British Nationals Detained Overseas

Debate between Kevin Brennan and Jeremy Corbyn

Wednesday 20th April 2022 Westminster Hall

[Kevin Brennan]

I am sure the Minister will have heard what the hon. Gentleman has said and will want to respond to that remark. It is important that, when the Prime Minister visits other countries and meets their leaders, he highlights these sorts of cases as a priority.

[Jeremy Corbyn (Islington North) (Ind)]

May I draw my hon. Friend’s attention to the case of Mehran Raoof, a trade union activist who is in jail in Iran? He was not released when others were released. The Foreign Secretary rather erroneously said that he did not want his name to be made public. It has been made absolutely clear through Amnesty International that his family do want his name to be made public, they do want a public campaign, and they do want him to be released in the same way that the very welcome release of Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe took place.

[Kevin Brennan]

My right hon. Friend quite rightly highlights that case and makes that name public. I am sure that will have achieved what he wanted. There are other cases, of course: Morad Tahbaz and Mehran Raoof, whom we have heard mentioned, are two other British-Iranians whose arbitrary imprisonment continues despite the recent negotiations. There is also British citizen Jimmy Lai, who is being held in solitary confinement in Hong Kong under the dystopian national security law.

Today, however, I want primarily to tell the story of my 30-year-old constituent Luke Symons, who has been held without charge or trial by the Houthis in various prisons in Sanaa, Yemen, since 2017. Like many people in Cardiff, Luke has a Yemeni family background, owing to the seafarers who settled around the city’s thriving docklands in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. By 1914, the Yemeni population of Cardiff represented one of the two largest Muslim communities in Britain, and it continues to constitute a proud and vibrant part of the diverse population of Wales’s capital city.

In exploring his religious and cultural roots, Luke travelled to Yemen, where he met his future wife, Tagreed, a Yemeni national, in 2014. In 2016, they had a son together. Shortly after Luke’s arrival in the country, the civil war started, leading rapidly to the overthrow of the Yemeni Government, and he found himself caught in the middle of a violent conflict that came to involve military intervention by regional powers, including Saudi Arabia. Luke and his wife tried to flee to safety; they tried to come back to the UK via neighbouring countries. They managed to get to Djibouti, but they did not get the support they needed from the UK authorities to be able to travel to Britain; sadly and unfortunately, they had to return to Yemen. Following that, in April 2017, Luke was detained at a Houthi checkpoint in Yemen upon the discovery that he held a British passport.

In the ensuing five years, despite numerous promises from Houthi and Yemeni officials, talks between regional authorities and UK Foreign Secretaries, and a visit to the prison by the UK special envoy to Yemen, Luke has remained incarcerated. As the Minister will know, in October 2020, it appeared as though Luke might be included in a substantial UN-supervised exchange, which consisted of more than 1,000 prisoners. The Foreign Office says that, following extensive negotiations and logistical planning for Luke’s release, with arrangements also being made to ensure safe passage for his wife and child, Luke’s captors inexplicably broke the agreement and severed lines of communication with the UK Government. That was obviously devastating for Luke’s family, who watched helplessly as other foreign nationals, including some from the United States, were returned home by their Governments from captivity in Yemen.

Since then, there has been very little outward progress on Luke’s case. Occasionally, his family have been allowed to communicate with him via telephone. They have become increasingly concerned and distressed by his poor physical health, which has been exacerbated by the notoriously squalid conditions of his captivity and the ongoing covid pandemic. There is also concern about the lack of access to medical attention for Luke. I understand that his wife, Tagreed, was recently informed by Houthi officials that the visits that she had been able to make have been suspended.

Perhaps most notably of late, Luke’s grandfather, Bob Cummings, who is also my constituent and, along with other family members, has campaigned consistently and courageously for Luke over the years, has told me of Luke’s worsening mental health and diminishing spirit. Luke is isolated; he is alone in his cell and is not allowed outside. He is deprived of contact with any other prisoners, and sometimes he is not even aware of the day of the week. The telephone conversations he has had with his family in the UK, which have been few and far between, have been supervised by his captors and cut off after very short periods. I take this opportunity to appeal directly to his captors—after all, they are ultimately responsible for his incarceration—to release this innocent young man, who has no part in the ongoing conflict in Yemen, so that he can be reunited with his family and return to the UK.

Other countries have lacked diplomatic presence in Yemen, and that is often cited by the Foreign Office as a significant factor limiting the UK Government’s influence and options for intervention in this case. I appreciate that it is very difficult to deal with the Houthis and not a traditional Government of any kind, but we must note that other countries whose embassies in Sanaa are closed and vacant, including the United States and France, have been able to secure the return of multiple citizens in the past couple of years. That prompts the question: if those countries have been able to do that, why has the United Kingdom not been able to secure Luke’s release?

I ask the new Minister for the Middle East to make it clear to her officials that securing Luke’s release during her time in office is a high priority, if not one of her highest priorities. I ask her to commit to taking a fresh look personally at Luke’s case, mastering the details and doing everything in her power, with all her energy, to try to secure his release. I want her to redouble efforts to open channels of communication once again with the Houthis, by whatever means, and to engage personally with her counterparts in France and the United States to understand their recent successes in securing the release of prisoners by the Houthis.

As we enter the third week of the two-month-long UN-brokered ceasefire and the associated prisoner exchange negotiations between the Houthi regime and the Saudi-led coalition that have been reported, and during the opportunity that the holy month of Ramadan provides, it is vital that the UK Government exhaust all options and use their international influence, including via the UN and, quite frankly, their much-boasted relationship with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, to explore any avenue to achieve Luke’s release.

This country’s close ties with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia are often controversial in this House because of that country’s human rights record. However, when Ministers are pressed on those ties, they are always quick to emphasise that the relationship allows us to influence the Saudi regime. Why, therefore, was Luke’s case not raised by the Prime Minister during his meeting with Mohammed bin Salman on 16 March, which, per the Government press release, included discussions relating to concerns about human rights issues?

Will the Minister undertake to speak with her Saudi counterparts to press them to include Luke’s name in any prisoner exchange that may take place during the current ceasefire? Recent discussions have not convinced Luke’s family that our diplomats are doing enough to leverage that relationship with Saudi Arabia, which is much discussed by Ministers, to press Luke’s plight.

The Minister will know that she is the fifth Minister to be appointed to the middle east portfolio since Luke’s arbitrary detention more than five years ago. There have also been four different Foreign Secretaries while Luke has been detained—the current Prime Minister, the right hon. Member for South West Surrey (Jeremy Hunt), the current Deputy Prime Minister, and of course the current Foreign Secretary—all of whom have expressed support for Luke but none of whom has met his grandfather, despite extending opportunities for meetings to the families of other British nationals in similar positions around the world.

Luke comes from an ordinary working-class family in Cardiff. They do not have any special connections or friends in the media or anywhere else, but they deserve the same consideration and respect from this Government as anyone else. I ask the Minister to commit to Luke’s family that she will raise his case with the Foreign Secretary at their next meeting. I ask her to involve herself in this case personally, as she has done with other cases, and to take full advantage of this latest, time-limited opportunity to reunite Luke with his family. I also ask her to ask the Foreign Secretary to meet Luke’s family personally, so that she can truly understand their plight.

This incarceration has gone on too long. I believe that with a prioritised and renewed diplomatic effort, using the current window of opportunity, Luke’s release could be secured, and he and his family could be reunited. I implore the Minister to act now.