Refugee Communities: Covid-19

Rushanara Ali Excerpts

Thursday 12th November 2020 Commons Chamber

[Rushanara Ali (Bethnal Green and Bow) (Lab)]

I beg to move,

That this House is deeply concerned by the ongoing humanitarian crisis facing refugees across the globe; has considered the secondary effects of the covid-19 pandemic on refugees and displaced persons in fragile or low-income states; and calls on the Government to provide urgent support to the world’s poorest and most vulnerable countries and communities as they deal with the covid-19 pandemic.

I am incredibly grateful to the Backbench Business Committee for allocating time for this important debate, to its co-sponsor my hon. Friend the Member for Oldham East and Saddleworth (Debbie Abrahams), and to cross-party colleagues who supported the call for it.

If the pandemic has taught us anything, it is that we are interconnected as a global village. We breathe the same air, drink the same water and enjoy a shared humanity that transcends borders. In that spirit, this debate addresses the plight of the world’s refugees in the face of coronavirus, and calls on the Government to do more to help.

This is not just a crisis across Asia, Africa and the middle east; it also affects Europe and the UK, as we have seen desperate people make perilous voyages across the English channel this summer and the terrible tragedy of refugees drowning at sea. These are desperate people exploited by criminal gangs and failed utterly by the international community.

As the MP for Bethnal Green and Bow, I can claim some connection to the word “refugee”.

It was originally coined by the French Huguenots fleeing religious persecution after 1685, many of whom came to Spitalfields in my constituency and left their mark on the east end’s streets, architecture and heritage.

The east end was home to many thousands of Jewish refugees in the 1880s. Jewish refugees from Portugal gave us fish and chips, and much else, of course. After 1881, Jews fleeing pogroms in the Russian empire came to the UK, and in the 1930s they came fleeing the Nazis; they included my hon. Friend from the other House, Lord Dubs, who escaped in the Kindertransport train. We owe him a huge debt of gratitude for all that he has done, and continues to do, to fight for refugee children. It is a great shame that our Government have not taken up his powerful case for our hosting refugee children.

We have accepted refugees who have fled civil war and conflict in many parts of the world, including the Ugandan Asians expelled by Idi Amin, and people from eastern Europe, Bosnia, Kosovo, Somalia and Iraq. As a nation at our best, we provided them with a welcome home, and a chance to succeed. We have benefited, of course, from their contribution to our politics, culture, economy and much else, which has added new dimensions to our Britishness. Of course, there are also the incredible contributions of many great figures, such as Karl Marx. There have been contributions to our business community, too—the founder of the Tesco family came from my constituency—and to many other fields.

The landing has not always been soft. There have always been bigots putting up barriers, and blaming and stigmatising refugees, but they have thankfully been in a minority. The UK can be proud of welcoming refugees, and of its global contribution to protecting them, for example through the role that Clement Atlee and Ernest Bevin played in the 1950s in founding the United Nations and the office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. There was also, under the Labour Government, the establishment of the Department for International Development, which this Government have sadly abolished in the middle of a global pandemic. I know the Minister will say that it is business as usual, despite the merger of DFID and the Foreign and Commonwealth Office; I hope so, when it comes to protecting the poorest in the world, who need our support.

Today, the refugee crisis is on a scale that none of us could have foreseen. Nearly 80 million people—more than the entire British population—have been forced out of their home by conflict and persecution. Among them, nearly 26 million are classed as refugees, over half of whom are under the age of 18. These children and young people have been uprooted and displaced at the most important time in their life. Millions of stateless people have been denied nationality and citizenship; access to basic rights, such as education, healthcare, and employment; and freedom of movement. They are often crowded into unsanitary camps, in which, despite the efforts of global non-governmental organisations, national Governments and the international community, there are huge issues in accessing healthcare. Life expectancy is incredibly low and infectious disease is widespread in them—and this is before we take into account the impact of coronavirus.

Over half of those affected by the Syrian refugee crisis have been displaced into refugee settlements. There are camps in Chad housing Sudanese refugees; camps on the Tunisian-Libyan border; the Kakuma camp in Kenya, one of the largest in the world; and camps in Iraqi Kurdistan, Jordan and Yemen. Of course, millions of Syrian refugees are being hosted by Jordan, Lebanon, Turkey and many other countries. One of the biggest camps in the world, in Bangladesh, is for the Rohingya people fleeing murderous violence and what the UN has described as ethnic cleansing; there is an International Court of Justice case on genocide committed by the Myanmar military and Government. Millions of people are living in that camp in temporary accommodation. I saw at first hand the impact on people, the vast majority of them children and women, of the unimaginable violence and genocide committed by the Burmese military. These people cannot work, and are traumatised by what has happened, having lost everything. Homes and villages were burned down; their mothers were raped in front of them, and their fathers and the young men in their family were murdered. Those were the testimonies that I heard when I visited those camps in 2018.

There is also the Syrian crisis, which we have been witnessing for many years. I visited the Beqaa Valley in 2013, at the beginning of the crisis, and saw the impact of that conflict on the children in particular, but also on the men and women. The situation persists, and the international community has failed to force the Syrian Government to end the war. Many have argued, including the president of the International Rescue Committee, David Miliband, that the camps should be closed down, with refugees being allowed to integrate into communities and to work. We also need to do more to enable the right of return for refugees, which means that much more action is required of the international community to look at ways of dealing with the root causes of the conflicts that have often led to people being forced out of countries—whether it be Syria, Myanmar or elsewhere.

