My Lords, it is my privilege to start the second half of this debate. I trust that your Lordships are suitably refreshed, in spite of the limited time made available for that purpose. I thank my noble friend Lord Ahmad for an excellent introduction, and I thank him and my noble friend the Foreign Secretary for giving us this opportunity today to debate the UK’s position on foreign affairs in a world that has become less stable, with events harder to predict than any of us had expected, even before Covid.
It is excellent for global Britain that a former Prime Minister, with much international experience, and who is held in high regard abroad, has returned to government as Foreign Secretary. It is also very good for your Lordships’ House that, once again, the holder of one of the great offices of state is accountable to Parliament in this place. I do not agree with those who say that my noble friend should be made accountable also to another place, because it would be most time-consuming for him to have to account to both Houses and would diminish the significance of his contributions to your Lordships’ deliberations in this place.
It is apparent that, following Brexit, the United Kingdom’s voice in world affairs has remained significant. We are the only G5 country that can develop a new independent trade policy and, as such, we are able to contribute positively to the further adoption of free, rules-based trade throughout the world. We need to restore the position of the WTO and act as a force for good through our newly acquired membership of the CPTPP. It is interesting that seven of the 12 members of this partnership, following our accession, are Commonwealth countries. Does my noble friend think it is possible for the Commonwealth itself to develop a more active role in supporting free trade and upholding the international order?
It is also interesting that the largest economy in the CPTPP is Japan. Our Japanese friends have been very active for several years in encouraging the UK to apply for accession, and they have effectively helped to persuade those members who were sceptical about the value to the partnership of the accession of a non-Pacific country. Japan understands and shares this country’s strong commitment to the international order, and it welcomes our tilt to the Indo-Pacific and renewed commitment to defence and security across the world—not by imagining that we are any longer a great imperial power capable of unilateral action but by using our hard and soft power in conjunction with our friends and allies, where we can make a useful contribution.
In that connection, I must record my great regret that the FCDO has disposed of a large part of our Tokyo embassy estate, which at a stroke lessens the ease with which we could effortlessly project soft power in the minds of the Japanese people. That was a mistake, but I am nevertheless happy that His Majesty’s Government now recognise clearly that Japan is our most important friend and ally among Asian nations.
It is also a pity that we allowed two major gigawatt nuclear power station projects—one with Toshiba and one with Hitachi—to crash. I ask my noble friend to give his support to seeking changes to the Government’s current nuclear policy to accelerate the commercialisation of another nuclear technology that we desperately need to roll out much sooner than currently envisaged. I am referring to Japan’s high-temperature gas-cooled reactor technology, which can make an enormous contribution to our total energy capacity, not just the electricity grid.
I mention also the enormous significance of the agreement announced in December by the UK, Japan and Italy to work together to create a new sixth-generation fighter jet—the Global Combat Air Programme. Bearing in mind that the RAF’s order for GCAP aircraft may need to be much bigger than he had expected, does my noble friend agree that there is a clear and urgent need to increase defence spending to 3% immediately, and probably to a much higher level within a year or two? What does my noble friend think about the interesting idea proposed by my noble friend Lady Goldie to issue a kind of defence bond? In these deeply troubled times, we surely need to think outside the box.
My Lords, as the death toll in Gaza now tops 30,000, we reflect on the catastrophe that continues to unfold since the horrific Hamas attack on 7 October. I too pay tribute to the Ministers for their work and commitment to achieving a resolution, but the impact of their efforts may be less as a result of the unconditional support that they have given to Israel since the events of 7 October.
In Gaza, the death and destruction continue and have not resulted in the freeing of the hostages. At least 30,200 people have been killed in Gaza, including more than 12,300 children and 8,400 women. More than 71,300 have been injured, including at least 8,600 children and 6,300 women, with more than 8,000 missing.
