Arms to Syria

David Winnick Excerpts

Thursday 11th July 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr David Winnick (Walsall North) (Lab)]

I congratulate the hon. Member for Basildon and Billericay (Mr Baron) on initiating this debate. I am opposed to arms being sent to the rebels in Syria, but let me make this absolutely clear: if I had a different viewpoint, I would still be of the opinion that it is Parliament that should decide whether or not such a decision should be taken. A great deal is said about reforms and changes for Parliament, but one of the most important aspects of the House of Commons is that major decisions such as whether arms should be sent in such circumstances should not be taken without the express and direct consent of the House of Commons.

[Dr Julian Lewis (New Forest East) (Con)]

I entirely agree with the hon. Gentleman but, in furtherance of his argument, would he also accept that even if it were not generally the case that Parliament should have its say before such a step is taken, when it is widely known that there is very substantial opposition to what is proposed, and that it is very likely that there would be a heavy majority of opposition in Parliament, it would be particularly unwise for the Government to go ahead without letting Parliament have its say and have a vote first?

[Mr Winnick]

I could not have put that better myself. It is very rare for the hon. Gentleman and I to agree. I hope that does not mean that we are in the wrong on this issue. My concern is that we are going into two long recesses and the Government could make a decision arguing that, given all the circumstances, it was necessary to arm the rebels in Syria, and although the House would almost certainly be recalled, the decision would have already been taken. The Government would be asking for support from their own Members on a three-line Whip. That is why is there is a good deal of anxiety—all the more so as we start our recess next week.

During the statement yesterday the Foreign Secretary said that it is “possible to anticipate” the supply of arms and that therefore there is no reason why it should not be debated “in advance”. Let me say to the Under-Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, the hon. Member for North East Bedfordshire (Alistair Burt) that those words have been carefully noted and the Foreign Secretary will be held to account on them by all of us if any other decision is taken when the House is not sitting.

During that statement the Foreign Secretary also spoke about the amount of support already going to the Syrian rebels—those we support. We are talking about armoured vehicles, body armour and communications equipment. Moreover, as was stated, another £20 million of supplies will be sent in the coming months. Might not the argument then be, “With all these supplies already sent, why not lethal weapons?” These things escalate, although I am not altogether certain that what has been sent has been justified.

Let us be clear about the background to this debate. Nearly 100,000 people have died in Syria since the conflict started. So many of the people who have been killed have been civilians going about their normal lives—or trying to do so; these are the men, women and children who have been killed, on both sides. The bloodshed and the suffering continues now. The argument for the supply of arms is that the stronger the rebels—at least those rebels the British Government support—the more likely it is that the Assad regime will be brought to the negotiating table. That is the basic argument, and no doubt we will hear further arguments along those lines from the right hon. and learned Member for Kensington (Sir Malcolm Rifkind), the former Foreign Secretary.

I would not dismiss that view out of hand; it is possible that there is some logic in that argument. Is it not, however, much more likely that arms supplies from the west, including from this country, would simply lead, as other hon. Members have said, to even more arms for the regime from its current backers? We would have an escalating arms race. Why do we believe that if the west started to supply arms to the rebels, the countries supporting Assad’s brutal, murderous regime—Russia, foremost, but also Iran—which, without question, has no legitimacy, would not increase the arms supply likewise? As I say, an escalating arms race can lead only to further death and destruction. As has been said by my right hon. Friend the Member for Neath (Mr Hain), neither should we overlook the sectarian aspect to the conflict, with support being given to both sides in accordance with a religious divide between Sunni and Shi’a. Again, we should not intervene in that.

I want to make it clear that there are circumstances where armed intervention from this country is justified. Nobody could have been more in favour of the support given in Bosnia and Kosovo than me. I believed that we had a duty in those places to provide support, and I was pleased to be among those who did so when Muslims were facing outright massacre. In the mid-1990s, at the time of the Bosnian conflict, I said that such support should be given—unfortunately, it was often not to be given until too late—but in Bosnia and Kosovo we were not faced with extremist elements; we were not faced with elements such as those in Syria, who obviously want to bring about a form of state run along more or less the same lines as the Taliban. Syria is a different situation altogether and that should be very much borne in mind.

What should we do in the circumstances? I could not agree more with the right hon. and learned Member for North East Fife (Sir Menzies Campbell) that we should, first and foremost, maximise humanitarian relief in every possible way, bearing in mind the suffering that has already occurred. More relief should be given. Every help should be given to innocent people who have been caught up in the conflict.

Finally, we must redouble our efforts to try to bring the conflict to an end, not by sending arms, but by trying to persuade Russia and other such countries to come to the negotiating table to end the suffering, to end the war and to bring about a situation where people in Syria can once again go about their everyday lives, however much there was a dictatorship there. That is a far better way of trying to deal with this terrifying problem than sending arms to those in Syria whom we believe are on the right side. Of course, we have no guarantee that if we were to do so, those arms would go to the people we believe should be supported.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mike Gapes (Ilford South) (Lab/Co-op)]

It is a great pleasure to follow the hon. Member for New Forest East (Dr Lewis), because I recall that he and I went to Sierra Leone together when we were both members of the Defence Committee when our Government had, rightly, intervened to defend democracy against people who were practising a form of terrorism against the population.

I am, by instinct and nature, a humanitarian interventionist. I support the responsibility to protect. I believe—I still say it, and it will get me criticised in some quarters—that voting for the intervention in Iraq in 2003 was the right thing to do, and I will not apologise for it. I believe that there are sometimes circumstances where it is right to take action without a United Nations Security Council resolution. For example, when John Major’s Government introduced a no-fly zone they did so without a UN resolution.

[Mr Winnick]

And there was Kosovo.

[Mike Gapes]

I will come to Kosovo, but I do not want to get diverted into the Balkans at the moment.

I also believe, though, that we have to look to the consequences of our actions and make judgments. I am not persuaded about suggestions that we provide sophisticated weaponry to opposition groups in Syria; in fact, I am very concerned about them. I am a member of the Committees on Arms Export Controls. We have accountability through the House and its Select Committees, and we monitor the transfer and sale of arms to states. However, the Government seem to be preparing to adopt a position that is not about transferring weaponry to states, but about providing weaponry to factions within a state. We might say that the National Coalition is the sole legitimate representative, although I do not hear that phrase being used quite so forcefully now, but it is certainly not the Government. Our Government would therefore be taking a decision to supply weaponry to a faction within a wider faction, within a state that still has a Government who control part of the territory, while other areas are controlled by warlords and tribal clans—the Kurdish people have almost total autonomy in one part of the country, as was the case for the Iraqi Kurds. Fundamental questions are being raised, so there would need to be an explicit vote in the House if such an action were taken, because it would set a lot of precedents. We all remember things such as arms to the Contras in the United States.

I will support the motion not simply because it is time to assert parliamentary sovereignty once more, but because there would be wider implications of such a decision by the Government. I am also worried that arms would be given to neighbouring states and then passed on, which raises additional problems. We need to explore issues such as end-use agreements, but any proposal will require an explicit vote of support.