The tragedy is that the huge financial commitment required to host the sudden influx of refugees is placed on the shoulders of the countries that are least able to afford it. Eighty four per cent of the world’s refugees are living in developing countries, and seven out of the top 10 developing countries hosting refugees are considered fragile states in the OECD’s fragility framework.

Although many countries suspended their refugee resettlement schemes due to the coronavirus pandemic, many of them have now resumed, but not here in the UK. The Government have also cruelly voted down the Dubs amendment, which would have guaranteed family reunion rights for child refugees after our withdrawal from the EU. I call on the Minister today to think again and work with his colleagues in the Home Office to make that happen. If there is one way to pay tribute to the courage and determination of Lord Dubs, who was a child refugee himself, this would be the way to do it, and I hope the Minister will take that on. The UK has accepted only a small number of refugees and asylum seekers, amounting to about 0.25% of the UK’s total population. Let us compare that with what some of the poorest countries are doing in hosting hundreds of thousands, if not more than a million, refugees.

This year, on top of all the problems facing refugees, we have seen the impact of the pandemic. We know that covid-19 thrives in crowded, cramped conditions where people cannot wash their hands frequently and where medical assistance is extremely limited. We know also that the Moria refugee camp on the Greek island of Lesbos, which is one of the biggest in Europe, desperately needs assistance. CAFOD is warning about the Syrian refugee camps in Lebanon, saying that the concern for the large refugee populations is that social distancing, self-isolation and frequent handwashing are nearly impossible in the communities in which they live. This problem is widespread—whether we look at Syria, Lebanon, Bangladesh or elsewhere.

From the Greek islands to Gaza and from Bangladesh to Botswana, the pandemic is set to sweep through the world’s refugee camps, and we need to do more. The United Nations Secretary-General has said that the covid-19 pandemic

“is menacing the whole of humanity–and so the whole of humanity must fight back,”

That is surely the right approach. In early April, more than 200 Members of Parliament signed a letter to the Prime Minister, which I co-ordinated, calling for urgent support. Those calls remain necessary. Our call was for the UK Government to support the UN’s $2 billion global humanitarian response to covid, to scale up the public health response, to support refugees who need help, to deliver personal protective equipment, to work with international partners, the World Bank and the IMF to cope with the impact of covid in middle income countries, and, of course, to support the UN General-Secretary’s call for a global ceasefire, including any UN Security Council resolution for a global ceasefire, to de-escalate conflicts in many of the parts of the world that are giving rise to the forced displacement of people.

The Government have gone some way to provide humanitarian assistance, but we call on the Government to do more on this particular agenda—on ending conflicts, holding to account certain Governments who are not doing enough, and also working with the international community to provide the much-needed funding.

For many years, I have campaigned with colleagues from across the House on the Rohingya crisis, so I want to focus my final remarks on the plight of the Rohingya people who have faced, as I said earlier, incomprehensible atrocities, killings, torture, executions, mass deportations, the razing of villages, and women and girls enduring gang rape and other forms of horrific sexual violence. I heard their testimonies at first hand when I went to Rakhine state in 2013 and then in 2017 and then to Cox’s Bazar, which hosts a million refugees from Myanmar who have been persecuted.

We have just recently marked the third anniversary of hundreds of thousands of people fleeing to Bangladesh to escape the genocide, but the genocidal violence against the Rohingya in the summer of 2017 did not come out of the blue. It came from a combination of decades of persecution, systematic discrimination and the denial of citizenship and basic human rights. In Myanmar, there has been and continues to be a significant escalation of violence, and the UN continues to document violence against children, including killings, maiming and sexual violence. The recent clearance operation was among the worst, and hundreds of thousands of Muslims who live in Burma continue to be vulnerable.

Earlier this year, The Gambia lodged a case against Myanmar at the International Court of Justice. Canada and the Netherlands have formally joined the case. As penholder for Burma in the UN Security Council, the UK should follow suit, and I have called the UK Government to do so time and again, as have others. I hope the Minister will be able to take that on and follow the lead of The Gambia, the Netherlands, Canada and a number of other countries in the prevention of genocide. This particular case is so important, because it will prevent the Burmese military from committing further atrocities and prevent people from having to take their lives in their hands once again. That is why it is so important that our Government support that move.

In terms of what we do next and how we provide support to those who desperately need it, I draw attention to the calls by former Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, who has said of the refugee crisis:

“This is not a problem in far-off lands that rich countries can ignore”.

There is growing demand that the Governments of the developed world, including our own, shoulder more of the responsibility. It is in our interest. That means we need to provide funding. I know the British Government are doing some of that, but we need to go further. We need to lead the way, working with the new US Administration. We need to act to try to ensure that there is a proper global health and economic recovery plan for those countries, because that is what will stem the rise in conflict, the increase in refugees and people being forced out of their homes, and it will help to reduce conflict.

We need to double funding to the World Bank for emergency aid. We need to provide more support to the International Monetary Fund to help those countries, so that they do not end up being desperate and the economic troubles do not cause further conflict and division, thereby causing more people to suffer and end up as refugees. We also need to do more to tackle climate change, which will create more refugees. In Bangladesh, 30 million people are likely to become climate refugees, so there is a great deal that we need to do going forward.

I hope our Government will take a stronger role in the international arena. If global Britain means anything, it means our responsibility to help the poorest in the world, because it is in our interests to do so. If we do not, those refugees out of desperation will want to flee and come to the shores of Europe, and we have seen the shameful experience over recent years where we have not been able to respond as generously as some of the poorest countries have.

[Hannah Bardell (Livingston) (SNP)]

I congratulate the hon. Lady on securing this debate. Does she agree that we must do our part in the UK, particularly when, as we did just after I was elected in 2015, this House voted to bomb Syria? I did not vote for that, but none the less, a majority of Members did. Where we are bombing countries, we need to be taking responsibility when people are displaced from those conflicts.

