Asked by: Danny Kinahan (Ulster Unionist Party - South Antrim)
Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, what recent discussions he has had with the US State Department on changes to the US visa waiver programme affecting people who have visited Iraq since 2011.
Answered by Lord Swire
While US immigration processes are a matter for the US authorities, we have raised with the US administration the importance of clearly communicating changes to their immigration policy. We remain in close contact with the US Embassy in order to avoid inconvenience to British nationals travelling to the US.
The Secretary of State for Home Affairs, my right hon. Friend the Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May) raised migration issues with Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson in Washington on 17 February.
Asked by: Danny Kinahan (Ulster Unionist Party - South Antrim)
Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, if he will make it his policy to distribute a proportion of the frozen assets of the Muammar Gaddafi administration in the UK to the families of people killed (a) by Libyan-supplied semtex and weapons and (b) on flight LW1103.
Answered by Tobias Ellwood
There is no legal basis upon which the UK could re-direct frozen Libyan assets or the interest accrued to individuals for the purposes of compensation. Regarding assets which belonged to Qadhafi or other regime figures, the UN Security Council has stipulated that when these are unfrozen, they will be made available to, and for the benefit of the Libyan people. For the duration of time that these assets are frozen, they and any interest they accrue will be governed in accordance with the specific sanctions in place over the individuals or entities to which the assets belong. In this case, the asset freezing measures are set out under EU Regulation 204/2011 which prohibits the release of frozen funds and the interest accrued belonging to listed individuals or entities except in very specific circumstances, which do not apply here.