In the Occupied West Bank, more than 500 Palestinians have been killed, including more than 108 children, with more than 4,600 injured. As the noble Baroness, Lady Morris, the president of Medical Aid for Palestinians, told us, a quarter of people are at risk of imminent famine and one in six children in the north is acutely malnourished. Gaza’s children are being starved at the fastest rate the world has ever seen. I am sure that she would testify that, unlike what was said earlier, in Gaza there are no places of safety for the protection of the civilian population, which is why the number of fatalities and injuries is so high. The executive director of UNICEF said last week:
“Horrific news out of Gaza that at least ten children have reportedly died of malnutrition and dehydration so far, while many more are on the brink … 1 in 6 children under the age of two in north Gaza are acutely malnourished … Over 500,000 Palestinians in Gaza are at starvation levels”.
Does the Foreign Secretary agree that starvation as a weapon of war is a war crime?
Infectious diseases are also spreading rapidly, and there is little access to medical care. No hospitals are fully functioning across the territory. At least 90% of children under five are affected by one or more infectious disease. Does the Foreign Secretary agree that an immediate permanent ceasefire is even more desperately needed now?
My Lords, I have three quick questions for my noble friend the Foreign Secretary. Does he agree that, for centuries, freedom of the press has essentially meant freedom from the control of Governments, both foreign and domestic? I have an interest to declare, as I have been writing for the Telegraph and the Spectator for over 30 years—although they pay so little that I would not really call it an interest so much as a mild or passing interest. I do not want that to be taken as a criticism in any way of the noble Lord, Lord Moore of Etchingham, owing to the fact that he was only obeying orders.
My second question is a follow-up to that of the noble Lord, Lord Ricketts. What is Britain doing to persuade the G7 to give the entire $300 billion of frozen Russian assets currently held by Euroclear in Brussels to the Ukrainians for the defence and reconstruction of Ukraine? We sequestered huge amounts of funds in both the First and Second World Wars, as did the Americans; there is plenty of precedent for this. The moral case is obviously clear, especially after the death of Alexei Navalny. The legal and economic arguments against it have been comprehensively demolished in a recent article in the Financial Times by Bob Zoellick, the former president of the World Bank:
“Policymakers rarely find opportunities based on sound policy, good politics and compelling ethical values … The G7 and other friends should quit dithering”.
The Foreign Secretary has done a wonderful job in Washington, trying to persuade Congress to part with the $66 billion or so, but this would be almost five times the amount and would set the Ukrainians up extremely well in the event of a Trump presidency.
My third question is: which country or group of countries would genuinely guarantee Israeli security against a future Palestinian state if it turned out to be revanchist? There are 15 demilitarised states in the world, none of which is in a conflict zone. No countries intervened when Hamas violently overthrew Fatah in Gaza in 2007. Who will step in when the so-called police force of a future Palestinian state starts to acquire heavy weaponry, armour or attack drones? The chronically anti-Israel United Nations? The G7? The Arab League? Britain and America have the dubious fact of having guaranteed Ukraine in 1994 after it got rid of its nuclear weapons. Surely Israelis are right to fear that any security guarantees will not be worth the paper on which they are written, at least while Palestinians still harbour these ludicrous dreams of expelling the Jews from the river to the sea.
My Lords, I will make just two points. Like everyone else, I wish there were no wars in the world. I wish we could all live in peace and harmony, and that we did not have to watch night after night on our TV screens humanity tearing itself apart around the world. That is just wishful thinking, so let me return to the real world.
At this moment, we have conflicts in Gaza and Ukraine. Ukrainians are fighting for the survival of their country against a tyrant, Putin. Along with the US and other European countries, we are standing with Ukraine. The way things are going, in spite of all our help and efforts, its looks as if the tyrant might prevail. President Macron alluded to the fact that NATO might consider sending troops to Ukraine. This proposal was immediately shot down by everyone, including our Government. Have our Government and NATO considered another option—something that NATO did in the war in the Balkans in the 1990s to bring another tyrant, President Milošević of Serbia, to his senses? I suggest that NATO considers provide air cover on Ukraine soil only, to protect the troops on the ground and to keep the Russian troops away from Ukraine borders. Like I said, NATO has done it before, so why not consider it again in Ukraine? It is a bit drastic, but a thought.
I will move on to Gaza. What happened on Israel’s soil on 7 October was horrendous. My heart goes out to all the victims of Hamas, a terrorist organisation. The State of Israel has the right to protect its borders and its citizens, but what it is doing in Gaza now to men, women and children is beyond description and disproportionate. I totally condemn it.
