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Iraq and the Middle East

My Lords, I will try to respond quickly to the points made by the noble Lords, Lord Howell of Guildford and Lord McNally. I first want to tell the noble Lord, Lord Howell, that the security of our remaining troops is our first concern; he will realise from the Statement that the decision made has been based on conditions on the ground. I can also tell the noble Lord, Lord McNally, that we are not working to a predetermined timetable. The transfer of security responsibilities to the Iraqis is the ultimate goal, but that is based on what happens on the ground. Following Operation Sinbad, we believe that we can best create the conditions for that by reducing our footprint on the ground and focusing our efforts on training the Iraqi police and security forces. The noble Lord, Lord Howell, mentioned the equipment available to our Armed Forces. We take the protection of our servicemen and servicewomen very seriously. We have rapidly procured a number of vehicles to enhance force protection, while substantial improvements have been made in recent years to the standard and quantity of body armour available to armed forces personnel; commanders in Iraq now have a range of that. There are also, of course, our military aircraft, which are fitted with defensive systems and other aids to mitigate threats present in the operational environments in which they are deployed. On the Baker-Hamilton issue, and following down the diplomatic route, I constantly hear these arguments about the US and UK strategies being at odds with each other. We are at the point in Basra where we are able to talk about troop drawdown precisely because of Operation Sinbad and what it has been seeking to put in place. In Baghdad, the United States, with the Iraqi Government, is seeking to use the increased troop levels to secure and then to hold areas of the city to enable reconstruction to take place. These are not mutually exclusive things, but a recognition that the situation differs in the two parts of the country and that Baghdad is particularly difficult. Given that 80 per cent of the conflict occurs within a 30-mile radius of Baghdad, the city has to be made secure. The decision that has been taken is that it can be made secure only on the basis of additional troops. At the same time, there is of course a diplomatic route that we want to follow. Noble Lords will again know that the previous and present Foreign Secretaries, Jack Straw and Margaret Beckett, have been involved with EU colleagues in negotiating with the Iranians on their nuclear ambitions. In fact, EU foreign Ministers discussed Iran briefly at their meeting on 22 January, and with our full support they agreed that, in order to ensure effective implementation of the United Nations resolutions, the European Union, "““should prevent the export to and import from Iran of the goods on the NSG and MTCR lists; ban transactions with and freeze the assets of individuals and entities covered by the criteria””," in that Security Council resolution, and, "““ban travel to the EU of the individuals covered by these criteria””." Officials are drafting a common position to take that decision forward. I also want to assure the noble Lord, Lord Howell, that we are supportive of the Lebanese Government and the efforts that they are making, as the Statement made absolutely clear. We have already had four independent inquiries into Iraq: the Butler inquiry, the Hutton inquiry, the ISC inquiry and the FAC inquiry. I remember that everyone was very pleased when we first announced the Hutton inquiry but, because they did not like the outcome, they immediately asked for another inquiry. In answer to the question raised by the noble Lord, Lord McNally, I do not believe that we should divert the attention of those working on this critical issue by holding a further inquiry at this time. The time to make such a decision will be when all our troops have come home from Iraq. We are constantly learning the lessons of the conflict. The noble Lord, Lord McNally, raised a number of further questions and in particular said that the leader of the Liberal Democrats had developed his own plan for drawdown. In December 2005, my right honourable friend the Prime Minister said: "““It is our strategy to draw down forces and we don’t want to leave people here longer than we need to. The whole process is to build up the Iraqi capability in the armed forces and police so we can draw down our own forces. The political aspect can only be buttressed by a strong security aspect increasingly taken over by the Iraqis themselves””." That was the position in December 2005 and is the position now. We have made some progress in that some of that drawdown will begin to happen. However, I can assure the noble Lord that we will retain a robust re-intervention capacity. On Baker-Hamilton, the noble Lord may recall that, at what was seen as great personal political risk, my right honourable friend the Prime Minister invited the President of Syria to the United Kingdom in 2002. Indeed, he was criticised by many for seeking to engage through diplomatic channels with Syria. That engagement broke down subsequently but we will continue to go down the diplomatic route. We will continue to work closely with the Iraqi Government on reconstruction and development. Our total pledge for humanitarian and reconstruction aid for Iraq for 2003-06 was £544 million; a further pledge of £100 million was announced by the Chancellor in late 2006; and over the next year the Department for International Development’s water and electricity projects will improve access to water for 1 million people living in southern Iraq and a further 328 megawatts of power will be added or secured to the Iraqi national grid. With the work already under way, this will help to supply almost 1 million people with 24-hour power. We intend to continue to work in partnership with our colleagues in the multinational force and the Iraqi Government, but bringing our troops home when the conditions are right is also an important element of the strategy.