The following Answer to an Urgent Question was given in the House of Commons on Thursday 30 October.
“With your permission, Mr Speaker, before answering my right honourable friend’s Question, I will say a few words about Hurricane Melissa, which is currently a category 1 or 2 hurricane. It is passing through the Bahamas’ outer islands and is impacting our British Overseas Territory, the Turks and Caicos Islands. I have been in touch with the Governor and Premier in the last day. We have deployed response teams to the region and mobilised £2.5 million in emergency humanitarian aid to help Jamaica rebuild in the wake of this disaster, the full scale of which is only now becoming clear. I am sure that the House will concur with the words of His Majesty the King and all those who have sent their support and solidarity to all those affected and will be thinking of those who have lost their life, not just in Jamaica but in Haiti and other countries across the region.
My right honourable friend is absolutely right to ask this Question. She will know of my keen interest in this issue over many years, including during the time in my career when I was working with Oxfam in her constituency on these issues, and with our late close friend, Jo Cox, on past atrocities and appalling situations in the conflict in Sudan. The reports of mass atrocities against civilians, and of the forced displacement caused by the Rapid Support Forces’ advances in El Fasher, are horrifying and deeply alarming. The scale of suffering is unconscionable. What is happening is often based on people’s ethnicity. Women and girls face widespread sexual and gender-based violence, and there is evidence mounting of defenceless civilians being executed and tortured, with aid workers also being targeted as they try to reach the most vulnerable communities facing famine.
As the United Nations Security Council penholder, we have called an emergency council session later today to maintain the spotlight on this situation, and to build pressure on the RSF to de-escalate, in line with UN Security Council Resolution 2736. Yesterday, the Foreign Secretary issued a statement condemning the killing of aid workers, including the executions reported in the Saudi maternity hospital, which was one of the last functioning facilities in El Fasher. That followed her statement on 27 October, which called on the RSF to protect civilians and urgently facilitate safe, rapid and unimpeded humanitarian access.
As the third-largest donor, we are mobilising £23 million of the £120 million announced in April to support the emergency humanitarian response in North Darfur. That will support those facing sexual violence and go towards the delivery of lifesaving food and health assistance by partners such as the International Committee of the Red Cross, the Sudan Humanitarian Fund and the Cash Consortium of Sudan.
As the Foreign Secretary said, the RSF leadership are responsible for the actions of their forces. All parties to the conflict must urgently act to protect civilians and facilitate safe, rapid and unimpeded humanitarian access. I can confirm that our special representative has been in contact with the RSF and Tasis to press for restraint and respect for international humanitarian law, and they are pressing for a call with Hemedti now”.
My Lords, the massacre at the El Fasher hospital and the surrounding city was deeply shocking. I know that the British embassy in Khartoum is temporarily closed, but can the Minister confirm what consular support, if any, the department can provide in Sudan? Can she confirm whether any British nationals have been affected in any of these attacks?
My Lords, Tom Fletcher, the head of UN OCHA, told the United Nations Security Council that there was indifference and resignation among the UN Security Council members. As the UK is the penholder for this crisis, we must take our share of the responsibility. Some 90% of children in Sudan are out of education, and 24 million people—40% of the population—lack sufficient food. We have been horrified by the scenes, most recently in El Fasher, that are in brazen defiance of Security Council Resolution 2736, passed in 2024, for the protection of civilians. In July, I asked the Minister what steps were being made by the UK for enforcing that resolution. She said she wondered what the point is of having these resolutions if they are not enforced. That resolution gave the Security Council authority for enforcement measures. What tangible steps is the UK, as penholder, taking to mobilise the protection of civilians, which is authorised in the UN charter and, specifically, in this resolution?
I stand by what I said. These resolutions and statements are helpful in many ways, but, unless they change things on the ground, I believe that we are failing. I wonder sometimes where the liberal outrage is for Sudan that we see for other places. There are many reasons why that might be the case, but a lack of attention and focus from this Government at the UN or anywhere else is not one of them. I led an event at the UN General Assembly just last month. We have been able to get the fact-finding mission off the ground and we are spending £120 million in ODA. On Saturday, I spoke to the Chadian Government about ensuring that the crossings remain open for refugees. We will continue to work with our partners and allies to get the focus on this conflict, where it really needs to be.
My Lords, I am one of those parliamentarians who had the chance of visiting Sudan and El Fasher some nine years ago as part of the parliamentary group led by the late Lord Sheikh. One of the things which inspired me to go there and find out more was that the information that we were getting in the Chamber in those days was that Omar Bashir’s air force was regularly killing so many people every week in that region. Once we got to Khartoum, we made a special request to go to El Fasher, in Darfur, and find out exactly what was going on. We spoke to the UN mission in Darfur, and what was surprising was that the information that we received there did not tally with the information that we were getting here. We raised it with our high commissioner there at the time and with the Government there. When we came back, the visiting group wrote a big report and submitted it to the Foreign Office, asking where the disparity in the information was coming from. With that backdrop, all I am asking today is whether we are making sure that the information we are getting is correct.
That is a very good question. Information is very difficult to obtain. There are few, if any, journalists in Sudan now, and the information that we do get is difficult to verify. The noble Lord is absolutely right to raise that. What we do have is the first-hand accounts of those who have managed to escape, and their testimonies are harrowing to hear. As the truth emerges, I think the world will be horrified at what it is. We are hearing reports already, which we have confidence in, of what has happened in El Fasher, particularly at the hospital, and these are by far the most disturbing accounts that I have ever had to consider.
My Lords, it is very welcome that we are discussing Sudan in this Chamber. However, I have to say, following the reference to Tom Fletcher, that he is hardly a reliable source. He is the UN official who said that 14,000 babies were going to die of famine in Gaza within days, and he had to retract that. One cannot help but contrast the constructive and calm atmosphere to genocide, as I suppose it is, in Sudan with the hysteria on the streets when it comes to Gaza and Israel. There are no marching students, there are no protests in universities, and there is no hot-tempered exchange in either Chamber. We need to be even-handed. The casualties and dispossessed people in Sudan greatly outnumber those of Gaza.
I am slightly surprised to hear the noble Baroness pronounce genocide, when she knows, and has supported our position, that we do not do that. That is for a competent court to do. Tom Fletcher is an outstanding leader of OCHA. He clarified what he said, as he needed to, on the occasion that she alludes to. He did the right thing, and I think that speaks well of him. The way that he is leading his organisation and drawing attention to what is happening in Sudan, and putting the resources at his disposal in the right place, speak very highly of him. He has our complete support.
My Lords, following my noble friend’s question, after the massacre in Rwanda the United Nations adopted the responsibility to protect resolution. It does not seem to have had any meaningful impact. I understand the Minister’s position, but the question is this: what on earth is the practical measure that can happen? People are desperate and trapped—we do not know how many tens of thousands of people—hoping that somebody is going to come and relieve them, but there is no sign of international action. What can we do to get forces actually on the ground to ease the siege and release the suffering before it becomes a total disaster?
The politics at the UN have evolved in an unhelpful way, I think, since the genocide in Rwanda and the initiatives that followed. I do not think that that is where we will see what the noble Lord wants, which is troops on the ground keeping the peace. We do not have peace. We need everybody who has any kind of influence over either warring party to get those leaders in a room and get them to negotiate. We support all current efforts being taken to bring that about, not least through the United States and the Qataris, but they have so far been unsuccessful. Given what has happened in recent days, the prospects for that seem dimmer, not brighter, but we keep going. All I can say is that this Government will get behind any initiatives designed to bring about a ceasefire.