Ahmadiyya Community

Alistair Burt Excerpts

Wednesday 20th October 2010 Westminster Hall

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Alistair Burt)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mrs Brooke. I thank you for presiding over the debate, and I thank colleagues who have taken part. I begin, of course, by thanking the hon. Member for Mitcham and Morden (Siobhain McDonagh) for her contribution and for raising this important subject. As the right hon. Member for Warley (Mr Spellar) said, her commitment to her community—both the section of it to which the debate relates, and all others—is noted in the House, and brings her recognition wherever she goes. It is another part of her work that she does commendably in the House, and we thank her for bringing it to the House’s attention.

I am grateful to the right hon. Member for Warley for his kind remarks. We do indeed go way back. We are both members of the Whips’ brotherhood, albeit on opposing sides of the House. We have both been around for a while. I appreciated the right hon. Gentleman’s work in Government. He was a good Minister and easy to talk to. Coming to open a road in my constituency of course marks him out as a special colleague, and I thank him for that. If I remember rightly, I think that I ran the 10 km race on that occasion—

[Mr Spellar]

There are differences between us.

[Alistair Burt]

I was going to say that ministerial engagements prevented him from running; but it was a good occasion and I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his comments, which I reciprocate. Although properly partisan we are able, we hope, to put such things to one side when we need to. This is one of those occasions.

In foreign policy there are many areas in which a change in Government makes little difference to what are conceived to be British interests. As to human rights and related matters I think the House can be assured that the view of the House, the Government and the country is reflected in Government. There may be nuances from time to time, but the things that we hold valuable are shared between us. The House will find the Minister and the Opposition speaking together in our condemnation of the attacks that are the subject of the debate and in our concerns about what can be done in the future.

Human rights and the treatment of minorities are obviously of major concern to the hon. Member for Mitcham and Morden in seeking the debate, and they are important to us all. She made a powerful and at times distressing case when she discussed circumstances affecting her constituents, and events in Pakistan. Her concerns for her constituents were echoed by the hon. Members for Hayes and Harlington (John McDonnell) and for Scunthorpe (Nic Dakin) and by other hon. Members who spoke.

The United Kingdom Government are concerned about the ongoing discrimination against the Ahmadi Muslim community in Pakistan and around the world. I am grateful for the opportunity to talk to hon. Members about it. We welcome the news about the all-party group and will keep in touch with that. The hon. Lady and her fellow officers will know that they need only make contact with us and we shall respond. She recognises, through the establishment of the group, the importance of the community to many hon. Members in the House of Commons who have relevant constituency interests. I will certainly draw the Home Secretary’s attention to the remarks have been made today concerning events that take place in the UK. I will move on to the matters affecting home affairs later, but there is no doubt that the matter has resonance both for our foreign relations responsibilities and for what happens in the UK.

I would like to put our relationship with Pakistan in perspective before dealing with the hon. Lady’s specific points, because it is important, and the right hon. Member for Warley referred to that, too. The Government are committed to a long-term, productive and friendly partnership with Pakistan. Our two countries share many strong ties: our history, the deep familial roots in our 1 million-strong British Pakistani diaspora, extensive business links and close cultural connections.

As we have heard, Pakistan is currently dealing with major domestic challenges. The recent devastating floods have caused an immense amount of damage and misery for more than 20 million people—misery on a scale that is difficult to contemplate in the UK, as the area affected is the size of our country. It is one of the worst disasters the world has ever seen. The UK has been at the forefront of the international response to the crisis, committing £134 million for urgent humanitarian relief and to help people rebuild their lives.

[Siobhain McDonagh]

Several Members have mentioned the amount of money that the British population have contributed to the relief effort in Pakistan, but we should also put on the record the work of the Ahmadis’ own charity, Humanity First, in raising funds and providing services in Pakistan during the floods.

[Alistair Burt]

The hon. Lady anticipated my next point, which is about the voluntary contributions, but I would not have mentioned that charity specifically, so I thank her for mentioning it. In addition to what the Government have spent, as the right hon. Member for Warley has said, the response from the community across the UK generally, whether or not they have relationships with Pakistan, has been remarkable— £60 million from different communities up and down the country—and those with family connections have been especially involved. We will continue to do that work. The right hon. Gentleman mentioned the European Union, and it is important that we work closely with it. Recently, my right hon. Friends the Foreign Secretary and the Prime Minister attended a European summit at which they took the lead in pressing the European Community to do still more to improve trade agreements to enable the Pakistani Government not only to get over the immediate hurdle of the floods, but to look forward to re-establishing their economy and to have the right infrastructure to be able to do so. The EU was able to take our lead and produce more trade concessions, which will give significant assistance to Pakistan in the future.

