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Foreign Policy

My Lords, like other noble Lords, we express our thanks to the noble Lord, Lord Thomas of Swynnerton, who always gives the House a very interesting historical analysis going back quite a long way: 661AD may be a record, although I am not sure of his recent speeches. We are grateful to him, particularly for his sensible suggestions at the end of his speech about the linkage between the US, the EU and other leading parts of the global village. I apologise to the noble Lord, Lord Howell of Guildford, for my absence for the first two minutes of his speech due to an urgent phone call. On behalfof these Benches, I thank him very much for whathe said—I echo the remarks from others in this debate—especially his sensible guidance about not having got too close to the United States on the mistakes that were made, particularly, in Iraq. When I was a Conservative many years ago, I had the pleasure and privilege of working at a very humble and low level for the late Sir Edward Heath. I was enormously impressed with his engagement with America as a country and a people and, none the less, his scepticism about some of the aspects of formation of policy in Washington DC. That followed Wilson and the terrible mistakes made in Vietnam when Ted Heath was Prime Minister. All that was a searing experience for all of us. Following those terrible mistakes, America calmed down for a while in terms of its geo-political international policies, with the exception of the Middle East where it started to make more and more mistakes. That may be a long time ago, but that was the kernel of the mistakes we see now. Perhaps I may thank very much the noble Baroness, Lady Turner of Camden. I agree with everything she said. Her remarks were extremely critical of the Government’s policy on Iraq and she was right to do make them. We were proud officially as a party to have marched against the war in Iraq. It was an illegal and criminal act, which has been a disaster for this country in foreign policy terms and a tragedy personally for the Prime Minister who made the hideous mistake of getting far too close to, probably, the worst post-war Administration that the United States has ever had to suffer, which can be seen in the polls for President Bush now. President Bush is the most mediocre of all the American Presidents, which sometimes is not saying much if one mentions certain other names. None the less, what he has done to his own people, and what the British Prime Minister and the American President have done to the people of Iraq, with this criminal behaviour, is a tragedy from which it will take many years for Iraq to recover. The destruction of Iraq, the economic infrastructure, the Halliburtonisation of the Iraqi economy and the tragedies, including probably 600,000 civilians killed, are all criminal acts. With the appropriate machinery, the people responsible for making those illegal decisions, without, first, any certification by the United Nations, should answer in the international courts for those mistakes. They will escape that and will not have to do that. It is a personal tragedy for the Prime Minister, and I do not say those words with any pleasure. In terms of the formulation of domestic policies after 1997, like others, I was most impressed with what thePrime Minister and his governmental team didfor this country with some of their reforms and modernisations. On domestic policy, there has been a good show by and large. We of course objected to, argued against and resisted many of the proposals in detail, but the general picture has been very good in Britain. I pay that tribute in a spirit of generosity to the Labour Government. I am sure that Mr Joseph Corre, a fashion designer, has misunderstood slightly the MBE procedure. In singling out the Prime Minister for some excoriating words, he has said: "““I have been chosen by an organisation headed by a prime minister who I find morally corrupt … [who] has been involved ""in organised lying, to the point where thousands of people including children have suffered death, detention and torture in Afghanistan and Iraq … To accept this MBE … would mean … I would have to accept the prime minister as someone capable of giving an honour ie an honourable man, which I cannot find it in my heart to do””." That is a severe criticism—I do not knowMr Corre—and some people might say it goes beyond the normal bounds. However, the Prime Minister’s principal legacy that people will remember is cash-for-peerages—I regret having to say this—and the continuing investigation; the criminal and illegal war in Iraq; the failure to achieve any sensible peace inthe Middle East; and the behaviour of a leading representative of the Government in stopping the investigation into British Aerospace and the Saudi Arabian al-Yamamah contract. Those are serious charges which I hope to have answered by the Minister today, if he has time, or perhaps on other occasions. However, I add my words to what the noble Viscount, Lord Montgomery, said about the two Members of the Government on this Front Bench.In total contrast to my previous remarks, the prosecution and expression of Labour Government foreign policy in this House has always been in highly capable hands with the noble Lord, Lord Triesman, and the noble Baroness, Lady Royall. We thank them sincerely. I wish that they could express themselves more boldly, as the noble Baroness, Lady Royall, tried to do during Questions on Tuesday in regard to the European Union. I turn now to the way in which the Government are to deal with the European summit. There are foreign policy aspects to it and the EU needs to be engaged in the Middle East road map again. I do not like the idea that is creeping into the press in this country that suddenly the quartet machinery, the road plan and all the other plans that were originally in place have now got to be set aside for some trendy kind of new structure; people are talking about a three-state solution and so on. In the White Paper on the European Union and the German presidency earlier this year, firm and totally unequivocal words were used. On page 12 at paragraph 56, it states: "““The EU will continue to play an active role in the Middle East Peace Process … in its own right and as part of the Quartet. The focus will be on supporting further negotiations between the two parties and looking to reinvigorate the Roadmap, the best vehicle for establishing a just and lasting peace. The EU will look to expand on practical steps to further the peace process””." This policy is in ruins. Although people have said that the United States has failed to do what is necessary in the Middle East, no one has mentioned the realityof the 32 vetoes exercised by the United States in the UN which allowed the Israeli Government—I amnot criticising the Israeli people; I love Israel as a country and I know it very well—to fail to acknowledge its responsibilities under international law and not respond to what the UN was asking, or insisting on, when Chapter 7 resolutions were involved. The asymmetry of what is going on in the Middle East is that Hamas, as always, is put on one side; Fatah is now the official Government only, but not elected by the people—most recently the Government were Hamas and still is—and Israel, asymmetrically, is not obliged to make any concessions. It always has to wait until later, as the noble Lord, Lord Blaker, has said on many occasions. These realities show that the foreign policy position without the EU will be weak indeed unless the EU is on equal terms with the United States in the future, has an equal role and the United States listens to the EU as well as to other countries. This is why the summit is so important. Unless those changes come, we will see continued mistakes made by the Americans in other areasas well. The whole Muslim world, including Muslim communities in Britain and in other European countries, is watching very closely to see whether the unfairness and injustice in the Middle East between Palestine and Israel continues. Even with an agreement on a two-state solution going back to the 1967 boundaries, it would leave Palestine with 23 per cent of the total combined territory. Israel with so much, Palestine with so little, is it not now time for a movement forward and for a just solution to be found? This would show once again that the UN is capable of doing this; that the EU is capable as well; that Russia has a role; and that the United Stateswill listen to others and will insist, quite rightly,that Prime Minister Olmert behaves properly in accordance with the requirements of the Oslo accords, which were never fulfilled on the Israeli side because of its accusations that terrorism prevented it from doing so. We know the realities when we visit the West Bank. I went there with Sir Gerald Kaufman MP two years ago and saw the stark and dreadful situation there. This cannot go on. It is a total disgrace for the western world. The Muslim community saw how Iraq invaded Kuwait and a year later was expelled—quite rightly, too—but this had nothing to do with removing Saddam Hussein or the other nasty bits of the Iraqi Government. When I was in Baghdad in 1988, on only one visit, the place was full of British and American officials saying that the Saddam Hussein Government were the most wonderful in the Middle East; Iran was the enemy then. Iran is once again the enemy to some in America and we must restrain the neo-cons from excesses in that field as well in order to get a just solution for Iran and its requirements for security as well as those of Israel. Israel has a sacred right to future security. That can only be provided by Israeli concessions and the EU has a major role to play. I hope the Government will endorse my expectations.