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What we are seeing on the West Bank is a human tragedy and a violation of human rights of major proportions. Senior members of Mr Netanyahu's Government have made no secret of their hope that all Palestinians can be removed from Jerusalem and, ultimately, from the West Bank. If, as I hope, Her Majesty's Government are serious in hoping for the creation of a Palestinian state with its capital in east Jerusalem, something must be done urgently to stop this appalling and shameful tragedy. I hope the Minister can confirm that his right honourable friend is taking up these cases with the Israeli authorities both bilaterally and in co-operation with our European and American partners-in spite of, or is it because of, Mr Netanyahu's humiliating rejection of President Obama's repeated calls for restraint. Without determined and effective American action, there is no hope of reversing this ethnic cleansing. Sadly, the quartet office in Jerusalem seems to be adopting a totally supine attitude towards these human rights violations by the occupying power.
All of us speaking in this debate face a dilemma. Having heard Mr Hague's interview on the BBC this morning, but not yet having studied his important speech in detail, I warmly welcome his intention to strengthen our diplomatic, commercial and economic contacts with the emerging powers, including Brazil and Turkey. In that context I wonder, as did the noble Baroness, Lady Williams, whether it was wise for the UN Security Council to have rejected both Brazil and Turkey's ingenious attempts to find a solution to Iran's nuclear ambitions and instead to strengthen sanctions
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I share the hope that Iran can be dissuaded from its apparent ambition, although publicly denied by the Iranians at a very high level, to acquire nuclear weapons. But I was struck by the reply of the noble Lord, Lord Howell, to the noble Earl, Lord Onslow, two days ago when he commented that the possession of nuclear weapons by India and Pakistan,
- "could be a good example of the theory of mutual deterrence working".-[Official Report, 28/6/10; col. 1510.]
Should we be surprised if Iran, neighbour as it is to a nuclear Pakistan, threatened by attacks on its nuclear facilities by a nuclear Israel, and neighbour to Iraq from whose aggression in the Iran-Iraq war it suffered more than a million dead, might draw the same lessons of deterrence as India and Pakistan? Whether it has or not, I believe that the arguments for working towards a nuclear-free Middle East are now as strong as they have ever been.
I still have a minute left and I would like to add two footnotes. The first is that some reference has been made today to the Falklands War. I put it on record that one reason why we managed to acquire and gain international support for our recovery of the Falkland Islands was precisely because we had resident posts in a number of embassies which have been or are being closed. Lastly, and on a lighter note, my noble friend Lord Hylton referred to the support of the Isfahanis for British football. I am astonished. Do they not know that British polo originated on the main square of Isfahan?
3.21 pm
Baroness Nicholson of Winterbourne: I thank the noble and learned Lord, Lord Howe of Aberavon, for giving us a wonderful opportunity to discuss Britain's foreign policy in, as he stated, a time when our world is much less predictable than before. As the noble Lord, Lord Desai, declared, we must therefore change our mentality to see where the power is going, which, as he commented, is most obviously reflected in changes of economic status. As all other noble Lords have commented in the debate, the speech by our Foreign Secretary today in the Locarno Room sets the stage most powerfully. He declared,
- "for the first time in years in my view Britain will have a foreign policy that is clear, focused and effective".
I am sure that we will support his aims of extending our global reach and influence, that we should use diplomacy to secure our prosperity, that we should promote our values using the appeal of our culture and heritage, and set out to make the most of the abundant opportunities of the 21st century systematically and for the long term. Particularly, his focus on the broadest possible definition of our foreign affairs and foreign policy, incorporating the UK's strengths such as education and connecting ministries and departments
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I shall focus for a moment or two on the huge strand of economics, trade and prosperity in foreign affairs throughout the Foreign Secretary's speech. Again, this is enormously welcome, most especially the strong stress on networks and contacts on the ground through our ambassadors in our embassies and high commissions, which seem to be being given the stronger role that they should always have maintained in order to give the UK the certainty and single focus that our interests on the ground have been lacking. As the Foreign Secretary commented:
"There is now a mass of connections between individuals, civil society, businesses, pressure groups and charitable organisations which are also part of the relations between nations and which are being rapidly accelerated by the internet".
