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Iran (UK Policy)

First of all, I shall do my duty and congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Thurrock (Andrew Mackinlay) on securing today’s debate. I was genuinely hoping that we could have a serious discussion about the intricate issues involved in Iran’s relationships with us and its multilateral and unilateral relationships. In his usual style, my hon. Friend has missed an opportunity to have that discussion. I will write to him on the specific questions that he asked, as I had no notice of them. As he rightly said, issues have arisen in the past few hours, and I do not want to mislead him or any other Member here. I will place a copy of the letter in the Library so that all Members can read it. I reject totally my hon. Friend’s assertions that there is no coherent strategy and that we are failing to mobilise European and wider international opinion. Nor are we sending mixed messages. I agree with him and with other hon. Members—although their comments, sadly, have been somewhat politically partisan—that we need a coherent relationship with Iran. We support those in Iran who want a democratic, accountable country that operates to international norms and does not engage internally or externally in the abuse of human rights or the encouragement of terrorism through support, financing or the provision of hardware. We want to resolve peacefully issues of the use of nuclear power for military rather than civilian purposes. We also want to see Iran play its part effectively in the international community. It is an important country and its people are important people. It must be seen to be embraced openly by the international community. It is therefore important, despite the difficulties, that we should have a bilateral relationship with Iran and work multilaterally with the international community to deal with many of those issues, some of which my hon. Friend mentioned in his speech and some of which I shall touch on generally. I have only a few minutes to respond to the debate. I am not using that as an excuse not to cover the waterfront of Iran, but that would be impossible do to in a few minutes. If at the end of my reply I have not covered all aspects of the debate, I shall write my hon. Friend a detailed note and, again, put a copy in the Library for hon. Members. Iran can play a more constructive role, particularly in relation to Iraq, about which it faces increased isolation, including among its colleagues in the region. It can take action to meet human rights commitments. Although it has signed up to them, it still imprisons its own people for demanding those rights. All those issues will determine the future shape of our relationship with Iran. We are committed to diplomacy and dialogue in our engagement with Iran, but that does not prevent us and the international community from maintaining pressure about legitimate concerns. Let me put the question of military action to bed. On 6 February this year, our Prime Minister said:"““Nobody is preparing for military action and nobody wants military action.?" On 2 February this year, US Defence Secretary Robert Gates said:"““The President has made clear, the Secretary of State has made clear, I’ve made clear…we are not planning for a war with Iran.?" That was followed by a statement from the Israeli Foreign Minister saying that Israel would prefer issues with Iran to be resolved through diplomatic channels. It is not helpful to continue this story. It is a red herring. It does not help our multilateral or unilateral relationships. Neither we nor the international community are preparing for war with Iran. During the past few years, international concerns have arisen about Iran’s nuclear programme. Iran’s uranium enrichment and reprocessing activities were secretly developed for 20 years, and questions put for the past four years by the International Atomic Energy Agency remain unanswered. Why is Iran’s military involved in a civilian programme? Why will it not explain its dealings with A.Q. Khan’s network, which helped North Korea and Libya with their secret nuclear weapons programmes? Why did it experiment with polonium-210, which has no use in electricity generation but can set off nuclear explosions? As I said, we remain committed to taking the diplomatic route in relation to Iran’s nuclear ambitions. Last summer’s generous proposals would give Iran everything that it needs to develop a modern civil nuclear power industry. This is where I take issue with my hon. Friend. The proposals were among a range of measures in which Britain has played its part multilaterally to promote engagement between Iran and the international community. We presented proposals that Iran could accept to resolve the issue effectively and sustain its own independent civil nuclear power industry, but it has chosen to reject that multilateral approach. We still need to work with Iran to gain active support for building, for example, new light-water power reactors, which would benefit Iran, not only technologically, but by moving it away from using nuclear power for military purposes. On regional issues, many countries in the middle east feel threatened by Iran’s increasingly malign role in Iraq, Lebanon and Palestine. They wonder how much worse it would be if the President had a nuclear arsenal. If we sit by while Iran acquires a nuclear bomb, how many other countries will try to follow suit? It is important to recognise that the Iranian Government, uniquely, opposes a two-state solution to the Israel-Palestine conflict—a two-state solution that this Government have worked in the heart of international diplomacy to promote, develop and secure, despite difficult circumstances. Iran’s President still queries the existence of the holocaust, in which 6 million lives were lost during the second world war. Iran remains a key source of funds and arms for Lebanese Hezbollah and Palestinian Islamic Jihad, using Iranian taxpayers’ money that would be better spent on providing housing, education and jobs closer to home. It is an ignominious regime that, while needing to provide 800,000 jobs each year to the talented young population from which it must secure support, spends and diverts that money to the promotion of terrorist activities. Iran is arming and funding extremists who are undermining security and stability not only in Iraq but throughout the region as a whole, and that should be ended. I turn to human rights, which was raised by my hon. Friend in relation to the MEK or PMOI. My hon. Friend suggested that I had been meeting with that organisation. I have no recollection of doing so, either as a Minister or as an individual member of the Labour party; I want to put that on the record. That does not mean that I never met somebody who belonged to it—people come up to me in their hundreds at party conferences, so I may well have done so. But I want to put on record the fact that I have never had discussions with that organisation about its activities.