North Africa and the Middle East Debate
Full Debate: Read Full DebateDepartment: Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office
Duncan Hames
Main Page: Duncan Hames (Liberal Democrat - Chippenham)Department Debates - View all Duncan Hames's debates with the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office
(13 years, 1 month ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Duncan Hames (Chippenham) (LD)
In these troubled times, Governments are swift to announce asset freezes for these astonishingly wealthy ruling elites. When a regime ultimately falls, as may turn out to be the case in Libya, what then happens to those assets?
Mr Hague
These assets belong to the people of Libya, and so in all normal circumstances—if we can describe any of these circumstances as normal—they would be available to a future Government of Libya. They are frozen, not confiscated. In this case, of course, they are very substantial. In the UK, we have frozen £12 billion of assets; in the United States, I think there were $30 billion of assets. That just shows that the Libyan people could have a much more prosperous future if they had a more economically open and politically free approach. Those assets are held for them.