[Rushanara Ali]

The hon. Lady is absolutely right that many conflicts have been caused by failures of the international community, so we bear a responsibility, whether it is Iraq, Libya or Syria. We need to act. We need to provide refuge to those who end up being displaced, and also we need to take action at the international level to bring an end to the conflicts that continue to rage.



In conclusion, we need our Government to take action, not only to provide the humanitarian assistance, but to work hard to hold to account Governments who are causing persecution, Governments who are failing to protect their populations and Governments who are actively responsible for ethnic cleansing and genocide in countries such as Myanmar. We also need to take a stronger role in mobilising support in the international community to provide more assistance to those countries; refugees are among the most vulnerable in the world, and covid has exposed them to even graver danger. We must protect them against the virus. We must press the world’s Governments to step up aid programmes, end conflicts, tackle poverty and prevent the deaths of tens of thousands of displaced people around the world. If we are to tackle this pandemic, in the words of the United Nations Secretary General,

“we are only as strong as the weakest”.

This is not just a matter of humanitarianism; it is also a matter of self-interest.

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)]

May I ask Members to be mindful that we have not only the call list for this debate, but another debate to follow? Both debates are on important subjects, but it all has to finish by 5 o’clock, so please be mindful as to the length of your contributions.

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[Rushanara Ali]

I am grateful to my hon. Friends and hon. Members across the House for their powerful speeches and to the shadow Secretary of State, my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Edgbaston (Preet Kaur Gill), and the Minister for their responses. Although the debate has exposed that we have much in common, we also have differences of emphasis. I hope that, if we can focus on one thing, we can build common cause in forging a much more positive narrative about how we speak of refugees and asylum seekers in our own country and elsewhere.

Too often in recent years, the rhetoric—particularly in our political narrative—has been so cruel and so intolerant that it has been deeply painful to observe. That vicious rhetoric, which sometimes, sadly, has been encouraged by certain political figures, has dehumanised refugees and asylum seekers. The othering of refugees and asylum seekers, from wherever it comes—whether it is in sections of the media or in our political discourse—has to stop. I hope that we can all work on that together, to try to build a more positive image and narrative of the contributions of refugees in our country and elsewhere.

During this pandemic, we have all been exposed to the fragility of life by seeing people in our own communities and among our families and friends get sick and some, sadly, die. I hope that we remember not only that refugees have to deal with the spectre of coronavirus, but that many have endured conflict and, as we heard, have seen family members killed and experienced rape and torture. In many conflicts, rape has been used as a weapon of war against women. We also heard about the mental trauma suffered by all refugees, but particularly refugee children and women.

As others have said, it is imperative that we work together to tackle some of these issues. We have all highlighted what can be done domestically on the “no recourse to public funds” issue, on protecting refugees in our country, on allowing them to work in order to make a living and make a contribution, and on protecting children and revisiting the Dubs proposals. We also need greater ambition in our Government to look at the global challenge—to look at leadership together—and to invest what will be in the trillions to help economies recover and to protect the millions of refugees around the world. As others have said, we also need a proper, fair way of distributing the vaccine, which is a great source of optimism for us all.

Finally, the Minister did not address a couple of points that I felt he should have addressed and on which I hope he will work with his colleagues. One was my request for the UK Government to join the Netherlands and Canada on the Gambia case in the International Court of Justice—the genocide prevention case—so that we can redouble our efforts to prevent further atrocities and the further prosecution of genocide by the Myanmar Government.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That this House is deeply concerned by the ongoing humanitarian crisis facing refugees across the globe; has considered the secondary effects of the covid-19 pandemic on refugees and displaced persons in fragile or low-income states; and calls on the Government to provide urgent support to the world’s poorest and most vulnerable countries and communities as they deal with the covid-19 pandemic.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)]

We will have a three-minute suspension for cleaning.

Syria: Humanitarian Situation

Rushanara Ali Excerpts

Tuesday 3rd November 2020 Westminster Hall

[Rushanara Ali (Bethnal Green and Bow) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir David. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Wirral South (Alison McGovern) on her powerful speech, and I congratulate the two speakers who followed her. I too pay tribute to our dear friend, Jo Cox, who was a powerful advocate for Syria and Syrian refugees.

I declare an interest, Sir David. I visited Lebanon in 2013 with the international children’s charity World Vision, and I also visited Jordan with the Westminster Foundation for Democracy. I visited Syrian refugees during those visits. During the trip to Lebanon, I visited a number of informal refugee settlements and saw the extent of the crisis. That was right at the beginning of the crisis, but things were unbearable, with hundreds of thousands of refugees fleeing to Lebanon, ultimately making up more than a quarter of the population.

Recently we have seen the challenges facing countries such as Lebanon, Turkey and Jordan. They have hosted the largest number of Syrian refugees, compared with other countries, including our own, as my hon. Friend the Member for Wirral South pointed out. I saw at first hand the devastation the crisis brought to people’s lives, and especially children’s. I will never forget the hundreds of children who were living in an informal settlement of makeshift tents on the outskirts of a town in the Beqaa valley.

The Palestinians, who had fled decades ago from Palestine and moved to Syria, had been forced out of Syria during the war, into the Palestinian camp in Lebanon. I will never forget the face of an elderly woman, who had been there since the ’40s, and then the children of the successor generation who had fled from Syria and were put in the overcrowded Palestinian camp in Lebanon. The plight of Syrian refugees is horrific, and alongside that, of course, there are the many Palestinians who were living in Syria and who were then forcibly displaced once again.

