War in Ukraine
Debate between Stephen McPartland and James Heappey(6 months ago)
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James Heappey
I heard a slightly different statement, and one that I think is self-evidently true. In a post-war Ukraine, the UK will absolutely seek to demonstrably support Ukrainian security on land, at sea and in the air, but obviously that is not something that we would do while a conflict is still live, for very obvious reasons.
Stephen McPartland (Stevenage) (Con)
I welcome the Government’s commitment to Ukraine and I am proud that Stevenage-based MBDA supplies Storm Shadow and Brimstone missiles, but we know from a recent report by the Royal United Services Institute’s open-source intelligence and analysis team that North Korea is now massively supplying Russia. Are there any plans to work with international partners to try to disrupt that supply or increase our supplies?
James Heappey
There are a number of outcomes that one might say reflect strategic defeat for Putin: Finland and Sweden joining NATO; growing distrust of Russia throughout its near abroad; and more recently its having to go to countries such as North Korea cap in hand to seek weapons because it is unable to sustain its own arms industry. That is not to mention the rapidly changing dynamic between Russia and China. Of course, the UK and our allies look at ways of disrupting Russian supply chains, but that would not necessarily be a matter we would discuss any further in public.