This point is historical. I do not mean to reopen old colonial wounds, but after the First World War the British Government had a mandate from the League of Nations to sort out the question of Palestine and leave peacefully with both communities, Jews and Arabs, living in harmony, side by side. We failed on that count and left in a hurry.
My Lords, at a recent meeting, Xi Jinping said to Vladimir Putin that right now we are witnessing changes
“the likes of which we have not seen in 100 years”.
He was referencing the change in the balance of power. It sounds like grandstanding, but what if he is right?
Today’s debate comes at a very important time. If the events of 2023 and 2024 tell us anything, it is that for the first time in a generation there is a genuine global challenge to our way of life in the West and to the international rules-based order. The geopolitical dynamics are changing and we need to wake up if Britain is not to be caught in the crosshairs of increasing competition between great powers. The gathering of the BRICS in 2023 was perhaps the most important gathering last year that nobody was talking about. Niall Ferguson talks of an “axis of ill will” comprising nations that are hostile to the West and to the liberal democratic rules-based system. We should take his words seriously.
This gathering is not just a talking shop. It is underwritten by China, a global superpower intent on rebalancing the geopolitical dynamics. To see this, look at three nations: Iran, Russia, and Saudi Arabia. Iran’s economy has grown faster than western counterparts despite US sanctions. Why? It is because Beijing consumed 90% of Iranian oil imports in 2023 and signed a $400 billion partnership agreement in 2021. Russia’s GDP is growing faster than any country in the G7. Why? It is because Beijing is now its main export partner for gas and other commodities. Beijing has ensured that sanctions against Russia have hurt Germany far more than they have hurt Putin. Meanwhile, the Chinese have poured in $17 billion in investment and construction into Saudi Arabia in the last three years, changing the balance for Sunni states too. The aggression of the Houthis against western nations started only once Beijing had brokered rapprochement between Saudi and Iran in that nation.
My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Baroness, Lady Stroud. I note that, with the noble Baroness, Lady Helic, who follows me, we form a wedge of former coalition advisers on the Order Paper, perhaps placed there as a reminder to the Foreign Secretary of calmer, gentler times, when Prime Ministers lasted their full five-year terms and parties co-operated to solve problems in government rather than tearing themselves apart.
I declare my interests as CEO of United Against Malnutrition and Hunger, trustee of the Royal African Society and chair of the Africa APPG’s inquiry into just energy transition. I associate myself with the excellent speeches of my noble friend Lord Bruce and the noble Lord, Lord Boateng, highlighting the need for a total refresh of UK policy towards Africa.
I will focus most of my remarks on the implications of climate change for our foreign policy, but first I want to say a brief word on Gaza. Over a quarter of Gaza’s population are said to be one step away from famine, almost the entire population are in desperate need of food, and child malnutrition is at catastrophic levels. This cannot continue. As my noble friends on the Liberal Democrat Front Bench and others have argued, there must be an immediate ceasefire.
Sadly, Gaza is not the only place where conflict is fuelling malnutrition. In Yemen, in DRC, in Ethiopia, in Sudan and South Sudan and in Ukraine, conflict has exacerbated a global hunger crisis already driven by climate-related extreme weather events. The impacts of climate change will only worsen. The science is unequivocal: warming is already at 1.1 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels and further warming is inevitable, with the 1.5 degrees Paris target almost certain to be breached and probably far beyond that. This is already having huge impacts, through more frequent and longer-duration climate events such as heatwaves, floods, droughts and tropical cyclones.
A few weeks ago I was in Isiolo County in Kenya, visiting impressive projects run by UNICEF to prevent and treat severe acute malnutrition. Isiolo County is only now recovering from prolonged drought, which is becoming more and more common in this part of Africa, creating acute food insecurity for millions.
My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow my noble friends from the coalition. I join many noble Lords who have paid tribute to my noble friend Lord Ahmad for his tireless work and endless optimism and energy. I also pay tribute to the late Lord Cormack. I will miss the wisdom and experience he would have brought to this debate.
