Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs and Defence

Many others have interpreted the position slightly differently, and we have been talking to those people. My right hon. and learned Friend the Member for North-East Fife, who is one of Parliament's pre-eminent experts in the field, is examining precisely such issues. On Iran, no one can doubt that the situation remains alarming, and I agree in part with the right hon. Member for Richmond, Yorks. I also agree with others about the need to condemn the way Iran has treated our consular employees. The shocking recent International Atomic Energy Agency report says much about how Iran has been deceiving the world, yet the current question for policy makers on Iran is whether the diplomatic engagement and negotiations have reached the end of the road and it is now time for sanctions or whether there is room still for at least one more go at negotiations. Even if one could be sure that Russia would support tougher United Nations sanctions—and I am not—the recent discussions on a deal over uranium for the Tehran research reactor seemed to me still to have real life in them. As the Foreign Secretary alluded to earlier, it is true that the Iranians are insisting that any uranium swap occurs in Iran, not outside Iran, but would the Six really want to be responsible for walking away from the diplomatic route because they were unwilling to compromise on the detail of a deal? I hope not. The right hon. Member for Richmond, Yorks may be right that we need to prepare some of the background for sanctions, but I would keep the tool of sanctions in the box at least for a little while longer, because if a deal is struck on the uranium swap, the chances of getting Iran to discuss the military dimension and the outstanding issues increases. Indeed, those chances could be improved if they were combined with a focus on other issues of common concern, especially, of course, Afghanistan. While the nuclear issue as it relates to North Korea gets less attention in this House—it has not been spoken about today—I urge the Government to do all they can to get the Pyongyang regime back to the Six-power talks. Too often we appear to believe that North Korea is fundamentally a show for the US and China to work on with South Korea, and we underplay the role of the European Union. I want to speak more about the new EU High Representative later, but given Baroness Ashton's success in trade talks with South Korea, perhaps she has the contacts and understanding to help make a breakthrough if the Council were to empower her to explore the options. This needs to be more of a priority for the Foreign and Commonwealth Office. Obviously, the nuclear issue is only one of many where a multilateral, multi-polar approach to foreign policy is essential. However, as other colleagues will no doubt speak at length on issues such as the climate change conference, the need for the G20 to collaborate on the economy, or the millennium development goals, I will not touch on them now, but I want to reflect briefly on some of the continuing challenges for multilateralism, beginning with the role of China. There is much to welcome about the role of China, and the part it wishes to play in the world. China's economic influence is well known, and the Chinese response to the global recession has been helpful. In some respects, the proposals from the Chinese on climate change reveal real leadership and understanding, but China's approach in all too many countries and its focus on economic issues before and above any consideration of other, wider concerns, such as humanitarian issues or international law, is alarming. Let me give a few examples. In Sri Lanka, the Chinese sold large amounts of weapons to the Sri Lankan Government and in return have been allowed many commercial opportunities, especially in terms of the development of a massive port in Sri Lanka that is of strategic economic and security importance to the Chinese. Far from not interfering in domestic politics, as the Chinese protest is their position, that policy was calculated and deliberate. While I welcome the Sri Lankan Government's announcement that they are to allow those in the internally displaced person camps to move freely, surely that remains an inadequate response to the humanitarian disaster in some of those camps. Moreover, that announcement was certainly not a result of pressure from the Chinese, but it may well have been a result of pressure from the EU, which proposed not to renew the generalised system of preferences—GSP—plus trade concessions. I hope the Government and the EU are not going to go soft on the GSP plus trade concessions and our concerns about human rights in Sri Lanka just because of this weekend's announcement. The Chinese are easily the largest foreign investors in Sudan, and probably also the largest market for its oil. At the United Nations, the Chinese have blocked stronger international progress and appear to have done nothing behind the scenes to get the Khartoum Government to stop the actions of the Janjaweed and other Government-backed militias in Darfur. Elsewhere in Africa, from Zimbabwe to the Democratic Republic of the Congo, we see the Chinese winning knock-down deals, partly because their contracts come with no questions asked. There are apologists who say, "Well, the west has done exactly the same" or "China has brought lots of investment." Well, that may be so, but I do not believe that such investments inevitably require a power such as China to adopt an amoral stance. There are plenty of examples of investment in developing countries being used smartly to lever improvements