Middle East and North Africa

Jeremy Corbyn Excerpts

Tuesday 26th April 2011 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hague]

The first point to make to my right hon. and learned Friend is that these are not instructors. I would not refer to them as instructors. It is a military liaison team; it is working on headquarters organisation. I stress that these officers are not involved in arming or training the forces of the opposition side in Libya. Our position—my right hon. and learned Friend has brought it up before—is that we will help with non-lethal equipment. The British Government have taken no decision to arm or equip the opposition forces with lethal equipment. I have expressed our view of the legality of that before, which is that the arms embargo applies to the whole of Libya, but that it is legal under the UN resolution to supply equipment to protect civilian life in certain circumstances. Other nations may wish to do that or to interpret the resolution in a different way. We interpret it in that way and believe that the best way for us to help is to supply the non-lethal equipment that I have mentioned.

[Jeremy Corbyn (Islington North) (Lab)]

May I congratulate the Foreign Secretary on delivering an absolutely brilliant piece of Foreign Office speak for the last 10 minutes? He assured us that there was to be no ground intervention, yet military forces are being sent to assist the British diplomatic mission. He assured us that there was no intention of regime change, and then promptly called for a regime change. What exactly is the Government’s position on Libya? Is it to have a partition; is it the overthrow of Gaddafi; is it to hand over the oil and banking interests to Qatar; is it the sale of arms to the whole region? What on earth are the Government’s long-term intentions on Libya? Will he please explain?

[Mr Hague]

I accept the hon. Gentleman’s congratulations in the spirit in which they were offered, and I am tempted to go over my whole statement again. Our attitude to the whole issue of change in the middle east is that if it goes right, it will be one of the greatest advances in human freedom and world affairs that we have seen—certainly since the end of the cold war, and in some ways comparable to it. If it goes wrong, however, leading to more authoritarian regimes or a long period of violent disorder, it will provide a serious threat to our own national security and that of the whole of Europe, with new breeding grounds for terrorism, uncontrolled migration and threats of extremism. We therefore have to do what we can to make sure that change goes in the right direction, not the wrong direction. That is what we want for Libya and what we want for other countries. We are able to help in each country in different ways, but that is the context in which our Libya policy sits.