Future generations may study this period as an example of how the world stumbled into a major upheaval. The world order, as envisioned after the destruction and horrors of the Second World War, is dangerously close to coming to an end. There has never been a greater need for our foreign policy to be strategically and morally consistent, and aimed at unifying rather than dividing our society. I fear that we are in danger of lacking on both counts. I will give two examples, necessarily briefly.
First, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has brought into question the idea of a Europe at peace—a Europe of prosperity and progress. Vladimir Putin sees Ukraine not as a final destination but as a starting point in his campaign to undermine the stability of Europe and NATO, from the Baltics to the Balkans. Logic and national interest dictate that we must support Ukraine in resisting Russian attempts to redraw its borders. Yet we are not applying the same logic in the western Balkans, where Russia is actively cultivating separatist proxies and where the risk of conflict is higher today than at any time in the last 20 years.
I know that my noble friend the Foreign Secretary is alive to the danger. In January he described his sense that
“the posture of the West when it comes to Kosovo and the western Balkans … is … set in a time before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine”.
Can he give an update on what has been done to bring our policy in line with our wider strategy towards Russia? Will this include a UK commitment to reinforce the military deterrent in Bosnia, through Operation Althea, as we have done so effectively with KFOR in Kosovo?
My Lords, for some months now it has been evident that 2024 was going to be a nail-biting year for Governments worldwide and for foreign policy practitioners, not just because of the plethora of elections—some more properly democratic than others—but because so many of the fixed points of international relations are under siege. It is high time for this House to be debating the choices and the challenges, and a privilege to be doing so in the presence of the Foreign Secretary.
There are no prizes for starting with the recent statements and actions of the man who is, in near certainty, going to be contesting the US presidential election in November. Donald Trump’s incitement to Putin to attack NATO member states is not only a blow to NATO’s deterrent capacity but a breach of the UN charter, and it is damaging to America’s own interests. How much good did US isolationism in the 1930s do for its security? His torpedoing of a Bill in Congress that contained what he had been asking for on migration was shocking, reversing, as he has done, Louis XV’s dictum, “Après moi, le déluge”, which means “After me, the deluge”, into “Avant moi, le déluge”—“Ahead of me, the deluge”.
One conclusion can be drawn already: whether Biden or Trump is in the White House after November, we Europeans are going to need to do more in our own defence and to do more together, working in concert, than we have done hitherto, and we need to get started on that now, not later. We need too to tighten the noose of sanctions on Russia, working with the EU and the G7 to reduce third-country leakage.
Then there is the war in and around Gaza and more widely in parts of the Middle East. No one can have followed events since 7 October without feeling deep anguish—anguish for Israelis whose compatriots were killed in the terrorist attack and some of whom are still being held hostage, and anguish for the many thousands of Palestinian civilians who have subsequently lost their lives. But we really should stop tearing ourselves apart over whether we back an immediate or a sustainable ceasefire, neither of which we are in a position to deliver.
It is a pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Hannay, and to welcome both his final comments and those on our relationship with Europe, which I will come back to.
It is tempting to focus, as many noble Lords have, on the situation in Palestine now: the hideous human suffering in the Gaza Strip; the terrible circumstances of the Israeli hostages; and the invention of a new acronym —WCNSF—meaning “wounded child, no surviving family”. UNICEF estimates that there are now 17,000 children in Gaza who are unaccompanied or separated from any relatives. That is about 1% of the entire population. Yet still we sell arms to the Israeli Government.
The topic of today’s debate is a broad one: the UK’s position on foreign affairs. I am in the lucky position that I can recycle material, because tomorrow I will be in Brussels with the Green European Foundation— I declare I have an unremunerated position on its journal board—to chair a debate at the Press Club on a major report, Geopolitics of a Post-Growth Europe. I urge noble Lords who seek new answers in a world where the old approaches—the approaches used for decades and continuing to be used by this Government—have delivered the conditions we have today to take a look at this report. Many will be pleased to note that in the introductory essay, the Dutch GreenLeft analyst Richard Wouters concludes that the EU
“should keep the United Kingdom close and underline that the door is open for re-entry. EU membership offers the closest form of alliance”.