Almost a decade has passed now since the conflict began, and we see no end in sight in terms of a peaceful settlement, but the coronavirus pandemic has made the situation much worse. It is vital that our Government redouble their efforts to keep the pressure on those countries such as Russia and China that are blocking peace. They have blocked efforts by the British Government and the international community to bring an end to the conflict through various UN resolutions proposed by the UK Government and other Governments back in 2011, 2012 and so on.

The pandemic has meant that refugees face even greater risk. The spread of coronavirus is impossible to control in camps, not only in the camps that Syrian refugees live in, but in many other camps, whether in Bangladesh or in other parts of the world where people have been forced out. We need a resolution on achieving peace, but we also need to provide greater assistance to those countries that are bearing the brunt when they have their own challenges. I hope the Minister can say more in his response about what we are doing to reduce the risk of the spread of the virus in camps and to provide more protection. UN appeals have historically been significantly underfunded over many years, and those countries are bearing the brunt of the crisis in terms of providing for refugees.

I turn finally to the issues around trying to get an agreement for an at least temporary peace, while negotiations continue. At the beginning of the coronavirus crisis, the UN Secretary-General called for a global ceasefire. We have to ensure that our Government take a leadership role in making that happen as we face a second wave that could spread into refugee camps.

I end by quoting the UN Secretary-General, who said at the beginning of the coronavirus crisis:

“COVID-19 is menacing the whole of humanity—and so the whole of humanity must fight back.”

Those sentiments are more important than ever now, especially as we consider the plight of Syrian refugees in different countries around the globe and the plight of other refugees around the world. We have to act together to protect refugees and to stop the conflicts going on in Syria and elsewhere, if we are to protect people’s lives.

Oral Answers to Questions

Rushanara Ali Excerpts

Tuesday 13th October 2020 Commons Chamber

[Dominic Raab]

I pay tribute to my right hon. Friend for all the work that he has done in this area. We will of course look very carefully at the case he raises, and I understand the point that he makes.

[Rushanara Ali (Bethnal Green and Bow) (Lab)]

Canada and the Netherlands have formally joined the International Court of Justice case, led by Gambia, on the genocide against the Rohingya people by the Myanmar Government. Can the Foreign Secretary explain why the UK Government, despite being a penholder on the UN Security Council, for instance, in relation to Burma, have not done so, and when he plans to change that? Will he meet me and my co-chair of the all-party parliamentary group on the rights of the Rohingya to discuss this matter further?

[Dominic Raab]

We have a Commonwealth Foreign Ministers’ meeting coming up, where we will be looking at the further amount of support we are providing to ease the humanitarian plight of the Rohingya. We have looked at the ICJ proceedings and will continue to keep those under close review.

China’s Policy on its Uyghur Population

Rushanara Ali Excerpts

Monday 12th October 2020 Westminster Hall

[Rushanara Ali (Bethnal Green and Bow) (Lab)]

I am pleased to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Gray, and I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Islwyn (Chris Evans) on securing the debate.

The fight to prevent genocide is a subject close to my heart, as it is to all Members in this debate and many others across the House. I have vivid memories of observing as a teenager what happened during the Bosnian and Rwandan genocides. Since becoming a Member of Parliament, I have campaigned on the genocide committed by the Myanmar Government against the Rohingya people. Many other examples that we have all witnessed in the past echo what has been happening recently.

We have seen in recent years that despite our proud record as a country in standing up against human rights violations, systematic discrimination, ethnic cleansing and genocide, our Government have been found wanting. We have seen that from the failure of the British Government, with the international community, to act in relation to what was happening with the Rohingya Muslims. I draw that parallel because it is vital that we learn the lessons of our recent history. Many of us warned our Government to act: not to remove sanctions against the Myanmar Government prematurely as they made the transition towards democracy, even when the US was not doing it.

This time, we see the US taking a leadership role and our Government dithering once again. I hope the Minister will step up and, if he is being prevented from speaking out against what looks like another genocide, talk to his boss and ask him to take genocide much more seriously. There is no more serious issue than what is happening in Myanmar, as well as in China with the Uyghur population.

I am incredibly grateful to right hon. and hon. Members from across the House for debating this issue because despite all our efforts, we failed to get accountability and action to prevent the exodus, punishment and persecution of hundreds of thousands of Rohingya Muslims. We ultimately saw a million forced out of their country in 2017, and we saw the plight of that group, yet even today—again, there is a parallel—our Government fail to support the actions of the Government of Gambia, who are leading an International Court of Justice case on that issue. I hope that as we move forward, we will learn those lessons and ensure that in relation to China, our Government show the courage of their convictions and take action to prevent another genocide.

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[Nigel Adams]

It is absolutely the case that companies need to abide by the law. More can be done in this area, and we are developing further measures. The Home Office announced on 22 September a series of new measures to strengthen the Modern Slavery Act. These measures require legislative change, which will be brought forward as soon as parliamentary time allows.

There were some excellent contributions from my hon. Friends the Members for Tonbridge and Malling (Tom Tugendhat)—the Chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee—for Henley (John Howell), for Crewe and Nantwich (Dr Mullan), for Isle of Wight and for Wakefield (Imran Ahmad Khan), and from the hon. Members for Mitcham and Morden (Siobhain McDonagh) and for Bethnal Green and Bow (Rushanara Ali). The hon. Member for Bradford West (Naz Shah) referred eloquently to genocide. Again, any judgment as to whether war crimes, crimes against humanity or genocide have occurred has to be a judicial matter.

