Lord Anderson of Swansea
Main Page: Lord Anderson of Swansea (Labour - Life peer)Ukraine: International Claims Commission Convention
Lord Anderson of Swansea Excerpts
Lord Anderson of Swansea (Lab)
My Lords, that was a powerful and valuable speech from the noble and learned Baroness, Lady Prentis, relying on her experience and her contacts. I was particularly impressed by the personal examples. We probably all know individual Ukrainians in this country who have suffered. As the last Back-Bencher in the debate—story of my life—I fear that everything that can be said has been said, but not everyone has said it, so here goes my contribution. I begin by adapting Yaroslavsky: we are witnessing the grand patriotic war of the Ukrainian people. Patriotic? Yes. Putin claimed that the Ukrainians were just cousins, or indeed part of the Russian people, but they have shown that he has provoked a very profound patriotism among the people, who have shown enormous courage and resilience.
I was at NATO headquarters on the eve of the aggression in 2022. I must admit to the Committee that the consensus appeared to be that, if there were an invasion, Russian troops—better resourced, and with a degree of morale—would be taking Kyiv within two or three days. That, happily, was not to be. This debate now is about making Russia recognise and possibly pay for its aggression.
Two main areas of concern were mentioned by the committee. First, there is the geographic limit and whether we should extend it to 2014, to Crimea and the Donbass. On the grounds of justice, of course, that should happen and there is the possibility of an amendment to the convention. However, the demands of justice, in my judgment, conflict with practicalities. The areas concerned are currently occupied by Russia, and they are likely to remain so in any ultimate settlement. Therefore, there are formidable problems; they have to be visited to assess and evaluate claims. The evidential problems are enormous.
The second area of concern relates to the prospect of achieving what we all would like: the extent of the compensation. There is a proposed three-stage process. The register is extremely valuable, but hopefully it will not just be a historic document. The commission will have to recognise categories, and presumably lawyers will have to work out standardised categories. There is then the assessment of the claims. The noble and learned Baroness, Lady Prentis, has given some indication of the vast accumulation of claims, which will make even the most assiduous lawyers work for very many years to come.
The final and most difficult part is the problem of payment. An enormous problem is posed. It is most unlikely that Russia will put up its hands and accept responsibility or pay anything voluntarily. Even the second stage raises formidable tasks in terms of assessment.
Turning to the point the noble Lord, Lord Hannay, made about the precedent of Iraq, with all respect to the noble Lord, for whom I have great admiration, there is no great difficulty in distinguishing the Iraq problem. In Iraq, we were dealing with a defeated country. It was not difficult, therefore, to assess the portion of the oil receipts of Iraq that could be used for compensating far fewer people. It was not the extent or the complexity that we have now. So the precedent, in my judgment, is not as helpful as we would like.
In the case of Ukraine, it is not likely that either side will triumph—there will not be a victory for either side—so where is the money to come from? Vast sums are involved. The noble and learned Baroness, Lady Prentis, has given an indication of the likely sums. The only potential source is likely to be the frozen assets held by western banks, which are, I agree, very substantial, including $9 billion in UK banks. But there are problems legally about this. It could set a very poor precedent for other states or individuals who deposit money in our banks. Here, we also have sovereign immunity.
It may be extremely difficult to obtain a consensus to achieve an agreement on defreezing those assets. Therefore, the demands of justice may not be attainable. I recall that we, as a committee, were urged not to use “reparations” —that was said by the noble Lord, Lord Hannay, I think—but instead to use “compensation”, which is a far less loaded term. Does anyone with a sense of history consider Russian agreement likely for such a proud nation? Equally, the United States is likely to ensure that any agreement or a settlement may have some territorial concessions, particularly given the warm relationship between President Trump and President Putin, but it is unlikely to lead to the sort of outcome we would all like. Similarly, China could of course use its limited influence in this field to side with Putin.
I concede that that would be a most unfortunate conclusion and against all justice. However, after the immense efforts, the costs and the work of all those experts—possibly extending over a decade or more, given the size of the claims that they have to consider—it may be that no money will ultimately accrue to the poor claimants who have suffered so much. We should be aware from the outset that there is a great danger of that. Now, the sceptics will argue this, and they may be proved right at the end of a long period. As we say in the committee’s report, expectations may, alas, not be realised.
Lord Hannay of Chiswick (CB)
Before the noble Lord sits down, I want to raise one point to which he referred: the large number of people who were compensated by the Iraq-Kuwait compensation commission set up by the UN Security Council. There were many hundreds of thousands of them, because workers from Sri Lanka, India, Pakistan and the Philippines were all grievously damaged and lost huge amounts of money, and they were all compensated by the commission. It was not the case that the Iraq commission dealt simply with the oil and the damage created by it being spilled, although it did do that; it also resulted in lots of very poor individuals receiving full compensation.
Lord Anderson of Swansea (Lab)
I hear the noble Lord, but I think he would agree that the amounts and numbers involved are vastly more in the case of Ukraine than was the case of the relatively simple—as compared with Ukraine—precedent of Iraq and Kuwait.
Lord Bruce of Bennachie (LD)
My Lords, I thank the International Agreements Committee for its work and its chair for his introduction; I also thank the members of the committee who have contributed. Following on from the noble Lord, Lord Boateng, looking at the wider international issues that flow out of this is something we should definitely acknowledge.