However, in terms of our relationship with the nations of the global South—a growing, still relatively young part of the global population, as opposed to ours—the important point is made that it pays for them to sit on the fence, to play off the US, the EU and China, as well as the UK, against one another to secure trade, aid, investment and even security protection. There are many reasons for them to not prefer us and our allies. Many nations and peoples do not see the Russian invasion of Ukraine as the imperialist, colonialist attack that it is, because they associate such behaviour with western Europe and the US. They see, rightly, that much of the injustice and suffering they experience today originates from us. They see the enforced austerity of the IMF, the predatory actions of western lenders, the corrupt behaviour of western mining companies, the refusal to open up the use of climate technologies and, crucially, the refusal to allow affordable access to essential medicines and vaccines with manufacturing close to where they are needed.
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The UK Government have so far refused to halt arms exports to Israel, despite the risk that these weapons pose to civilians. Special rapporteurs, independent experts and working groups issued a statement on 23 February, warning that the transfer of weapons or ammunition to Israel to be used in Gaza is likely to violate international humanitarian law and must stop immediately. Further, the Dutch Court of Appeal order on 11 February required the Netherlands to halt its export of F35 fighter-jet parts to Israel, because of the clear risk that they might be used in the commission of serious violations of international humanitarian law in Gaza. The UK’s own arms criteria establish the very same obligation, yet the UK produces 15% of the parts of all F35s being used in Gaza.
The UK did suspend arms licences to Israel during the bombardment in Gaza in 2014, despite the very much lower numbers of deaths and injuries, when the Foreign Secretary was then Prime Minister. In the light of the potential complicity of the UK in war crimes, will he halt arms exports to Israel as he did in 2014? Is he aware that hand-wringing pleas for restraint while still supplying weapons seems rather hypocritical, whether they come from the UK or the United States?
Israel is now pushing ahead with an additional 3,300 illegal settlements in the West Bank. Will the Foreign Secretary let us know the Government’s view of this and of further expansion of settlements, potentially into Gaza? Will they ensure the rights of the Palestinian people to return to their land, as is their right under international law?
The Foreign Secretary has spoken about the two-state solution. If he truly believes in this, then time is very short, and action must be taken now by making Hamas and Israel accountable, releasing the hostages and showing to all parties a commitment to a different vision of peace and justice with security for Israel and Palestine, starting with the recognition of the Palestinian state.
Even now, the British Government bear a moral obligation—I think the noble Baroness, Lady Mobarik, used those words—towards the Palestine conflict, stemming from their historical involvement following the 1947 withdrawal. We left behind a complex and unresolved situation that resulted in decades of conflict and bloodshed on both sides, and immense suffering for the Palestinians. Millions of them became stateless refugees in neighbouring countries. As a former colonial power, Britain has a moral responsibility to advocate for a just resolution by acknowledging the consequences of its past actions and engaging diplomatically as the main power, and by providing further humanitarian aid and supporting a peaceful solution. Addressing this long-standing issue aligns with British values of justice, compassion and international responsibility, and would foster stability and hope in the region.
Furthermore, we would be naive to think that the wars in the Middle East and Ukraine are purely isolated incidents. They are emblematic of the shifting of geopolitical tectonic plates. The odds that a third front opens up in Taiwan or the South China Sea grow sadly shorter by the day. Xi has consistently stressed that the Taiwan issue cannot be passed on from generation to generation. US intelligence sources and the Taiwan Foreign Minister have said that 2027 is the year they are concerned about.
If Britain is to stand tall and be resilient in the coming years, it is essential that we prepare now. Three principles should govern our actions. First, we must set our economy and society on to a resilient footing. Geopolitical risk should be run through our every decision. If this means directing investment into local and reliable supply chains, that may be necessary. If it means increasing military spending, we should do that too. If it means adjusting our net-zero targets to avoid critical dependencies on China, then we need to consider this as well.
We urgently need to know how a crisis in Taiwan would impact us. A recent study by the Rhodium Group forecast that a conservative estimate puts the damage at $2 trillion globally. Given that our trade-to-GDP ratio is 70% and the odds of the US, which is far less vulnerable than us to these shocks, using the full force of economic statecraft in the context of any confrontation are high, we should make this a priority. I ask my noble friend the Foreign Secretary: what assessment have His Majesty’s Government made of these risks and will he make any such assessment public?
