Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, what discussions he has had with his counterpart in the new Nigerian administration on (a) security cooperation in advance of the UK-Nigeria Security and Defence Partnership Dialogue 2023 and (b) requests for support on security issues.

The new Nigerian Foreign Minister is yet to be appointed. However, I [Andrew Mitchell] discussed rising insecurity and the UK-Nigeria Security and Defence Partnership with then presidential candidate Bola Tinubu, in December 2022. The UK Government looks forward to strengthening this partnership at the next annual dialogue later this year.