My hon. Friend the Member for Wakefield referred to strategic cultural cleansing. The freedom to practise, change or share one’s faith or beliefs without discrimination or violent opposition is a human right that all people should be able to enjoy. He was also right to highlight the lack of condemnation from predominantly Muslim countries of the oppression of the Uyghurs. I am sure that his powerful voice will have been heard today.

[Rushanara Ali]

The Minister mentions genocide. A clear-cut International Court of Justice case is currently ongoing, but the UK Government refuse to back it. What test has to be passed before our Government—a penholder in the UN on Burma—are likely to act? That is the problem: constant excuses.

[Nigel Adams]

I know how powerfully the hon. Lady feels about this issue, but, as I say, there is a specific definition in international law, and any decision has to be judicial. I am sure that this will come up in the future, and I am more than happy to meet the hon. Lady to discuss it.

The hon. Member for Aberavon (Stephen Kinnock) asked whether we would publicly oppose China’s election to the United Nations Human Rights Council this week. He will be aware that we never comment on voting in UN elections, which are conducted by secret ballot. The UK has been absolutely clear with China about our grave concerns in relation to Xinjiang. As I said, on 6 October we joined 38 other countries to call on China to allow immediate and unfettered access for independent UN observers.

I know that I have to give the hon. Member for Islwyn a couple of minutes, so I will wrap up. I reiterate that we cannot speculate on future designations under our sanctions regime. China must immediately end extrajudicial detention in Xinjiang and uphold the principles of freedom of religion or belief, freedom of speech and freedom of association for every single one of its citizens. As the Prime Minister and Foreign Secretary have made clear, we want a positive relationship with China, but we will always act to uphold our values, our interests and our national security. We are crystal clear with China when we disagree with its approach.

Occupied Palestinian Territories

Rushanara Ali Excerpts

Thursday 24th September 2020 Commons Chamber

[Stephen Kinnock]

But if one is seeking to restart negotiations, one needs to do so on the basis of a plan that has legitimacy. It is not possible to move forward if the plan is actually based on breaking the law. Countless UN resolutions have pointed out that the settlements, as they stand, are illegal, so that has to be taken off the table before there is even a basis for starting to talk. That is why it is perfectly understandable why the Palestinian Authority is refusing to engage on that basis.

The Foreign Secretary and his Ministers continue to present the Trump-Netanyahu plan as a basis for talks. They ask the Palestinians to compromise, yet the Palestinians have already ceded 78% of their land to Israel. How much more can they be asked to compromise?

[Rushanara Ali (Bethnal Green and Bow) (Lab)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that given Britain’s unique history in relation to Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territories, it is important our Government continue to work at being an honest broker rather than taking sides? The position the UK Government have taken actually puts at risk Britain being seen as an honest broker.

[Stephen Kinnock]

I agree entirely. This country has a unique place in history and a unique responsibility, particularly if we trace this back to the Balfour declaration. It is vital that everything this Government say and do honours the commitments in that declaration.

The Foreign Secretary and Ministers also say that the Palestinian side should make a counter-offer. Well, they have: a two-state solution, as already set out in countless UN resolutions and based on 1967 lines. That is the counter-offer. Prime Minister Netanyahu’s coalition had agreed that Israel would begin de jure annexation from 1 July. Thankfully, the Israeli Government have rowed back on that for now, but what we are instead witnessing is more annexation by stealth. Netanyahu announced approval of preliminary plans for 3,500 new housing units in a new settlement in the E1 area between Jerusalem and Ma’ale Adumim, thus severing East Jerusalem’s contiguity with the rest of the west bank.

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[Stephen Crabb]

There is a lot in the Trump plan that I am sceptical about, and the viability of a future Palestinian state is important for me as I reflect on these issues, but I believe first and foremost in the power of sitting down and talking. The intransigence and refusal to engage on the part of the Palestinian leadership is a huge roadblock to progress in the region. That is why I reiterate my point about the need for leaders to show leadership. It is not just about the job title. It is about taking brave decisions to sit down and talk and break out of old modes of thinking and old patterns of behaviour.

My hon. Friend the Member for Bury South (Christian Wakeford) referred to a tech start-up company that we visited in Ramallah a number of months ago. The young people we met in that company look at what has happened in the tech sector in Israel, which has seen enormous growth and been a source of prosperity for Israel, and they want that too—they aspire to be a start-up nation too. They have every right to aspire to that, but they are also aware that their leadership has let them down on so many occasions. When we debate these issues in the Chamber, it is important that we think about not only the words of the Palestinian leaders but the Palestinian people themselves and what they aspire to.

[Rushanara Ali]

Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that one of the major obstacles to young Palestinians being able to do what he describes is their lack of freedom of movement and their inability to access education, skills and opportunities? In order to present a balanced argument, I appeal to him to recognise that freedom of movement is a major obstacle to opportunity for the very people he is talking about.

[Stephen Crabb]

I have seen all the roadblocks and the impediment that they create to economic opportunity. It is bad in the west bank, and it even worse in Gaza, but there is a reason why those roadblocks are there: they minimise the threat of violence and death for Jewish Israeli citizens. That is exactly the point I am trying to make—we need to move beyond that. It requires our Government to put more pressure on the Palestinian leadership to root out the school textbooks that glorify violence and incite hatred, to abandon the language of conflict and confrontation and to seize opportunities for peace.

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[Naz Shah (Bradford West) (Lab)]

Some 103 years ago, the Palestinians were abandoned when our then Foreign Secretary decided unilaterally to facilitate the establishment of a new state for one people in another people’s homeland. In 1948 the Palestinians were abandoned when that state was established, and in 1967 they were abandoned again when much of their remaining homeland was lost, leading to the occupation that continues today.

