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Middle East and North Africa

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for those questions; I think that they reflect the large measure of agreement across the House on many of the issues. I shall run through his questions in the order in which he asked them. The right hon. Gentleman was quite right, of course, to pay an additional tribute to our armed forces and the work that they have done on Libya. He asked what the situation is in Sirte. There remain two small, steadily shrinking areas where the pro-Gaddafi forces fight on. I do not think that it is possible to give a time scale—[Interruption.]—well, a more precise time scale than anyone has given so far, which is what the shadow Foreign Secretary was asking for. We have always resisted putting precise time scales on things. However, clearly great advances have been made by the free Libya forces in recent weeks and days, and there are now two small areas left. That shows that the pro-Gaddafi forces that remain are in a very difficult position. The right hon. Gentleman is right to ask about weapons coming into the country. Indeed, that is part of the issue of the stabilisation of Libya. The national transitional council has been consistently underestimated in the past six months, at every stage. International opinion, many media commentators and sometimes those in this House thought that the council did not have the capacity or expertise to get a grip on its country. It has shown at every stage that it does, and I think that it will, in addition, have that ability when it comes to controlling the supply of weapons. We are giving it assistance in tracking down some of the weapons of the Gaddafi regime that have gone missing, and that assistance will continue. Syria has long since passed the fork in the road. The right hon. Gentleman is right that back in March, I said that it was at a fork in the road—I said it for a while—but the Assad regime is now far past the fork, and sadly it took the wrong fork. That is why we said in August, along with the United States and our European partners, that Assad should go, and that the regime should come to an end. It is for the Turks to announce, of course, the details of their proposals. For reasons that will become obvious, I cannot give details of the next measure that the European Union will take; action against a major Syrian entity will be announced pretty soon. The right hon. Gentleman was worried about the brevity of my remarks on Bahrain, but that was simply to comply with Mr Speaker's strictures. One could talk for hours on any of the subjects that we are discussing, and if the House sets aside the time, I will be delighted to do so. Over the past few months, Bahrain has taken some actions that are welcome, and some that are very unwelcome; it has gone in different directions—sometimes at the same time, speaking frankly. It was welcome that it announced the commission of inquiry into abuses, and indeed put internationally respected people on it. I also welcome its decision, after the international outcry about the trial of the doctors and nurses, about the retrial. It is welcome that it has attempted, since the time that the right hon. Gentleman was talking about, a national dialogue in Bahrain, yet of course there are many valid, legitimate criticisms as well, and allegations of human rights abuses. That national dialogue has not yet been successful in bringing everybody together in Bahrain. The diplomatic message to Bahrain is communicated in many different ways, including by me, in my conversations with the Foreign Minister of Bahrain. The Under-Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, my hon. Friend the Member for North East Bedfordshire (Alistair Burt), is in regular discussion with the Bahraini authorities. The National Security Adviser, Sir Peter Ricketts, recently visited Bahrain and made clear our views on all these matters, so I want to put the emphasis for the next 17 days, up to the publication of the commission of inquiry's report, on the great importance that I think all of us in the House attach to that, because the credibility of the report and the readiness to act on it will be an important test of how Bahrain will approach the coming weeks and months. In Yemen, we are taking many steps to support an orderly transition of power. I pay tribute again to the staff in our embassy in Yemen, who work in what is perhaps the most dangerous situation that any of our diplomats face around the world. I visited them there in February. They do a great job in supporting the Gulf Co-operation Council's efforts to promote dialogue and trying to persuade all sides to sign up to the orderly transition of power. We continue to work closely with the Gulf countries, including Saudi Arabia, on this. As I have said, we are about to discuss this in the United Nations Security Council and are considering whether a resolution there would add to the international pressure on the President to sign up to an orderly transition of power. I agree with the right hon. Gentleman's concerns about the Egyptian economy. I expressed those concerns to the Egyptian Foreign Minister when I talked with him last night and, in particular, asked him and the Egyptian Government to take steps to give investors in Egypt greater confidence about both security and in relation to recent court decisions. That is very important to British businesses, which are the largest investors in Egypt, particularly in the oil and gas sectors. He undertook to do that, and UK Ministers will of course strongly reiterate these concerns on forthcoming visits. The right hon. Gentleman is also right to raise concerns about the timetable for presidential elections slipping. When I asked the Egyptian Foreign Minister about that yesterday, he said that he believed that the elections would take place by the summer of next year. According to other commentators, that is an optimistic timetable. Without interfering in the sovereign affairs of Egypt, I think that we can continue to express our view that the sooner such elections take place, the better. Egypt of course needs clear and strong civilian leadership in the form of a democratically elected President, and that cannot come about too soon. The right hon. Gentleman and I are in agreement on welcoming the release of Gilad Shalit. The Security Council is considering the membership application of the Palestinians through its normal procedures. When and how to take that forward will be partly up to the Security Council and partly up to its members. There is currently no specific proposition before the Security Council on this. He said that I had expressed carefully chosen words on the issue. They are very carefully chosen, because words really matter on this issue. It is a delicate and difficult subject. Our words are all directed towards trying to bring about the resumption of negotiations between Israelis and Palestinians. How we act in the Security Council or on any motion that may come before the UN General Assembly will be determined by how we can bring about a resumption of negotiations. All 27 EU countries have withheld a verdict on motions at the UN, partly because there is currently no specific motion to vote on, but also to maximise our leverage over both Israelis and Palestinians to return to talks. That is the basis of our position and I think that it would be wrong to move away from it at the moment. On Iran, we announced considerable additional European sanctions at the end of May. We are working on further sanctions, but I am not in a position to announce those today. The attempted action revealed by the United States this week makes a strong case for additional measures, which we are now discussing with our partners. The right hon. Gentleman rightly identified the importance of the BBC Persian service, through which we should communicate at every opportunity. Attempts are made to block that, but we of course support the service politically, diplomatically and technically in any way we can.