Mike Gapes
Main Page: Mike Gapes (The Independent Group for Change - Ilford South)Department Debates - View all Mike Gapes's debates with the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office
(10 years ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Mr Hague
The United States did the last rotation of Baltic air policing and we are contributing to it now, as my hon. Friend knows. The French have deployed four Rafale aircraft which are based in Poland. Denmark has deployed four F-16 aircraft to Estonia and there is work on further maritime deployments as well. So a variety of countries are involved in these exercises and policing.
Mike Gapes (Ilford South) (Lab/Co-op)
I welcome the deployment of UK forces to front-line NATO states, and I also welcome the Foreign Secretary’s visits to Georgia and Moldova as well as Ukraine, but what assistance and help can we give, particularly to Moldova, because what might happen in Transnistria at some point could be a repetition of what has happened already in Crimea?
Mr Hague
This is a very important point and it is one of the things I went to Moldova to discuss with its Government. Of course, the opening up of a closer economic relationship with EU countries is a major opportunity for them. Already, when Russia stopped buying Moldovan wine, which is one of its principal exports, the EU opened up to Moldovan wine. We may have to be ready to do that in other areas of the economy as well. The Moldovan Government made a number of requests to me on my visit, and I am thinking positively about all of them and discussing them with my EU colleagues.