We must work with allies to strategically prioritise the maintenance of the international rules-based order. The liberal democratic world underpinned by the West has provided for greater prosperity worldwide than any other system. If we do not understand this and do not invest in this, we will hand over the rules-based order to nations which play by different rules. Finally, we must take a step back and ask ourselves: who are we and what are we building? Confidence in our identity and character as a nation matters. In a time of shaking, will Britain allow itself to be riven by division internally or will we stand tall?
In the early 20th century, we were resilient in crises and came out stronger on the other side. Our current internal weaknesses and lack of confidence in our own civilisation leave us vulnerable. We must remember who we are and why our way of life is worth defending. If we fail to do this, we may not like the world order that our children inherit. If we succeed, not only will we still have an important role to play in the world but we will have the resilience to stand in a time of shaking and a clearer identity as to who we are as a nation.
Every increment in warming will bring escalating hazards for human health and ecosystems. As the APPG on Malaria and Neglected Tropical Diseases notes, changes in precipitation combined with increasing temperatures will alter vector breeding habitats and pathogen development, changing the geographical distribution of diseases, transmission risks, prevalence rates and the virulence of disease. Some 500 million more people could become exposed to chikungunya and dengue by 2050, with a recent UK Health Security Agency report warning that dengue could be transmitted in London by 2060.
Warming is being accompanied by unprecedented biodiversity loss, by increasingly desperate competition for resources and by rising sea levels that threaten massive human dislocation. Our foreign policy needs to shift dramatically to meet this reality.
First and foremost, this means seeing ourselves as others see us, not just as we would like to be seen. It means understanding that lecturing nations that have done little to contribute to climate change, but are most vulnerable to it, on clean energy transition, while granting new oil and gas licences in the North Sea, destroys credibility. It means honouring our pledges on international climate finance. The Independent Commission for Aid Impact recently stated that, to meet the UK’s pledge to spend £11.6 billion on ICF by 2025-26, we need to spend 55% of the total in the next two years. I hope the Foreign Secretary can tell us in his reply whether that is actually going to happen and, if so, how the spend will be profiled.
ICAI also criticised the Government for “moving the goalposts” by changing the way the target will be met, which it said amounted to an additional £1.724 billion being categorised as international climate finance that
“was not new and additional spending for developing countries”.
Again, this is destructive of our credibility in an area we once led on.
We also need to recognise that addressing climate change will require us, as the noble Baroness, Lady Fall, said, to work with Governments and countries we do not like. That does not mean abandoning our values and principles, but it does mean co-operating together for a wider good. The climate crisis poses an existential threat to humanity. We need to face up to that reality and make global co-operation to protect our planet the number one priority of our foreign policy.
The second inconsistency arises from the Israel-Gaza war. In a 1987 interview with the Jewish Chronicle, against the backdrop of the first intifada, Margaret Thatcher, a great friend of Israel, repeatedly urged restraint, stressing that it was
“vital not to use excessive force”.
In response to a question about settlements, she set out what should be an abiding principle:
“what you do not like yourself you must not do to others”.
Regrettably, in the current conflict Israel’s right to self-defence has morphed into a disproportionate military response, tantamount to the collective punishment of a civilian population. Civilians are being killed and starved as their homes, schools and hospitals are destroyed and their children maimed.
Where we have rightly condemned Russia’s use of siege tactics and its attacks on hospitals and civilian targets, and where we have rightly condemned the terror attack against Israel, the taking of hostages and the sexual violence that was committed, we, along with the US and some other democracies, have also provided diplomatic and moral cover for the carnage in Gaza. These apparent double standards have been noted by British people and in countries around the world. Such inconsistency runs counter to our long-term interests, which should be the shaping force for our foreign policy. It helps Vladimir Putin, undermines our national interest and weakens our moral authority. The welcome exception to that is my noble friend’s call for a Palestinian state. Could he give his assessment of just how close or far away the horizon that he has spoken about is now?
The Government have done an admirable job of explaining our policy on Ukraine and carrying forward public support for our goals. The same cannot be said of our response to the war in Gaza. How did we end up alienated from the electorate, who are shocked by the civilian toll and many of whom are protesting because they believe that their voices cannot be, and are not, heard in Parliament?
