Raqqa and Daesh Debate
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Ben Bradshaw
Main Page: Ben Bradshaw (Labour - Exeter)Department Debates - View all Ben Bradshaw's debates with the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office
(6 years, 6 months ago)
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Alistair Burt
I thank my hon. Friend, who is the Chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee. Russia’s engagement in this has clearly been to stabilise the Assad regime. The Russians’ primary objective has been to secure their interests in Syria, through Assad, rather than to recognise that he had turned against his own people and to join in a coalition of interests to secure peaceful transition and peaceful reform as part of the end of the conflict. Clearly there are operations against Daesh which have not been participated in by regime forces or those who have supported them, such as the Russians, and other action has been taken, but I am not sure it is true to say that in all cases Russia has not taken action against Daesh forces, because it will have done when those forces were threatening the regime. That is when Russia will have taken that action.
Moving on, the Geneva talks that will start under the guidance of Staffan de Mistura will inevitably involve Russia as a participant in trying to see what we can do now, towards the end of the conflict, to provide stabilisation. I can make it clear that the UK will echo the remarks made by the Chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee. We recognise Russia’s responsibility in the conflict, but now it has a responsibility in the post-conflict situation to remedy some of the problems it has caused.
Mr Ben Bradshaw (Exeter) (Lab)
Some Members of this House received and continue to receive considerable abuse for the decision we took back in November 2015 to support the extension of the RAF mission to Syria. Does the liberation of Raqqa and this considerable setback to Daesh not show that we were absolutely right?
Alistair Burt
Yes, in a word. We have been learning over time the consequences of not taking action. We have all learned that there are consequences of action and of inaction, and sometimes the choices are impossible. But it is perfectly clear that decisions not to do anything will almost inevitably result in a situation becoming worse and steadily more difficult for those involved. The right decisions have to be taken on intervention or not, but the decision of the House to support David Cameron’s determination to take action in Syria was the right one.