British-Iranian Relations

Question for Short Debate

Asked by

To ask His Majesty’s Government what their priorities are in respect of the conduct of British-Iranian relations.

My Lords, in thanking all noble Lords who are to speak today, I wish that more time was available for an extended parliamentary debate. I should also record for the sake of transparency that the noble Lord, Lord Polak, and I are both sanctioned by the Iranian regime.

Key issues that the Committee will want the Minister to address include Iran’s reported ability to have enriched uranium to levels just short of the threshold for making a nuclear bomb. We will want to hear about its supply of drones to Putin for his use in the illegal war in Ukraine and its support for regional proxies destabilising the region—not least for the Houthis in Yemen, where an estimated 150,000 people have been killed in the war, including 10,000 children. We will want to hear about the malign activities of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, inside and outside Iran, and the continued lamentable and dismal failure to proscribe it; about abductions and extrajudicial killings, including of UK citizens, and the increasing use of the death penalty; about the decision this week of the independent TV station Iran International to leave London because of threats to its staff, along with similar, systematic targeting of BBC Persian staff and their families; about the shocking ill-timed cuts to the BBC Persian services when widespread protests are sweeping the country, heroically initiated by defiant women, and when the need for the flow of reliable news rather than propaganda has never been greater. We will also hear about the systematic abuse of human rights, not least for political and religious beliefs, including those of Baha’is and Christians whose beliefs do not conform to those of Iran’s repressive theocratic regime.

I turn first to nuclear proliferation. The inspectors for the International Atomic Energy Agency say that levels of enriched uranium at Iran’s nuclear sites are now just 6% below the threshold for a nuclear weapon. In a week during which North Korea launched an intercontinental ballistic missile, it was disturbing to read that their brothers in arms in Iran are also developing comparable technology, with direct application to intermediate and intercontinental-range ballistic missiles.

Back in 2021 in the integrated review, the United Kingdom asserted that with its allies it would

“hold Iran to account for its nuclear activity”.

I would be grateful if the Minister could tell us when the update of the review will be completed and explain what we mean by accountability, how we intend to respond to these most recent developments, and what it meant when we said we remain

“open to talks on a more comprehensive nuclear and regional deal”

—not least in the context of President Biden’s reported remarks that the JCPOA is dead.

In any event, why should we believe anything this regime says or promises? It told the world that its centrifuges could enrich uranium only to a 60% level of purity. As its total enrichment of uranium stockpiles now exceeds JCPOA limits by at least 18 times, it is patently clear that this is not a regime whose word counts for anything.

My Lords, for many years I have been associated directly and indirectly with Iran. I have visited many Iranian cities and have a great affection and respect for the Iranian people. I am very keen to try to help them in getting them medicines, essential equipment and other humanitarian help. It is my understanding that the acute lack of essential food and health commodities in Iran is in great part due to the gap between the Iranian and international banking systems. This is reflected by Iran’s non-adherence to recommendations of the Financial Action Task Force, which is one of the main obstacles preventing the Iranian banking system joining the global banking community.

As it appears unlikely that this problem can be resolved in the short term, the need seems obvious for an approved secure banking channel to be established for the uninterrupted supply of essential goods to the Iranian population, regardless of the international political environment. Multiple solutions have been proposed over recent years that have not gained much traction or success. However, I am aware of a Swiss proposal, initiated by a former senior United States oversight official in the Washington area and his Swiss-based colleague, which has received the preliminary blessing from the relevant US department that handles such issues. Would the Minister agree to sit down with me and the sponsors of the Swiss proposal to understand its merits? My understanding is that this proposal could easily incorporate other interested actors, such as Qatar, to which an invitation has already been extended to participate, and would be operational in a matter of days, provided that appropriate approvals are received. This could mean the possibility of delivering medicines and other essential goods during the Iranian new year period that starts next month, which would make an immediate and meaningful impact.

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Alton of Liverpool, for this debate.

The United States Government classify the Islamic Republic of Iran as the foremost state sponsor of terrorism, alleging that Iran provides a range of support, including finance, training and equipment, to terrorist groups around the world. How else can we explain the use of Iranians drones in Ukraine or the security of some of the countries in the Middle East?

