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Arms Export Controls

I refer the hon. Gentleman to the report. An annexe sets out information sent by the organisation Saferworld, which listed arms exports year by year from the UK to Sri Lanka. We were told by the then Foreign Office Minister, now the Minister of State, Ministry of Defence, my hon. Friend the Member for Harlow (Bill Rammell), that there had been a pause in those exports as a result of the conflict. However, that pause came later—in 2008, not 2006. The issue raised when questioning the Minister, which is reflected in the report, is that the ceasefire established in 2002 was always tentative, breaking down and being significantly eroded; yet in most years from 2002 onwards the Government continued to allow exports of a whole range of weaponry to the Sri Lankan armed forces, including small arms, naval components, helicopter components and so on. We might make an assessment today that the situation in a particular country is relatively safe with regard to the export of armaments; but within one, two or three years, or perhaps 10 years, those same weapons could be used by the same Government or a successor Government for repression or in an internal conflict, which would be contrary to the intention of the Government's original decision. We must therefore be rigorous. When the Foreign Affairs Committee was discussing the matter with the Foreign Office Minister, I pointed out that we had much tougher rules with regard to Israel on such matters than we do for Sri Lanka, yet many more people died in the conflict in Sri Lanka than were killed in Gaza. According to the Government's October response to the Foreign Affairs Committee human rights report, more than 200,000 internally displaced persons are still being held in IDP camps in northern Sri Lanka. The Sri Lankan Government do not agree with that figure. In a communication dated yesterday—presumably sent in expectation of today's debate—the Sri Lankan Government claim that the number of people remaining in the IDP camps is much lower. They claim that there are 164,338, of whom 151,000 are in what they call zones 0 to 11 and welfare centres, 7,255 in transitional sites and 247 in what they call an elder home, giving a total of 158,990. The others, presumably, are somewhere else. The Under-Secretary of State for International Development, my hon. Friend the Member for Worcester (Mr. Foster), has recently been in Sri Lanka, and has been pressing for the early release of those people. There is no prospect of their being returned to their homes soon; the situation is bleak, given the water supply, the overcrowding and the climate. That is partly because some of those areas have been mined, but also because the Sri Lankan Government seem determined to keep young men and women in screening centres and in detention.