That is a most important declaration which we should all promote in incorporating our interests in a way that has not been the case in recent years on the ground, and possibly not even in the UK.
Since completing my second term as a Member of the European Parliament- where for seven and a half years I had the honour of serving as vice-president of the Foreign Affairs Committee-and returning here to resume full-time work in your Lordships' House, I now chair the All-Party Parliamentary Group for Business Development in Iraq and the Regions. Our aim as an APPG-we have strong membership from all parties in both this House and the other place-is to encourage and foster the economic development of Iraq and her neighbours with the UK in particular, with special stress on the significance of culture and education, both vocational and tertiary.
This follows an earlier initiative-designed also to strengthen Iraq's free market in the private sector-that I co-founded last year, the Iraq-Britain Business Council, IBBC, which I also chair in an honorary capacity. This has become the leading membership organisation for business development in Iraq and the region. This, too, is a not-for-profit organisation which enjoys high-level support from both the UK and the Iraqi Governments. It brings together key business leaders to provide a joint platform for identifying mutual interests and common goals. In this first year, in support of the Foreign Secretary's comments on cultural and educational exchange, we have already begun to found a private university within the Iraqi state sector, which we hope in the fullness of time will include all relevant technical and business departments and an all-important school of humanity.
I believe powerfully in the stress laid in the Foreign Secretary's speech on bilateral relationships and on elevating relationships across every sector. This is of vital importance for the United Kingdom in terms of economics and politics, which have not been as close here as in other key member states of the European Union and beyond. The Foreign and Commonwealth Office, as the key focal point for the promotion of all UK interests, should have that strength and power. It should also have, wherever possible, significant financial and personal support to make that happen.
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Foreign policy is not only a reaction to what is happening but should lay the foundations for good decisions for many years to come. That is where the stress that the Foreign Secretary and other Members of this House have already placed upon research, study and exploration over a wide range of ministries in the United Kingdom is vital. Foreign policy is about the standing in the world of the United Kingdom. This can be created and maintained only over the long term, as well as by reactions in crises. All of this must rest on common values. Therefore, we should not be afraid to promote as hard as possible, in every possible way, democracy, the fundamental freedoms and the rule of law.
The noble Lord, Lord Butler of Brockwell, raised the question of the important values that are implemented in strategic thinking in the EU Council of Ministers. The UK should be in front and pre-eminent, both there and on the ground. With a new External Action Service, a strong Foreign and Commonwealth Office and a clear, directed foreign policy we will go much further than we imagine we have the capacity to go today.
3.28 pm
The Earl of Sandwich: My Lords, I, too, congratulate our former Foreign Secretary on his timing today and our present Foreign Secretary on his new approach and wider outlook.
My concern today, again, is Afghanistan. Apart from the timetable of withdrawal, I read or heard nothing this morning to confirm that we still support the United States' strategy following the dismissal of General McChrystal in somewhat discouraging circumstances. It may well be that the US strategy is in disarray and it could be the moment for us to exert influence in Washington. I hope the Minister will give some more clues on this today because the situation for the Afghan people seems more desperate than ever.
The British public are losing interest in the Afghan project and I offer one possible explanation: they were deceived. They broadly supported the initial campaign to send troops, not because they were defending this country-which was never a realistic proposition-but because they wanted to protect the Afghan people from tyranny. Events in 2001 provided the trigger but at the time, as in Iraq, it seemed that the Afghans wanted to be liberated and would naturally accept the temporary presence of foreign forces and aid workers.
One mistake was to attempt to reconstruct the country according to a model that was too rigidly western, but I do not blame only the Americans for that. Far too much inappropriate aid was wasted in the first few years and much of it went to satisfy the appetites of warlords as well as foreign consultants and companies bringing money back home. When President Karzai criticises foreign Governments for encouraging corruption through large aid transfers, he is absolutely right. That is what happens with large contracts. Stories of large transfers of funds to the Gulf have now even led Congress to suspend the US aid programme.