In recent days, we have seen a democratic revolution fully supported by the Iranian people. This is a revolution against the mullahs, the likes of which we have never seen before. More than 750 people have been killed, according to the Iranian opposition People’s Mujaheddin Organisation of Iran. I have seen similar evidence of the attacks on resistance fighters in Camp Ashraf, where they had sought shelter. I have seen video evidence of the hanging of women and children on cranes in Tehran. There is one change in the protest marches that are now taking place: it is a revolution carried out mostly by Iranian women.

Democratic rule is perfectly possible in Iran. Mrs Maryam Rajavi leads the pro-democracy Iranian opposition coalition, which has produced a 10-point plan and has widespread support in both Houses of the UK Parliament, as well as in Parliaments in many parts of the world. She mentions the rule of law and proper fair elections as essentials. Briefly, she talks of establishing a democratic, secular and a non-nuclear republic. I make a plea to our Minister: invite Mrs Rajavi to London to meet our Government and Iranians living in the United Kingdom.

My Lords, the people of Iran are entitled to have good relations with the people of the United Kingdom. However, I would argue that the current Government of Iran are absolutely not entitled to have good relations with His Majesty’s Government.

I commend my friend Hillel Neuer, who is the indefatigable executive director of UN Watch, a human rights NGO based in Geneva. He has been holding the Iranian regime to account; indeed, he headed the campaign to remove Iran from the UN Commission on the Status of Women in 2022. I thank my noble friend the Minister for taking such a strong lead on that issue. I hope he will forgive me for not having enough time to list all the reasons why the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps should be proscribed as a terror group; perhaps I could just ask him in his response to furnish the Committee with the reasons why the Government have not done so.

Hillel is rightly campaigning for UN delegations to walk out in protest when the Iranian Foreign Minister addresses the UN Human Rights Council next Monday, on 27 February. Global figures have joined that campaign, including Masih Alinejad, the exiled Iranian women’s rights activist whom the regime attempted to assassinate in New York last summer. I urge my noble friend the Minister to lead once again and take a strong stance against a regime that tortures, kills and hangs its own people. If we stand for the protection of human rights as we say we do, my noble friend should stand up and leave the room when the Iranian Foreign Minister begins to speak.

My Lords, I also congratulate my noble friend Lord Alton on achieving this very important debate.

I will use the short time available to give a personal message from Christian Iranian asylum seekers based near my home in Witney, who have become friends. These are their words, not mine:

“Our Iranian friends are losing their lives for the simplest human rights of a person. At the risk of making their voice known to the world, they have come to the streets and they only protested. But the answer to their protest was gunshots, prison and execution. In the last four months, more than 1,000 people have been killed in Iran. Many of their bodies have not been handed over to their families; many have been executed and several hundred innocent children have died. Now, we have only one request to the British people: please help us so that the voice of the people of Iran is heard because, in our country, there is nothing but oppression, torture and imprisonment; the oppression of women; and shutting the mouths of young people. My country smells of blood—the smell of the blood of my brothers and sisters, who only wanted nothing but the cry of freedom in the street.”

These poignant words provide a painful, powerful endorsement of the purpose of this debate. I hope that the horrific persecution of minorities by the regime in Iran is something that the Minister can address in his reply.

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Alton, for obtaining this debate, for his superb introductory talk and not least for his powerful call that we should oppose the persecution of Baha’is and Christians. I will raise just two issues in the few moments I have.

First, as we conduct British-Iranian relations, it is vital that we support loudly and clearly those who are demonstrating for their freedoms, in particular those who face the most opposition: the young and the women who are being opposed by their own Government. They are rightly demonstrating for freedom of speech and for their rights to an education and a job.

It is difficult to know exactly how many people have been caught up in the demonstrations although it is widely reported that, so far, between 600 and 800 protesters have been killed, more than 30,000 have been arrested and more than 40 have been executed. Those are probably very modest figures. I echo the question to the Minister from the noble Lord, Lord Alton: what attempts are being made to record the regime’s crimes so that they can be taken to the UN Security Council? What representations have His Majesty’s Government made to the Government of the Islamic Republic of Iran? Does the Minister agree that Supreme Leader Khamenei and President Ebrahim Raisi should be held to account?

