---

Terrorism (Foreign Policy Aspects)

: I have no further information than the hon. Gentleman about what was said in the House. All that I would say is that I have no evidence to challenge the Prime Minister's assertion that this country is not engaged in torture, and condemns it. The question is what is happening with respect to the United States and its flights around the world. It has been reported that there are so-called black sites in Poland and Romania—prisons or detention centres, which may or may not now be closed, but which at some point have perhaps been places where people were kept for some time before being moved to another United States facility elsewhere. It is worrying that those issues have become so prominent and—to return to my earlier point—have become part of the debate about standards, double standards and the image of the democratic world in the context of the war on terrorism. It is not justifiable or excusable and it is also politically foolish for us to use measures that imply that our standards have changed so as to infringe human rights and break international law in the pursuit of the cause of protecting our people from terrorism. I do not want to comment now on the important judgment by the Law Lords today, but it puts the discussion into context. I hope that when the Government consider the matter internationally and make representations to the United States, they will recognise that we can be damaged and tainted by association with the activities even if we do not participate in them. The need for clarity in our position and our response to what is happening is very important. I shall deal briefly with the situation in Iraq. The report that we published in March refers to Iraq in considerable detail. The Committee has closely followed developments there. We note that violence continues to be a serious problem in some, but not all, parts of Iraq. The north of the country is relatively peaceful, and the democratic autonomous region there has thrived for many years, both before and since the intervention in 2003. The south of the country around Basra, which is where the British forces are, was much more peaceful and less violent until recent months in which there have been some unfortunate developments and problems. We gave detailed consideration to these matters in the report, but since then there has been the very important development in Iraq of the constitutional referendum and the preparations that are now well under way for the elections on 15 December. I supported the intervention in Iraq, as did many other Members. Some of my colleagues took a different view, but whatever our position, I believe that we all want there to be a successful outcome to those elections and all parts of Iraq society, including the substantial body of Sunni political figures who so far have not engaged directly in the political process, to be involved in the process in the coming months so that the next Iraqi Government to be formed after the elections can unite all the communities in the country so far as possible. That will not be easy, because there are still massive stockpiles of former Ba'athist weaponry, many people with the ability to use those weapons and people with an agenda who are determined to destroy the progress towards democracy and stability in the country.