Written question asked by Lord Lancaster of Kimbolton (Conservative) on Friday, 14 November 2008, in the House of Commons. It was due for an answer on Tuesday, 18 November 2008. It was answered by Douglas Alexander (Labour) on Tuesday, 25 November 2008 on behalf of the Department for International Development.

Stabilisation Unit

Question: To ask the Secretary of State for International Development what assessment he has made of the Stabilisation Unit's performance against its aim of improving its understanding of the tasks involved in a stabilisation effort in (a) Afghanistan and (b) Iraq.

Answer: The Stabilisation Unit seeks continually to learn lessons from the UK's experience in Afghanistan and Iraq, as well as from other partners and theatres. Its understanding of stabilisation is summarised in two documents. In June 2008, the Stabilisation Unit produced its ““Stabilisation Task Matrix””, which describes a menu of tasks which might be required to achieve stability and suggests who would need to take lead responsibility (the military, the police or civilians) for each task in ““non-permissive”” and ““permissive”” environments. The primary purpose of the Matrix is to enable the UK to further develop its capability to meet future challenges. The Matrix will be reviewed by spring 2009. Later this month, the Stabilisation Unit will also publish the ““UK Approach to Stabilisation””, which will describe emerging UK experience and best practice.Both documents will be available on the Stabilisation Unit's web-site:"www.stabilisationunit.gov.uk."

Secondary information