Council, Chevening and the FCO, these programmes were monitored and evaluated in line with standard FCO and British Council processes. The British Council do not currently operate or fund programmes in Iran.