Pakistan is also suffering from the scourge of terrorism. More than 3,000 Pakistanis died last year as a result of terrorist attacks. Those attacks and the groups that perpetrate them pose a grave threat to Pakistan and to the stability of the region and beyond, including the UK. I would like to repeat the words of the Prime Minister when he paid tribute in August to the resilience of the people in Pakistan in facing that threat. We are committed to working with Pakistan to defeat this threat. It threatens both our countries.

Human rights are at the core of our foreign policy. We raise our concerns about human rights wherever and whenever they occur, without compromise and will continue to do so. As the Foreign Secretary made clear in a recent speech, we will improve and strengthen the work of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office on human rights. That will be underpinned by British values and by our support for democratic freedoms, universal human rights and the rule of law. That approach will be based on realism; we will never overlook human rights abuses and will always strive for progress, but we will be practical in our approach and flexible about what might work best in different contexts, which is only sensible.

The multiplicity of links between the UK and Pakistan means that we engage with each other on all subjects—counter-terrorism, security policy, immigration, trade, development, education, the rule of law and human rights. As I have outlined, that last subject is critical to the conduct of UK foreign policy. It is as relevant to our relationship with Pakistan as it is to our relations with the rest of the world. We do not shirk from our responsibilities in highlighting our concerns about human rights, including to our friends.

Pakistan has made important progress in improving human rights. The ratification of the international covenant on civil and political rights and the convention against torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment and punishment is an important step in enshrining inherent rights in law, although we hope that the Government will look to remove or redraft the current reservations that they have lodged against both treaties. It is important that those instruments are fully implemented to help to ensure the human rights of all Pakistanis.

However, Pakistan continues to face significant challenges in those areas, and we remain committed to working with the Government of Pakistan to address them. One of the most important challenges is discrimination against, and persecution of, those of a particular religious belief, whether Christians or Sikhs, as is sectarian violence between Sunni and Shi’a Muslims. It is vital that the Government of Pakistan uphold the fundamental rights of all Pakistani citizens, regardless of their faith or belief. Pakistan can only benefit if all its citizens are able to play a central role in society. We regularly reinforce that point for our colleagues in the Government of Pakistan at all levels, and they have now established a Ministry for Minorities, which has active leadership and has brought about some positive changes. A remaining critical challenge, as has been mentioned today, is the reform of Pakistan’s blasphemy legislation to ensure that it is properly implemented. Misuse of those laws is the basis for much of the discrimination suffered by religious groups in Pakistan, as the hon. Lady made clear.

[Tom Brake]

On discrimination, are the FCO and the Department for International Development in a position to monitor effectively whether the aid for Pakistan is being delivered equally across all communities?

[Alistair Burt]

The short answer is yes, and I know that because the point has come up before. If I may, I will deal with that towards the end of my remarks.

The Ahmadiyya community in Pakistan is 4 million strong. Following the creation of Pakistan in 1947, the community played an important role in the development of the new country; Pakistan’s first Foreign Minister was an Ahmadi, and many prominent members of both the army and the civil service followed their faith. However, since the mid-1950s Ahmadis have faced increasing levels of discrimination, culminating in the passage of constitutional restrictions on their way of life: in 1974 the Pakistan Parliament adopted a law declaring Ahmadis to be non-Muslims, and in 1984 a further ordinance was passed, forbidding Ahmadis to refer to themselves as Muslims or to “pose as Muslims.” Pakistanis themselves must take the lead in legal reform of the constitutional and legislative constraints on Ahmadis. The Government of Pakistan have a responsibility to protect all their citizens, regardless of religion or belief. The structural nature of that discrimination helps to create an environment of intolerance that manifests itself in horrific attacks.

I turn now to the attack on Lahore that was the subject of many of the remarks made by the hon. Member for Mitcham and Morden. The attacks against the two Ahmadiyya mosques in Lahore on 28 May, which killed 93 people and injured more than 100, prompted a worldwide response and rightly generated widespread indignation in the UK, both from parliamentarians and the general public. The attacks, unfortunately, were among many that violent extremists have carried out against both minority and majority Muslims over the past few years.

The Foreign Secretary, as has been acknowledged this afternoon, was swift in his denunciation of the attacks. Shortly after, the British high commissioner in Islamabad raised both the attacks and the wider discrimination against the Ahmadiyya with the chief Minister of Punjab, Shahbaz Sharif. I echo the point, made by the right hon. Member for Warley, that it is important that we engage at both federal and provincial level, which we do, in order to make our points on human rights. It is essential that the message gets though everywhere.

Senior officials from the British high commission in Islamabad had regular contact with officials from the Ministry for Minorities on the matter long before the attacks took place, and continue to do so. What more, then, can we do to help end the difficulties faced by Ahmadis in Pakistan and elsewhere? Most importantly, we must engage robustly and regularly with the Government of Pakistan, and we do. Following the attacks, I met with members of the Ahmadiyya community from the UK. I had the honour of meeting the national president, Rafiq Hayat, and members of the community in my office, and I am grateful for his insights on the issue at the time. He was able to give me at first instance evidence of discrimination and attacks on the community. As a result of that, in answer to a question from the hon. Member for Carshalton and Wallington (Tom Brake), I contacted the Home Secretary and briefed her about the matter so that she was able to take it into her calculations and her concerns about extremism in the United Kingdom. I shall ensure that a copy of today’s debate goes to her, with emphasis on the remarks that have been made.