I was privileged to be a member of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe between 1999 and 2005. That is a long time ago, I know, but where we are now started then. At that time, I was a rapporteur in the release of political prisoners from Azerbaijan—we were somewhat successful, at least for the time being—and a co-rapporteur on the investigations into the Khodorkovsky and Yukos affair.
I also witnessed the extinction of opposition among Russian parliamentarians. When I arrived in 1999, there were members of Yabloko—the liberal party—as well as independents and opposition communists. All of them spoke out against the Russian Government freely in the Council of Europe. By the time I left, though, they had all gone. They disappeared. The only ones there were Putin’s stooges.
I have to say, at the time, I was also shocked that the Conservative Party left the Conservative group in the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe and joined Putin’s group, which was under the leadership of one of Putin’s members of parliament. I found that shocking. It was actually reversed by David Cameron when he was the Prime Minister.
As noble Lords will probably gather, I am a bit of a champion of the Council of Europe and of what it does and stands for, and I think that this convention is exactly the kind of thing that the Council of Europe can do well. After all, it has 46 member countries across Europe, and it is always fighting for justice and for human rights.
It is interesting that not only has this committee given us a recommendation, but, of course, the Legal Affairs and Human Rights Committee is chaired by the noble and learned Lord, Lord Keen. Clearly, he and his committee have been instrumental in carrying this forward within the parliamentary assembly. I certainly welcome, first of all, the initiative by the council and the Government’s participation in it, and I recognise the reservations that the International Agreements Committee has made, even though it has acknowledged that those are not reservations that justify not going ahead with this.
The noble Lord, Lord Anderson of Swansea, made the point about where the money will come from, and the worry that it might lead to disappointment or become a white elephant, as other people have said, but I do not think at this stage that that is the right mood to take. First, the actual quantification of the scale of the destruction, humiliation and damages is worthwhile. It is important to say to people, “Perhaps you will never get reparation,” but even quantifying it and organising it is in itself a process that has some validity. On that basis, I believe it is well worthwhile.
I pick up the point that in reality, probably the only realistic source of funding is seized Russian assets. I accept the arguments, or the reservations, but I have to say that the damage and destruction that Russia has done—and is trying to do—to Europe, Africa and elsewhere should not be unpunished and uncompensated for. Actually, by my figures, those assets are nothing like enough. There is an estimated $300 billion of Russian assets in Europe, and about £25 billion, I think, in the UK. The World Bank’s rapid damage and needs assessment estimates the total damage between February 2022 and December 2025 at $195.1 billion, but a 10-year recovery plan would cost $587.7 billion, so that $300 billion would meet only half of that estimated damage.
Even if there is a peace settlement—and I realise we have no idea how, when and whether that might happen—it seems that Russia has to be held accountable, not to the extent that we did with Germany in Versailles but to a realistic extent, to say, “You can’t do this kind of damage and just walk away and expect everybody else to pay”. I argue that that is the right thing.
The register was created in May 2023, and steps have been followed to set up the register and then the convention. The Government have signed it, have offered support for the administration and for the cost of running it, and have said that they are going to ratify it by the end of the year, so the simple question to the Minister is: can we have some assurance that that will actually happen? I am quite certain that, in this House, there would be clear support to help it through quickly.
There is a concern—I am sorry to raise this, but I think it needs to be raised—because this is an instrument of the Council of Europe. The Council of Europe, of course, is the underpinning of the European Convention on Human Rights. This is a serious political point: the Conservative Party is committed to leaving the European Convention on Human Rights, which means leaving the Council of Europe, because, to be a member of the Council of Europe, there is a mandatory requirement to be a signatory of the European Convention on Human Rights.
Therefore, if the Conservatives are supporting this while pursuing a policy that makes the vehicle for delivering it obsolete as far as the UK is concerned, they have some questions to answer, because that would be the consequence of their decision. I hope they will think again and I hope they will not do it—I hope, actually, that they never get the chance to do it, but that is more fundamental. I know that is a hard political point, but it is a real one, and I do not think that we can just ignore it; that would be the consequence of the policy being pursued.
Lord Anderson of Swansea (Lab)
The secretary-general of the Council of Europe recently made a speech to the assembly stating in terms that, to be a member of the Council of Europe, you must be a member of the convention.
Lord Bruce of Bennachie (LD)
That is my understanding—that it is a mandatory requirement. We will hear from the noble Lord, Lord Callanan, regarding the Conservative position. We have also heard from Conservative Members who are supportive. I get that: I am quite certain that the noble and learned Lord, Lord Keen, is supportive. What we need to know is: if they are supporting this convention, how is that consistent with the policy they are adopting? I am not suggesting that those who have spoken are not sincere in their support—I am sure they are—but there is an issue to be addressed.
This is an initiative by the Council of Europe that gives real hope to the people who have suffered damages: it provides the ability to quantify the harm and damage, and gives a clear understanding that it may never be resolved and they may never get the money. In the end, there will be time to say whether we have or have not achieved it. But the Russian money is there and, if there is a will, at least some if not all of it could be diverted to this cause. That would make this a real and worthwhile outcome, rather than just an optimistic hope. I hope that the Government will use whatever good offices they can, both in terms of UK resources and influencing others. I believe in international law. It should be possible to prove that the damage done by Russia justifies the seizing and confiscation of those assets and does not compromise the international banking system.