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There was an even more important mistake, which was to identify foreign aid too closely with the military campaign. Today not just USAID but DfID has a vast aid programme in Helmand, not primarily because of the extent of poverty there but because it has been seduced into a hearts and minds campaign that runs in tandem with a war against insurgents. In Marjah, US marines with back pockets full of dollars are offering to build mosques, clinics and schools in the hope that the insurgents will somehow be persuaded to come down from the mountains and rejoin a peaceful community, but that is not going to happen.
The principal UK aid agencies have warned against this "reconciliation" policy for some time. Indeed, the British Overseas Aid Group called on the Ministry of Defence in January, as the Minister may know, to complain about the confusion caused principally by the provincial reconstruction teams. The PRTs were intended to protect and work alongside civilians, but in effect they are military operations rooted in military discipline. I have regularly mentioned this in debates here. If the Foreign Secretary and his colleagues genuinely want to involve civil society more in forward planning in foreign policy, I suggest that he contacts our own aid agencies at the earliest opportunity.
Soldiers can be very efficient in short-term reconstruction, and indeed have successfully built refugee camps, bridges and buildings such as schools and health centres elsewhere. However, when it comes to earning trust among the local population, the involvement of local people in decision-making and the longer-term planning of health and education policy, aid is better left to the specialised aid agencies. There are a lot of NGOs working in Afghanistan with many years' experience but, instead of building up their resources, the war and investment in security firms has made their work more vulnerable. Private security firms are the very antithesis of peaceful reconstruction and have caused a lot of resentment.
Some of the best development work going on is far from the battle front. I was involved in a project secretly training women teachers during the time of the Taliban, and similar clandestine projects continue today in many parts of Afghanistan, run or funded by UK aid agencies. But surprisingly, Afghanistan, although nearly bottom on the list of poorest countries, is not getting the same support per head from the UK as other countries. Much of our aid is concentrated in so-called "secure areas" covered in troops and barbed wire. One may well ask the Minister, "What is our real objective in remaining in Afghanistan? Do the Afghan people have any evidence that we are there for international development, or is aid becoming an arm of our security strategy?".
Now that the aid budget is ring-fenced, there is a temptation for other departments to give it different names and label their own work as international development. The noble Lords, Lord Hannay and Lord Anderson, have both mentioned the obvious overlaps between aid and diplomacy. I congratulate DfID on the innovative work that it does in countries such as Kenya, Sudan and Nepal. I admit that the arrival of the coalition has given departments the opportunity to review their programmes after many
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I am not part of a "troops out of Afghanistan" campaign. We have a commitment to NATO for another four or five years. But while our casualties have increased, the priorities have surely changed. It is my sincere belief that the public are expecting us to remain as channels of development assistance, not as a fighting force. The Army may well have successes but it cannot guarantee that the local population will receive our assistance or proper protection.
3.35 pm
Lord Wilson of Tillyorn: My Lords, in thanking the noble and learned Lord, Lord Howe of Aberavon, for launching this debate, I should like to concentrate on just one part of that very large canvas that has been sketched out. That one part-quite a large part-is China.
A great deal is said about the enormous development of China over the past few years. Statistics flow out and they are all fantastically impressive. For example, it is responsible for 7 per cent of the world's GDP; China will very shortly overtake Japan as the second largest economy in the world; huge numbers of PhD students and engineers are turned out every year. All those statistics are significant. Our own relationship with China is significant. Among many other things, as noble Lords will know, China supplies the largest amount of investment in the European Union to the United Kingdom.
All this raises the question of how one copes with this rapid development of China. Our dialogue with China is very encouraging. The sort of things that can be talked about, and the way in which it can be done, would have been impossible 10 or 20 years ago. I think that it is common ground that we should try to encourage China to participate in all the international organisations.
However, one of the issues is the point made by the noble Baroness, Lady Williams. It is that those organisations were set up a long time ago, before China re-emerged on to the world scene. Therefore, if we want China to play a real part, we must accept that those organisations will have to change. You cannot expect a large country such as China, coming from a different background, simply to be absorbed without any effect on the organisations. Perhaps the IMF is a good example. There has been an increase in China's contribution to it and therefore in its voting power, but it has been only very slight.