Secondly, I want to say just a few words about the vital importance of the BBC Persian service, to which the noble Lord, Lord Alton, referred and which has a weekly estimated audience of 1.6 million people. The BBC Persian radio service costs only around £800,000 a year. It is appalling that BBC Persian staff, especially women journalists, are being targeted. Iranian journalists working here in the UK are finding that their families back in Iran are being threatened and sometimes arrested and interrogated.

My Lords, I am delighted to follow the right reverend Prelate and also talk about the matters he talked about. My noble friend Lord Alton’s welcome and timely debate invites us to address the issue of what the Government’s priorities for British-Iranian relations should be. I would have no hesitation in naming the reversal of the lamentable decision to close down the BBC Persian radio service as the short-term top priority.

Why so? First, it would be one of the few actions that our Government could take of their own volition to reach out to Iran’s citizens in a period when they are going through great stresses and difficulties and are deprived of fair and accurate information.

Secondly, although I have listened carefully to the BBC’s and the Government’s explanations justifying the closure of BBC Persian’s radio broadcasts, I find them totally unconvincing. It is true that the radio audience is smaller compared with that of other media channels but, when they are deprived of radio, what alternatives will that audience have that do not put them at increased risk and cost?

Thirdly, and most importantly, why on earth is a step being taken that will only give delight to those who oppress Iranian citizens and deprive them of objective information—a step that they will surely hail as a victory? I very much hope that the Minister will tell us that this regrettable closure will now not proceed and that the cost of maintaining the radio service will be met as an addition to the FCDO’s block grant to the BBC’s overseas services.

In conclusion, I will mention another long-standing priority: the currently stagnant negotiations over Iran’s nuclear programme aimed at reviving the JCPOA. In my view, the Government are to be congratulated on persevering with this effort, unpromising though the present circumstances are. To abandon the JCPOA would merely give pleasure to the hard-liners in Iran who have always sought to undermine it. To abandon it without any alternative course to ensure that Iran does not obtain a nuclear weapon would be folly.

My Lords, freedom is a precious commodity but nobody knows with any degree of certainty where and when the situation in Iran will finally end. However, its people have sent an indisputable message to the mullahs and the revolutionary guard that enough is enough and their time is up. The people must always come first; the indicators are that the wind is in their sails. Arabian and Middle Eastern near-neighbour states are already pushing back against regime change but now is the time for the Government in London to become more assertive and be on the right side of history by supporting root-and-branch change away from corruption, illegal imprisonment, capital punishment, the confiscation of homes and the pillaging of the wealth of the nation.

Since the regime controls the economy, joining the revolutionary guard is an assured way to advance in a difficult life exacerbated by crippling sanctions. A long-term necessity is that the conditions are such that the economy can be opened up, to the benefit of all. The new generation in the IRGC is far removed from the original purpose of the Islamic revolution; given the incentive to do so, lower ranks could come out as sympathetic to the uprising given that the regime is now recognised as being so unpopular. The flight of capital from the country by senior members of the Government is testament that the end could be near.

However, I make a note of caution: the Islamic Republic has a strong lobby outside Iran, most particularly in Washington. A certain leftist ex-Prime Minister is being groomed to take over the mantle and, if this ploy is successful, will serve as a puppet of the regime by implementing cosmetic change only. The “Woman, Life, Freedom” movement has not yet found a single voice. It should be encouraged to do so post-haste in the same manner as the way in which Khomeini orchestrated the uniting of disparate factions in 1979. There is a consensus in Iran that the West is not doing enough. However, I remain of the belief that the leadership will buckle when faced with continued condemnation and pressure. Frankly, everything hinges on the strategic support that the uprising receives from the United Kingdom Government and others.

I join others in saving my concluding remarks for matters relating to the pending BBC closure. I can do no better than join the dots with what I said the other day in the Chamber:

“Our foreign policy and strategy should deem this an entirely illogical move … closure will send conflicting messages about the support we have in this country for the uprising.”—[Official Report, 21/2/23; col. 1616.]