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Queen’s Speech

My Lords, when I listened to the gracious Speech yesterday I felt totally humiliated by the manner in which the Government showed such disrespect, not only for the ordinary citizens of the United Kingdom, but for Her gracious Majesty. They did not include a single word of recognition for those who serve our nation. Her Majesty, who never fails to acknowledge our serving forces, must have been dismayed by the absence of the Government’s sensitivity and compassion. What is this nation of ours becoming as it is being led in confusion into chaos? There is neither clear direction nor conviction coming from the Prime Minister, the Secretary of State for Defence or the Foreign Secretary. Just look at the contradictory messages that they have been giving: "We are in Afghanistan for the long haul"; "We could be pulling out of Afghanistan in the foreseeable future"; "There are enough helicopters to meet operational requirements"; "We are going to have more helicopters". Each utterance depends more on the public mood on any particular day than on understanding the mission that we have undertaken. Spin outstrips clarity. While the Government fight their knee-jerk war with the press, our troops are left to struggle not only with the enemy on the ground, but with our national inadequacies. I had the privilege of visiting our troops in Helmand in 2008, when it was clear that the entire burden was being carried by our young men and women, such as those at Musa Qala who were for weeks on end, without respite, mentoring Afghan forces. Was there any strategic back-up, I asked? What was the long-term ambition for this new army when our troops were gone? Everyone who has served during a terrorist campaign, as I have, will know that it is as remunerative for an Afghan to fight for the Taliban or al-Qaeda as it is for him to fight for the national Army, and that one day the young Afghan soldier must go back to his village. However, I am told that virtually nothing is being done about the education of these young men. Why have our planners not recognised that, besides learning to fight, these young men need to learn to live—to return home with status and a wider ambition for their families and community? That should be part of a strategy for at least beginning to normalise that region. Another issue in Afghanistan that puzzles me is the use of UAVs. I am no expert, but where 10 UAVs, for example Predators, can be produced for the cost of one Chinook helicopter, it strikes me that control from somewhere in Colorado or North Dakota—7,500 miles away—is not, however good communications may be, the way to maximise this asset for our troops. Should British forces not have more UAVs in a surveillance role, responding to commanders on the ground and flown by operators embedded with units on the ground, to better and more immediately counter the situation where most of our casualties are the victims of massive dug-in landmines? Perhaps the Minister will explain why this Government appear to have, and to tolerate, this semi-detached approach to this campaign and to the defence of our troops. In foreign affairs, the Government state that they will, ""work for security, stability and prosperity in Afghanistan and Pakistan, and for peace in the Middle East"." How, then, have we managed to withdraw from Iraq so ineffectively that the Prime Minister, Mr. Nouri al-Maliki, and his Government are able to persecute—to see killed or tortured—the 3,500 Iranian refugees at Camp Ashraf who oppose the dangerous mullahs’ regime in Iran? When I seek parliamentary Answers, I am virtually told by the Government, "Nothing to do with us—we’re out of there". Is that not shameful and a slur on the memory of our young servicemen and women who gave their lives to make Iraq a safer place—troops taken there, it now appears, at the behest of this Government on a false or misguided premise? In the short time still available to me, I turn to what I consider to be the greatest and ever enlarging blot on the character of our nation and an area studiously and consistently avoided by this Government; that is, the Government's persistent obduracy in respect of our obligations, as a guarantor power, to the island of Cyprus, our acquiescence in the 45-year denial of human rights to the Turkish Cypriot community and our mendacity in respect of our fellow guarantor and long-time ally, Turkey. I will pose a number of questions that I hope the Minister will be more courageous in answering than has been the case in response to my Written Questions. Is J.D. Bowers, the international authority and respected American professor of genocide studies at Northern Illinois University, correct when he openly confirms that Greek Cypriots and EOKA-B, under the leadership of Nikos Sampson, were guilty of the genocide of Turkish Cypriots within the 1963 United Nations definition of "genocide"? Did the Akritas and Ifestos 1974 plans not spell out the means and methodology for that genocide? Was Turkey justified in its intervention in 1974 that brought an end to the killings, when we had turned our backs on our treaty obligation? Have the Greek Cypriots rejected every potential settlement for the past 35 years? Did the Blair promises of 2004 to Turkish Cypriots, following their acceptance of the Annan Plan, run totally and completely into the sand? Unless the Government and the EU face up to the truth of these questions no progress will be made and we will have to face up to a two-nation island; perhaps that is inevitable. Finally, did not Defence and Foreign Affairs Ministers snub those 371 of our troops who died during the Cyprus emergency of 1955-59, their families and comrades, by failing to attend the unveiling of the memorial to them—more than 300 of them travelled to Cyprus for the occasion—on Armistice Day this year? I acknowledge and appreciate that the high commissioner attended, but it was unforgivable that no Minister attended this unique occasion—and we all know why. If the answers to my questions are in the affirmative—and they must be—will the Minister at least tell us why Prime Minister Brown even considered signing a Memorandum of Understanding with Greek-Cypriot President Christofias on 5 June 2008, in the midst of the Cyprus talks process? It was a memorandum that further fuelled and underpinned the aggression of the Greek Cypriots towards the Turkish Cypriots. The Minister may not like it, but she will know that every word I have uttered is true. Otherwise, let her say so now. In the final analysis, I have to ask: is there any honour left in my country or are there any values left worth defending? Which is more important to this Government—the next election or the next soldier who dies in the belief that this nation is worthy of his sacrifice?