But this year they have not just been abandoned; they have also been ignored. On the back of ignoring them, Israel’s ignoring of international law has been rewarded, not punished, by political normalisation with two states in the region. We all want peace in the Holy Land, but when we are told that there are peace deals being announced without the Palestinians even being part of those deals, we should get real about whether peace is what we are really getting.

Peace is too important to be mis-sold. While Israel, understandably, pursues normalisation, we should remind all concerned that there is nothing normal about occupation. We found the lockdown due to covid-19 incredibly difficult, with curfews, lack of freedom to travel and being cut off from family, but Palestinians living under Israeli military occupation have been under their own lockdown for so many decades.

The argument being proposed is that the normalisation agreements with Bahrain and the UAE have halted annexation of even more Palestinian territory, but, as my hon. Friend the Member for Aberavon (Stephen Kinnock), who I thank for securing this debate, pointed out, they are continuing behind the scenes. The Israeli Prime Minister has made no such guarantee in any case to his own Knesset, and he has been indicted already more than once for breach of trust as well as for fraud. Why should we take anything he says at face value?

Closer to home, we know from our experiences with the Good Friday agreement that peace can come only when sworn enemies are seated around the table, not when only one side of the table has the chairs out. It is that experience we should be sharing with the world in Britain’s commitment to a safer, fairer world for all—including Israelis and Palestinians.

The recent announcements coming from the UAE and Bahrain are significant to those states’ relations with Israel but detrimental to peace between Israelis and Palestinians and righting the wrongs committed during the military occupation. No normalisation effort with Israel will be real and genuine—let alone accepted by the people of the region more widely—without addressing the reasons why normalisation has escaped Israelis for so long: the occupation and the wrongs emanating from it.

[Rushanara Ali]

Does my hon. Friend agree that, despite what has recently happened, the Israeli Government have not ruled out normalisation of annexation for the long term, that it is a temporary thing, and that our Government need to ensure that the Israeli Government do not continue to pursue that as an agenda?

[Naz Shah]

I thank my hon. Friend for her intervention. Indeed, she and I were in Palestine last year, visiting the Palestinians, and we saw at first hand what happens. I agree and would go further: as my hon. Friend the Member for Aberavon said earlier, it is not even paused; the truth is, it continues.

In Northern Ireland, we would not have declared peace with the Irish just because Britain normalised full political relations with Dublin. Nor can the Israelis claim peace with the Arabs just because of deals struck in the UAE and Bahrain. Trade deals and PR stunts are one thing; peace is completely different. Both Israelis and Palestinians deserve better than the status quo. Both the oppressor and the oppressed and their populations suffer through injustice.

As Dr H. A. Hellyer of the Royal United Services Institute and the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace wrote last week,

“full normalization for Israel does not require its government to set up diplomatic outposts in cities far away from Tel Aviv, but rather, to come to an equitable and just settlement with the people of Palestine, from Gaza to Jerusalem to Ramallah.”

In the end, the normalisation of Israel in the region can come only through acceptance on the ground by the wider Arab public, including the people of Palestine, irrespective of the fanfare from the Trump Administration.

As we continue to pursue peace, we must ask, who is peace for? It is not for the Emiratis and it is not for the Bahrainis. It is not even for us. It is for the Israelis and Palestinians. Anything that excludes one side is nothing to do with peace. This is not about the art of a deal—especially when the artwork is counterfeit—it is about the rights of the oppressed, the occupied and the erased.

--- Later in debate ---

[Rushanara Ali (Bethnal Green and Bow) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Aberavon (Stephen Kinnock) on securing this important debate. I draw attention to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests for a visit to the Occupied Palestinian Territories with Medical Aid for Palestinians and the Council for Arab-British Understanding.

I rise to speak as a friend of Palestinians as well as Israelis—as, I believe, are all Members across the House. The conflict between Israelis and Palestinians has meant suffering on all sides for generations, along with regional instability and insecurity for Israelis as well as Palestinians. In Gaza, 80% of civilians depend on international humanitarian relief. In 2010, former Prime Minister David Cameron described the blockaded Gaza strip as a “prison camp”. The situation has not improved much since then; in fact, it has got worse. The plight of Palestinians has been worsened by restrictions on freedom of movement and on freedom of access to work, opportunity, healthcare and education. When I visited the Occupied Palestinian Territories last year, it was clear that the situation had got progressively worse. The daily battle of survival—to get to work and through checkpoints—is exhausting to observe, never mind to live through. That is why it is imperative that all of us work together to ensure that the Palestinians have a right to statehood. Our Government must do all they can to ensure that there is a genuine peace process to provide security for Israelis, a two-state solution and the right to Palestinian statehood. But the so-called Trump plan and the annexation threat by the Israeli Government have put all that in jeopardy and taken us backwards.

We need our Government to fight for an end to the occupation, to illegal settlements, to demolition orders, and to the barriers that prevent Palestinians and Israelis from being able to live side by side in peace and security. We need the international community to redouble its efforts to ensure that a genuine peaceful settlement can be reached. The Trump plan is far from that. That is why it is important that our Government fights for a permanent commitment to preventing annexation, not just a temporary reprieve. We need our Government to act as an honest broker, not to take sides. We need our Government to play the role that the world desperately needs us to play with other partners to ensure peace and security in a troubled nation and a troubled region. It is imperative that we all work together to make that happen in a genuine way.

[Several hon. Members rose—]

Detention of Uyghur Muslims in Xinjiang

Rushanara Ali Excerpts

Wednesday 9th September 2020 Commons Chamber

[Shabana Mahmood]

I thank the hon. Lady and agree with everything she said. Her remarks are testament to how much cross-party agreement there now is about what is happening to the Uyghur people at the hands of the Chinese Government. I would certainly welcome an opportunity to work closely with her and other Conservative Members so that we can lobby their Government to take the action that we would all, I am sure, like to see.

