Oral Answers to Questions Debate
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Tom Tugendhat
Main Page: Tom Tugendhat (Conservative - Tonbridge and Malling)Department Debates - View all Tom Tugendhat's debates with the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office
(6 years, 2 months ago)
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Tom Tugendhat (Tonbridge and Malling) (Con)
My right hon. Friend is a noted expert on the region, and it is a pleasure to see him representing Her Majesty’s Government in the middle east, but can he bring a little clarity, which the FAC asked for, on the difference between the YPG and the PKK? We received evidence after evidence that there is indeed no real difference, yet Her Majesty’s Government are supporting a group that appears, at least slightly, to be linked to a group that, as my right hon. Friend’s colleague the Minister for Europe and the Americas said just now, is a proscribed organisation.
Alistair Burt
I thank my hon. Friend not only for his question but for his leadership of the FAC, and we will study its report carefully. It asked for clarity in some situations in which it is genuinely difficult to provide clarity. There will be a full written response from the Foreign Office in due course, but we do designate the PKK as a proscribed organisation; that is the situation at present.