[Mary Macleod (Brentford and Isleworth) (Con)]

Would my hon. Friend agree that MPs are best placed to show leadership on this issue in our local communities, and to speak out against any persecution of Ahmadis?

[Alistair Burt]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. On such issues, it is clear that those of us in leadership positions have a responsibility to speak out. She put that clearly.

Indeed, I thought my hon. Friend the Member for Battersea (Jane Ellison) also got it right when she said that, for most of us, differences in doctrine between those of different faiths, including majority faiths, are never a justification for violence or discrimination. We all have different views on many things. None of us should be able to use those differences of view as an excuse, for that is what it is, to discriminate or commit violence against others—or, if not physical violence, to use the language of abuse which all too quickly can be turned against a group of people. We have seen that in our own society and community and, sadly, worldwide.

As my hon. Friend said, we do not really care about those differences. What we care about are tolerance and the principles of respect for different views, protection under the law and freedom from fear. Those are the things that matter to people in the UK, and within that we allow people to hold their different views. If those principles are transgressed, we are all violated to some degree, and that is why we will continue to speak out so clearly.

I shall draw to the attention of my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary the matters raised here that affect the UK, because they indicate a degree of fear and concern in the Ahmadiyya community that must be recognised and discussed in those places where that community might be under threat. This debate has done a valuable job in bringing forward the issues affecting people in this country as well as abroad.

I conclude by going back to the Pakistan side of things and saying a little more about the matters raised by the right hon. Member for Warley. Together with our EU colleagues, we have a regular human rights dialogue with the Government of Pakistan in which the continuing mistreatment of religious groups features strongly. I have been disturbed to hear about reports from the leadership of the Ahmadiyya community of discrimination which continues to be suffered both here and abroad, and we mention them when speaking to those we deal with from Pakistan. They are aware of the knock-on effects in the UK of comments and discrimination in Pakistan.

I speak regularly to Shahbaz Bhatti, Pakistan’s Federal Minister for Minorities—most recently, just last week. The work that he is doing to reform the blasphemy laws is incredibly important, and we support him wholeheartedly in it, but I do not think that any of us have any false expectations. We recognise just how difficult it is to deal with such laws in a culture that has been turned against minorities and against the Ahmadiyya community. Despite the strenuous efforts of many in that Government to say and do the right things, it is hard to get such things through.

Trying to change the blasphemy laws provides perhaps the best opportunity for a change in attitude. I have raised the treatment of Ahmadis in Pakistan with the Pakistani Minister and, through him, have been monitoring the progress of the case against those accused of the Lahore bombings. The Government of Pakistan must ensure that the investigation and legal process are open, transparent and credible.

I spoke to the high commissioner for Pakistan at lunch time, to inform him of this debate and to get an assurance from him that he takes these matters extremely seriously. He wanted to communicate to me just how seriously his Government take these issues and this case, and I put that before the House.

I commend the recent report by the all-party group on human rights on their recent investigation into the treatment of Ahmadis in Pakistan, and I note its recommendations. The members of that group will be pleased to learn that the British high commission in Islamabad has been funding a project to increase the capacity of law enforcement officials, Government representatives and civil society to implement and monitor proper procedure in blasphemy cases. That is a way in which we can use the Foreign Office budget directly and practically to build capacity, and to assist those who would like to see change to achieve it.

The hon. Member for Carshalton and Wallington discussed media reports that aid for the victims of the flooding in Pakistan is being denied to some religious groups. That is very disturbing. The UK is committed to ensuring that the aid that we provide reaches those who need it most. Access to aid should not be predicated on religious or political belief, which is a principle to which all humanitarian organisations and non-governmental organisations delivering UK aid subscribe. The Department for International Development closely monitors how our aid is distributed and undertakes strict checks on the organisations that we fund, to ensure that our aid is spent properly and delivers the intended results. I welcome the commitment by the Government of Pakistan to ensure the equitable distribution of aid to those in need, and look forward to their adhering to that principle.

Discrimination against or marginalisation of any group because of their religion or belief is not acceptable. The UK is consistent in condemning all such instances when they occur, and I know that hon. colleagues on both sides of the House support that. The Government are aware of and critical of the discrimination faced by the Ahmadiyya in Pakistan. We are committed to working with the Ahmadiyya community, NGOs and the Government of Pakistan on the issue in a spirit of openness and understanding. Accordingly, I thank the hon. Member for Mitcham and Morden for bringing the matter to the House, and assure her that she will have our support in taking it forward in the future.

[Annette Brooke (in the Chair)]

I thank all the contributors to the debate.