Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action

Lord Polak Excerpts

Thursday 7th April 2022 Grand Committee

Asked by

[Lord Polak]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what steps they are taking to ensure the United Kingdom and other signatories establish a second negotiating track on “regional issues” should all parties return to the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action.

[Lord Polak (Con)]

My Lords, first, I refer the Committee to my registered interest as President of the Conservative Friends of Israel. It will surprise no one when I state that I would prefer that the JCPOA itself would take into account regional issues. Had it done so in 2015, things would have looked very different. It was a tragic miscalculation then, and it is unforgivable now to make the same error in today’s fragile and dangerous world. As Winston Churchill famously said in a speech in the Commons in 1948, “Those who fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it”. It is widely accepted that the failure to cover Iranian missile delivery systems in the JCPOA of 2015 was a mistake, but today, while the negotiations are going on in Vienna, those very same blind spots have reappeared.

In previous arms control treaties, the UN required the supervised removal or indeed destruction of all ballistic missiles with a range of more than 150 kilometres. All those offensive and destructive missiles were banned and could not be manufactured or transferred to proxy organisations. The question must surely be asked why such requirements were not set out in the JCPOA seven years ago. For the past seven years, this vacuum has allowed Iran to develop its missile power in numbers, range and accuracy.

Can my noble friend the Minister help me? If it is indeed a fact that, upon returning to the JCPOA talks, President Biden stood together with France, Germany and the UK, and committed himself to establishing a second negotiating track that would focus on prohibiting the use or distribution of such missiles, can my noble friend describe how we are exercising our responsibility to ensure that President Biden follows through with this commitment?

It is clear that a second track is more necessary than ever. Only last month, the IRGC fired a barrage of missiles in northern Iraq, targeting the US consulate in Erbil. This attack is a stark reminder: while the world is focused on the Ukraine, Iran remains committed to spreading terrorism and violence in the Middle East and beyond. This is just one of the many attacks that the IRGC has carried out. As I stated in the Chamber on 19 January, the IRGC claimed responsibility for the downing of the Ukraine International Airlines Flight 752 in January 2020. The IRGC actively pursues the destabilisation of the Middle East by lending financial, military, economic and social support to Hamas, Islamic Jihad and Hezbollah. Thus the need for a second negotiating track is vital to secure the region, as the IRGC’s increasingly extensive and deadly arsenal of ballistic missiles, naval missiles, naval mines and rockets are more dangerous than ever.

I have previously called for Her Majesty’s Government to proscribe the IRGC, as has been done with Hezbollah and Hamas. In reminding the Committee that Hezbollah was a creation of the IRGC, it is very hard to comprehend, that while proscribing Hezbollah, we have not proscribed the parent body, the IRGC, and I urge the Government to do so.

I turn to a shameful display of double standards. At the end of February, the UK, along with the US, the EU, Australia, Japan and many other countries, correctly began a barrage of sanctions on Russia and its institutions, in response to the military activity at the Ukraine border. As the appalling military activity escalated into the fully fledged attack on Ukraine, these sanctions have been intensified. This is right and this is just, and we must do all we can to support President Zelensky and the Ukrainian people. I commend the Prime Minister, the Foreign Secretary and Defence Secretary for their leadership. However, just as we are engaged in sanctioning Russia, the JCPOA talks in Vienna are currently negotiating sanction relief for Iran. Iran is a regime that is responsible for multiple war crimes, and the continued spread of terror and instability. I ask myself, why would Western states, which have taken severe measures against Russia, seriously contemplate lifting sanctions against the Iranian regime? I do not understand this, and I do not understand these double standards that are being practised.

Iran is posing the most dangerous threat to stability. Its influence stretches far beyond its borders. The Quds Force, which is an arm of the IRGC, is responsible for building an arc of influence throughout the Middle East, by supporting pro-Iranian activities in Iraq, Syria, Lebanon and the Palestinian territories. The IRGC has some 190,000 active personnel and is continuing to carry out gross violations of human rights, killing many civilians domestically and internationally.

Can my noble friend the Minister tell me what he believes to be the views of our allies in the Gulf region towards France, Germany and the UK in pursuing the new JCPOA agreement? Do the views of those experiencing the Iran-backed atrocities count? I hope that we are not returning to a bygone era where, from the comfort of thousands of miles, we impose solutions.

It seems clear that, rightly, the West has taken a staunch hard line against Russia. The same cannot be said about Iran. The JCPOA is a weak and one-dimensional response to the terror-supporting Iranian regime. This is absolutely not the time to reduce sanctions on Iran, but rather to impose heavier sanctions—sanctions that arguably brought Iran to the negotiating table in 2015. The Iranians respect strength and take advantage of weakness. Now is the time for strength in a troubling world; the same strength that is standing up to Russia must be repeated in standing up to Iran.