for their wider population—this is a question of political will. China would win more friends and influence, and would boost the multilateralism it professes, if it wielded its economic muscle in more enlightened ways—I hope that President Obama has been saying as much on his recent trip. As we approach the end of the first year of President Obama's first term, many commentators are circling to lambast him for the lack of progress, but on the big issues they are utterly wrong. On Afghanistan, they say that he has delayed, but I think that he is right not to rush. On Iran, they say that he has been too willing to focus on diplomacy, but I think that he needs to be encouraged to stick with it. On the middle east, they say that he has made little progress, but I think he has been courageous and right to expose Israel on the critical issue of the settlements. Prime Minister Netanyahu, Likud and their coalition partners are in real danger of totally isolating and undermining the moderate Palestinians and Arabs—people who have been patient and moderate despite all the humiliations. For Israel's sake, I hope that the Israeli Government wake up soon and realise that while settlement expansion continues it is simply unreasonable to expect any Palestinian leader to negotiate. Of course we know that Israelis still suffer dreadfully under the threat of terrorist attack, especially from the rockets of Hamas and others, and the international community must always remember to condemn such indiscriminate attacks made on civilians populations, but how does alienating Palestinians from their more moderate leaders in Fatah and elsewhere hinder and hurt Hamas? How does the continuing blockade of Gaza win over the Palestinians? Obama must try to get Netanyahu to face up to that political reality. If he does not, I fear that the long-term peace and security Israel rightly craves and deserves will be postponed still further. I wish to touch briefly on two issues before concluding, the first of which is the European Union and the second of which is Iraq. We are to have a debate on European affairs shortly, so I will keep my remarks on the EU particularly short. However, given the significance of the recent final ratification of the Lisbon treaty and the decisions for the new President of the European Council and the High Representative, I want to welcome the opportunity Europe has to press ahead and act more effectively on the practical European and international problems that affect our constituents, be they on the economy, the environment or organised crime. With the institutional wrangling over, the EU can be more effective on foreign and security policy than in the past. Of course that will not happen overnight—it was never going to—but with the sensible appointments of Herman Van Rompuy and Baroness Cathy Ashton, real progress will be made. The Foreign Secretary had argued that we needed a President of the European Council who would stop the traffic in Beijing. That was not only wrong, but it was the reverse of how he and his colleagues sold the provisions for this post in this House and in the public debate. The then Minister for Europe, the right hon. Member for East Renfrewshire (Mr. Murphy), and I both argued that these posts were rightly constrained by the requirements for unanimity on foreign and security policy, and were about greater efficiency and effectiveness. The Conservatives and others sought to ignore that reality; they scaremongered about European Presidents and Foreign Ministers as if the new posts came with great decision-making powers, whereas, in reality, they are the servants of the nation states. It would serve the argument against Euroscepticism better if the Foreign Secretary's line on Europe was more consistent and if he left the confusion on Europe to the Conservatives. Pro-Europeans need to take the European debate to the Conservatives on foreign policy, be that on EU-Russia relations, the middle east or elsewhere. The Foreign Secretary opened this debate with an upbeat assessment of the situation in Iraq, but when one reads a lot of the reports, one finds that the political and economic situation there is extremely fragile. Of course we hope that more progress will be made, but Britain and the others who invaded Iraq need to be there to ensure that we deliver on our development commitments. When the Iraq inquiry was announced, the Liberal Democrats raised serious concerns about its structure, timetable and membership. On the eve of its opening its public sessions, new concerns have arisen. The Cabinet Office recently published a protocol on the documents for that inquiry, which specifically excludes some documents even going to the inquiry and puts a series of restrictions on what documents the inquiry can publish. I do not believe that that is delivering on what the Prime Minister promised when he announced the inquiry. Many others are concerned about how the secretariat for the inquiry is being staffed not by lots of outside experts in a mixture with civil servants, but by people who were all in the Foreign and Commonwealth Office or in the defence and the intelligence services at the time. We believe that they do not give the inquiry the independence that it needs. Our foreign policy deliberations will remain scarred over the question of the Iraq war unless and until the inquiry is got right. We should have learned the lessons earlier and I believe that our efforts in Afghanistan and elsewhere would be rather more effective if this inquiry had happened earlier. I hope that it will be able to deliver the full, independent and comprehensive verdict that we need to go forward.