Another aspect is our understanding of China. It was encouraging that the Foreign Secretary spoke today about the need to re-emphasise geographical expertise within the foreign service, which has perhaps been downgraded over the past few years. As my noble friend Lord Kerr of Kinlochard said, that expertise, which can be produced in the Foreign Office, is vital to what we are doing.
More broadly, we should have enough people in this country-not just in the foreign service-who have an understanding and experience of China. The same applies in the other direction: there should be
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Perhaps I may make one last comment-on Hong Kong. The noble and learned Lord, Lord Howe, in the negotiations in which he played such an enormous and significant role about the future of Hong Kong, used to refer to the Ming vase that we were passing on to China. The Ming vase has not been dropped; it is still there. Hong Kong is a success story. Hong Kong in China, but as a very special part of China, is not just a success story, and therefore a cause for great encouragement, but a place of enormous opportunity, of which I hope that people in the UK will continue to take advantage.
3.40 pm
Lord Sheikh: My Lords, this is a most timely and important debate. The world is transforming before our eyes and Britain must be capable of setting its foreign policy in the context of these changes. Over the past 12 months, I have visited East Africa, Russia, Syria, Turkey, the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus, Qatar, Kuwait, the UAE, India and Egypt. I went to these countries to speak at international conferences, for humanitarian reasons or to attend important events-and also for commercial purposes. These visits have enabled me to acquire a better understanding of the situation in the various countries, and I have built up some excellent connections with politicians and people of the countries. I have also fostered good relationships with high commissioners and ambassadors of various countries, as well as their diaspora in the UK. We all need to be involved in networking at all stages; we must foster country-to-country as well as people-to- people contacts.
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In view of the time constraints, I shall comment only briefly on some salient issues. Last weekend, while the Prime Minister was showing a strong lead in Canada, the Foreign Secretary was spelling out a new approach to foreign policy in an interview for the Sunday Telegraph. He has expanded on that vision today and I commend his analysis. His vision, based not on the historic blocs but on taking a fresh look at the new global dynamics, is most welcome.
I am sure we all feel that we should not only maintain but strengthen our relationship with the United States. I am encouraged by the conciliatory attitudes of the Obama Administration, particularly towards the Muslim world. I commend the importance that the Government attach to India and look forward to an enhanced partnership with India. The importance ascribed to this was demonstrated by the reference in the gracious Speech. We need also to accommodate the development of greater links with other countries with emerging economies. We have seen the rise in economic power of the Gulf states and we welcome the involvement in various companies and organisations in our country, which will strengthen not only economic but political ties with the Arab states. I have previously spoken in your Lordships' House on the important role that the Commonwealth can play in building strong relationships in various ways, particularly in strengthening political ties and resolving conflicts. I was pleased that the coalition programme included a statement on strengthening the Commonwealth.
I have already stated that I have visited countries including Turkey and the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus. I fully support the entry of Turkey into the European Union. We need also to resolve problems in Cyprus. I also feel that we should engage with Turkey and its involvement in resolution of conflicts in surrounding areas, including Iran and Palestine. We cannot afford to ignore the challenges presented to us by the ongoing conflict in Palestine. Recent events can serve only to stiffen our resolve that the only long-term and sustainable solution involves two states, with the achievement of a viable and sovereign Palestinian state alongside a secure Israel. That will be the most acceptable solution.
Last week, I visited Russia to make a keynote speech at an international conference on Islamic finance. Our relations with Russia have deteriorated in recent months and some serious issues remain outstanding. Engaging with Russia is complex. The Government have announced that they will seek to establish a new relationship. I feel that we should give that serious consideration.
About three weeks ago, I attended and spoke at a conference in Uganda relating to peace, democracy, the rule of law and the maintenance of human rights. We should continue to ensure good governance and seek to bring to book persons who have committed crimes against humanity.
I have watched with alarm the way that relations with Iran have deteriorated, particularly following last year's presidential elections. We must not forget the important opportunity that the UN presents and Iran needs to engage with the international community. We
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I strongly support the coalition pledge to ring-fence the development budget. Not only is it the right decision from a humanitarian perspective, but it shows the world that we are serious as a nation about supporting developing and emerging economies. This will undoubtedly contribute towards reinforcing British influence and prestige in global affairs.
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