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Iraq and the wider Middle East

I thank my hon. Friend for that point. As I am sure he knows, the one is legal and the other is entirely illegal. As I say, our huge endeavours have been undermined by our invasion of Iraq. Most importantly, the invasion has rendered us a far less effective interlocutor in the now possibly fatally flawed middle east peace process. I am not a fundamentalist, and I do not oppose all military interventions, but we have to learn from our history. Ali Allawi, the former Iraqi Defence Minister, recently wrote in The Independent that"““What we are witnessing…is the beginning of the unravelling of the unjust and unstable system that was carved out of the wreckage of the Ottoman Empire. It had held for nearly 100 years by a mixture of…outside meddling, brutal dictatorships and minority rule.””" Britain is part of that history; it first occupied Basra in 1914, it ruled Iraq in the 1920s, and it invaded a sovereign Iraq to establish a pro-British Government in the 1940s. Our involvement in Iran followed a similar pattern, so our support for regime change and the defence of western oil interests is nothing new. What ought we to learn from the history of the middle east? First, we should learn that we cannot impose foreign solutions on the area. We should also learn that arming one dictatorship to fight another, as we did in the case of Iraq and Iran, only increases oppression and bitterness, and it will do so again if the US attacks Iran. I echo all the warnings given on that subject today; there will be huge opposition if our Government support such an action. As Ali Allawi says,"““What was supposed to be a straightforward process of overthrowing a dictatorship and replacing it with a liberal-leaning and secular democracy…has instead turned into an existential battle for identity, power and legitimacy that is affecting not only Iraq, but the entire tottering state system in the Middle East.””" Allawi offers Iraq and the international community a blueprint for moving forward, for beginning to make the peace, with an acknowledgement—he is a Shi’a—of the fundamental shift from Sunni to Shi’a domination. He argues for the involvement of threatened neighbours, and for Iran and Turkey to be introduced into a new security structure for the middle east that would recognise legitimate concerns, fears and interests. In essence, Allawi’s blueprint moves to a multilateralist, multi-ethnic approach to the future, away from the simplistic unilateralist approach of the Bush Administration. Britain should do the same. Our use of ““hard”” power must be linked to a foreign policy that identifies the links between human rights, human security and counter-terrorism. Humanitarian intervention, which I support, needs to be rooted in internationally accepted humanitarian principles, not in geopolitical self-interest, as was the case in Iraq. The Foreign Secretary today gave us many reasons to hope that the elected Iraqi Government may in the foreseeable future be able to take over their own security and begin the rebuilding of their state. Like everyone who heard her words, I welcome them and I hope from the bottom of my heart that she is correct, but learning from our mistakes and thinking outside the Bush box will be essential if we are to be there supporting that Government and enabling them to move forward in their own direction. We must support a regional security conference and the involvement of Iran and Syria, as many others have said today, without preconditions. We must help to secure a viable Palestinian state. Like others who have spoken, I cannot understand how we have been prepared to talk to all manner of regimes around the world, but not to the democratically elected Hamas Government. I understand the position of Israel. I understand the position with respect to transfers of money, but there can be no case for isolating Hamas and failing to talk to them in the critical situation that we face. We have an important role to play in the world, but we must learn to see and to define that role through British eyes, to engage more positively with our European allies, to follow the United States less slavishly, and to advance our progressive agenda of justice and poverty alleviation. Unless we do that—unless we re-embrace our fundamental values—we will not be able to give to the desperate Iraqi people the kind of support that might enable them to secure a better future for themselves in the way that they choose.