Our role in the world is only as strong as our cohesion. Pursuing policies abroad that divide and weaken us at home is not in our national interest. I recall the words of my noble friend Lord Hague, a previous Foreign Secretary. Speaking in 2010, he said:
“Foreign policy is domestic policy written large. The values we live by at home do not stop at our shores. Human rights are not the only issue that informs the making of foreign policy, but they are indivisible from it”.
Instead, we should concentrate on how to prevent such appalling events happening again. In that context, I applaud the shift in policy over Palestinian statehood that was hinted at by the Foreign Secretary, and the move away from the long since bankrupt policy of offering statehood only at the end of a process over which Israel would have a veto at every stage. Would that be to offer Hamas victory? Certainly not, because Hamas does not even contemplate a two-state solution and because any such approach would necessarily involve all concerned—Israel’s Arab neighbours and Israel itself—recognising each other and committing themselves to respecting each other’s sovereignty.
The UN has taken some hard knocks in recent years, but now is not the moment for the UK, a founding member and a permanent member of its Security Council, to give up on it, to walk away washing its hands; nor would it be sensible to propose a process of fundamental reform in such unpropitious circumstances. It is better, surely, to focus on sectoral reforms and, in particular, ones that relate to the priority concerns of the countries of the global South, thus helping to bridge the gap that has opened up between them and the West. Such measures include: strengthening the World Health Organization, enabling it to deal more effectively and more equitably with the next pandemic when it comes along; bridging the gap between the warm words agreed at COP meetings and members’ actual performance on climate change, with additional resources for mitigating measures in heavily indebted developing countries; getting the sustainable development goals back on track; and restarting a dialogue on strategic stability between nuclear weapon states.
I conclude with a plea that we do not give in to counsels of despair or to siren songs to appease actions that we know are wrong and which we have all committed ourselves to resisting. Diplomats, to whose ranks I belonged, and democratic politicians are professional practitioners of the art of the possible. But that art has to be anchored in common interests and common values. So I would express the wish, and I will do so myself, that we dedicate our debate today to two outstanding men who gave their lives to making the world a better place: Yitzhak Rabin, Prime Minister of Israel, who knew that Israel would never be secure or prosperous without a two-state solution, and Alexei Navalny, who championed a Russia with which we could have lived in peaceful coexistence, and whose parting advice to all of us was, “Do not give up”.
History is not pre-written but made by the actions of people. Where we are today is the result of past actions over decades and centuries. Men sitting on these very Benches imposed starvation on India, forced 1.5 million Kenyans into concentration camps between 1952 and 1960, and imposed similar conditions in the so-called Malaya emergency. What should be at the heart of our foreign policy is, first, acknowledging the many abuses of the past and then that we need to act to stop the continuing oppression that arises from our own actions.
Debt cancellation is an obvious area of urgent need. Through that we would, as Wouters points out, ease the pressure on global South countries to sell off their biospheres and their lithospheres, and reduce the pressure to promote often exploitative labour conditions in export-orientated industries, when the efforts of their people could instead be directed towards delivering resilience and security, particularly food security, in the age of climate shocks.
I finish with a reflection on normative power—the power to exports one’s values—as an integral part of geopolitics and how living up to those values is crucial to being able to use that power for constructive good. With that in mind, I have two direct questions to the Minister for his summing up.
First, as Prime Minister in 2015, he made a public call to halt the planned execution of child defendant Ali Mohammed al-Nimr in Saudi Arabia. Ali was ultimately spared and has been released from prison. There are at least three such child defendants now in Saudi Arabia, despite its promises to stop sentencing child defendants to death. Will the Minister tonight publicly call on the Saudi authorities to prevent the executions of Abdullah al-Derazi, Youssef al-Manasif and Abdullah al-Howaiti? Secondly, the published value of UK arms sales licensed to Saudi Arabia since the bombing of Yemen began in March 2015 is £8.2 billion; the Campaign Against the Arms Trade says that it is much more than that. What is the world reading of Britain’s values when we export those arms and hand them over to one of the world’s regimes that is most abusive of human rights, particularly the rights of women and vulnerable migrants?