We should all be alarmed and appalled by what we are seeing, but we should all also resolve to forge a path forward for Uyghur freedom. I do believe that, as the hon. Member for Wealden (Ms Ghani) said, our Government can play a key role in averting disaster. The time has certainly come for Magnitsky-style sanctions on individuals, whether state or non-state actors, where there are reasonable grounds to suspect that the person is involved in serious human rights violations in Xinjiang. There is no good reason to explain why these have not already been activated. I believe that the Government’s current position is that the evidence is not there yet—a position that I have to say I find incredible. If the evidence we already have is not strong enough, then could the Minister tell us what more is required? What line has to be crossed before we say that sanctions are now appropriate?

Sanctions alone will not, of course, be enough. We should go further in using and enforcing domestic avenues of accountability—in particular, corporate accountability relating to supply chains, as my hon. Friend the Member for Coventry South (Zarah Sultana) remarked. We cannot allow the fruits of forced labour to end up on our shores and in our homes. I know that British people everywhere would be appalled to think, for example, that the personal protective equipment that we have all come to rely on could have been produced by the abused and subjugated people of Xinjiang. If our words on eradicating modern slavery are to mean anything, then surely the commercial goods that the Uyghurs and others in Xinjiang are forced to make should be squarely in our sights.

Both these options relate to following and then attacking the money. As distasteful as it may seem, money does matter a very great deal. The Chinese Communist party has busily been buying up influence and the silence of other countries. A challenge based on restricting the flow of money for key regime individuals, and also for companies, both Chinese and others, that are benefiting from these crimes would hit where it hurts and send a clear message too.

There are legal options as well. I know that the situation is complicated—China is of course a permanent member of the UN Security Council—but we should not let that stand in our way, as the hon. Member for Wealden made clear. I know that the Government are proud to have co-ordinated a joint UN statement, and I am sure that the Minister will remark on that. I do not wish to sound uncharitable as to the actions that the Government have been trying to co-ordinate. I know that even getting to that point, faced with a concerted counter-effort by the Chinese Government, is significant, but I also know we can do better. As the Bar Human Rights Committee has said, we should lead efforts to establish an impartial and independent UN mechanism such as a special rapporteur, or maybe an expert panel, to closely monitor the situation in Xinjiang.

We should investigate the viability of more innovative legal approaches that could be taken, as we have seen in respect of the Rohingya. The International Criminal Court has intervened to probe the violence against Myanmar’s Rohingya community because part of the crime—deportation—has taken part in Bangladesh, which falls within the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court even though Myanmar itself does not. Similarly, we know that deportations are taking place from Jinjiang to Tajikistan and Cambodia, and people are then repatriated to China and later murdered, tortured or sterilised.

[Rushanara Ali (Bethnal Green and Bow) (Lab)]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for securing this very important debate. Does she agree that if the perpetrators of ethnic cleansing and genocide are not prosecuted—as in the case of the Burmese military, despite the now overwhelming evidence—it is likely that genocide will become a policy tool for China and many other countries and leaders around the world? It is on our country and our Government to show leadership here.

[Shabana Mahmood]

My hon. Friend makes an important point. We can be in no doubt as to the ambitions that the Chinese Government have: President Xi Jinping made clear in his 2050 vision statement the sort of dominance that his country wishes to achieve. If the current actions of the Chinese Government are allowed to go unchecked for any longer, we are heading for a very dark century indeed, which is why we must all take action and press the Minister today.

Official Development Assistance

Rushanara Ali Excerpts

Thursday 9th July 2020 Commons Chamber

[Rushanara Ali (Bethnal Green and Bow) (Lab)]

I congratulate the right hon. Member for Sutton Coldfield (Mr Mitchell) on securing the debate. The Prime Minister has had his sights on scrapping DFID for some time. In fact, it has always been an easy target for some on the right, but it is thanks to the good men and women across political parties who helped to build a cross-party consensus that we have sustained our focus on tackling global poverty.

I pay tribute to the right hon. Gentleman and former Prime Ministers Cameron, Blair and Brown, and many others across different parties, who have supported our effort to tackle global poverty. It has saved millions of lives. We have seen this effort show great leadership around the world. Our investment of 0.7% of GNI to eradicate poverty has built good will around the world. We are an international leader because of the work that we have been able to do together, and that is what is at stake and at risk with the focus on downgrading DFID, on blurring the boundaries, on the militarisation of DFID spending—which is what is coming—and on down- grading the focus on poverty alleviation. [Interruption.] The Minister is shaking his head. I ask him to commit today to continuing the legislative commitment to eradicating poverty and keeping it enshrined in law, so that we do not see the diluting of poverty alleviation, which has built our reputation and soft power around the world. What is happening is a retrograde step.

I have spent many years visiting places to see the work of DFID officials and the NGOs that we support—British NGOs, which are the pride of our country. Of course there have been mistakes but overall, with our DFID, they have made an enormous difference, supporting refugees after the genocide caused by the military attacks on the Rohingya population who sought refuge in Cox’s Bazar and the Syrian refugees on the border of Lebanon and Syria, helping with the situation in camps in Jordan and many other countries where our aid effort has saved lives, and protecting women against violence and rape used as a weapon of war. Our DFID has protected those people. My plea to the Minister is to ensure that, as we move forward, we do not see a downgrading and diluting and we do not see the bad old days of aid for trade—a situation where we damage our global interests. In the middle of this pandemic, when our relationships and our need to work together globally are more important than ever, we must focus on what works, and what has worked is that focus on humanitarian support—on protecting people and saving lives. That is what builds good will, that is what builds our power around the world, that is what builds and strengthens our relationships —that is what will build global Britain, in the best sense of the phrase. As a former colonial power, we must remember our responsibilities to the world.

[Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)]

We will have a two-minute limit for the last two Back-Bench speakers.

DFID-FCO Merger

Rushanara Ali Excerpts

Thursday 18th June 2020 Commons Chamber

[Dominic Raab]

I thank my right hon. Friend and former Chair of the Women and Equalities Committee. Of course she will know from the equalities agenda how easy it is for cross-cutting issues to fall between the cracks of individual Government Departments. We remain absolutely committed, and she will know that I am personally committed, to our campaign to ensure that there are 12 years of quality education for every girl in the world, not just as a matter of moral duty but because it is one of the best levers to raise poverty in those countries. I also cite COP26 and climate change as another example of where we need to bring together our domestic ambitions and our international ambitions across the board and unite our diplomatic muscle and leverage with our development goals.

[Rushanara Ali (Bethnal Green and Bow) (Lab)]

The spread of covid-19 has pushed half a billion people into poverty and 265 million to the brink of starvation. This merger is a massive distraction in the middle of an emergency. Can the Foreign Secretary assure the House that official development assistance will not be misspent on foreign security projects, which risk the UK contributing to human rights abuses abroad?

[Dominic Raab]

I thank the hon. Lady for her question. I know that she takes a very close interest in this matter. In relation to conflict situations in particular—I have mentioned Yemen, but I can think of other situations around the world—integrating the aid and development budget and policy is the way that we will get a coherent approach, which not only brings the conflict to an end and alleviates the humanitarian crisis, but is the best vehicle for protecting human rights sustainably.

Oral Answers to Questions

Rushanara Ali Excerpts

Tuesday 25th June 2019 Commons Chamber

[Sir Alan Duncan]

Yes, I am very happy to confirm that, but of course we need to see far more than that in Venezuela. Maduro has brought his own country to its knees. Millions of people have fled to neighbouring countries. The country has been ruined by the lunacy of one man, and we all, as the international community, need to work together to do everything we possibly can to restore the fortunes of that once great country.

[Rushanara Ali (Bethnal Green and Bow) (Lab)]

T1. If he will make a statement on his departmental responsibilities.

[The Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Mr Jeremy Hunt)]

This might be my last Question Time as Foreign Secretary—or indeed it might not—but one important event that will happen before the result of the Conservative leadership election is announced is the launch of a major global campaign to protect the safety of journalists around the world. The UK has joined forces with Canada to spearhead this campaign, which I will be launching next month with Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland. It will be the world’s first ever ministerial summit on media freedom, here in London. We have 700 confirmed attendees from media and civil society across 98 countries and from 45 different Governments. Together we will shine a light on abuse and raise the price for those who would harm or imprison journalists.

[Rushanara Ali]

I thank the Foreign Secretary for announcing that conference. Whether he remains Foreign Secretary or becomes Prime Minister, or takes any other post, I hope that he continues consistently to champion human rights and media freedom.

I declare an interest in that last month I was part of a delegation with Medical Aid for Palestinians and the Council for Arab-British Understanding that visited the Palestinian refugee camp of Dheisheh in the occupied west bank. There we witnessed the vital work in education, health and other areas of humanitarian relief that the United Nations Relief and Works Agency does but which is now at risk because the US has threatened to defund and delegitimise the agency. Can the Foreign Secretary confirm that the UK intends to support the renewal of UNRWA’s mandate at the General Assembly later this year so that it can continue its vital work of protecting people and giving them a sense of hope?

[Mr Hunt]

I thank the hon. Lady for her good wishes. She once bought me a cappuccino in Portcullis House, and I look forward to returning the favour in No. 10, if that is what happens. I can confirm that we will continue to support the renewal of UNRWA’s mandate and the vital work it does.

Sri Lanka

Rushanara Ali Excerpts

Tuesday 23rd April 2019 Commons Chamber

[Mr Hunt]

I am happy to give my hon. Friend a personal commitment that I want to do more on this front, and also to tell him that the United Kingdom is a world leader in countering extremist disinformation online. We have developed particular expertise over the past five years or so, and we share our information widely.

My hon. Friend is right to say how coldly calculated this attack was. To co-ordinate six explosions to take place at virtually the same moment required an enormous degree of planning. Those people knew exactly what they were doing. They spent a long time planning the attacks and finding the recruits to carry them out. We have to think hard about the kind of people who would do such a thing, and I hope that will mean that we redouble our efforts to ensure that it does not happen again.

[Rushanara Ali (Bethnal Green and Bow) (Lab)]

I join the Foreign Secretary, the shadow Foreign Secretary and colleagues across the House in utterly condemning these terrorist attacks. My thoughts are with the victims and their families.

Does the Foreign Secretary agree that the focus on protecting religious minorities—in this case, Christian minorities—must be redoubled? The atmosphere of intolerance towards religious minorities in different countries—whether they are Christians, Buddhists, Muslims, Jews or Hindus—has increased, and the international community must step up to provide that protection, as well as security for minorities.

[Mr Hunt]

The hon. Lady is absolutely right. Let me also commend her for the work that she has done in championing the rights of Rohingya Muslims in Burma; I think that my first contact with her when I became Foreign Secretary was in that connection.

It is important to understand that it is an easy first step to target and attack someone because of their religion, and that in very poor countries where many people have not had a proper education it is easy to whip up feelings in a way that can be lethal.