Extracts from FCO Questions - June 26

Seema Malhotra (Feltham and Heston) (Lab/Co-op) 

More dialogue is vital and must be supported by the international community. What assessment has the Minister made of the influence of Russia in the negotiations between the Kurdistan Regional Government and the Iraqi Government, given the significant investment by the Russian firm Rosneft in Kurdistan’s regional oil pipeline?

The Minister for the Middle East (Alistair Burt)

It is true to say that, in the formation of the new Iraqi Government, there are many interests from countries in the region. What is essential is that the new Iraqi Government demonstrate their independence and determination to run Iraq without external interference, and stand up for the needs of all their communities to make sure that the disaster that befell Iraq in the past, when other communities were not properly represented, does not happen again.

• Stewart Malcolm McDonald 

  I do not like saying this, because he is a good Minister, but for him to say to that the UK is not affected displays a shocking level of languid complacency. Of course the UK will be affected if this goes ahead; it will hand to the Kremlin unimaginable economic and political leverage. Why will he not show some muscle, see that this is a big problem, not just for the UK but for the entirety of the future of Europe, and start rallying together with our allies to stop this project?

• Sir Alan Duncan 

  I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his appreciation of my skills as a former oil trader. Nord Stream is indeed a pipeline that takes gas from Russia to Germany through international waters, until Denmark, and then it makes landfall in northern Germany. It is primarily a matter for those countries but, as he says, it is of extreme strategic importance to Ukraine, which I fully recognise. That is why we have had meetings with the chief executive of NAFTA. It is also significant to note that, on 10 April, Chancellor Merkel stated that Nord Stream 2, as a project,

  “is not possible without clarity on the future transit role of Ukraine”.

• Tom Tugendhat (Tonbridge and Malling) (Con) 

  I welcome the Minister’s statement. He is more than aware from his many trips around Europe, and indeed his expert understanding of the energy business and the United States, of the potential impact on not only eastern Europe, but our forward defences because of that. Does he agree that working together with allies around the Baltic, where this pipeline seems to be going to flow, would be very much in our national interest and that the UK very definitely has an interest in making sure that Russia does not complete this project?

• Sir Alan Duncan 

  I reiterate that, in terms of our actual energy supplies, Russia accounts for only about 1% of UK gas demand, so it is very small and most of it comes from Qatar and elsewhere. However, this pipeline is potentially of strategic importance for the influence of Russia, as my hon. Friend, the Chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee rightly says, so of course we are in discussion with Germany and other interested parties about the significance of the proposed pipeline.
  
  

  • Mr Bob Seely (Isle of Wight) (Con) 

    9. What progress his Department has made on the Global Britain agenda. [906043]

  • The Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Boris Johnson) 

    Global Britain is about being open, outward-looking and engaged with the world so as to maximise our influence, and I give the House the clearest recent example of that: the 28 countries who joined us in sympathetically expelling 153 Russian spies.

  • Mr Seely 

    Does my right hon. Friend agree that this is the perfect opportunity for us to fundamentally rethink our foreign policy post Brexit, and that more work could be done on the idea of global Britain to ensure that we have a foreign policy fit for the 21st century?

  • Boris Johnson 

    My hon. Friend is absolutely right, and that is why we have responded to the challenges that the world presents us with today by increasing our diplomatic staff by another 250 diplomats, in addition to the 100 that we added to our European strength, and we are opening 10 new sovereign posts in the Caribbean and the Pacific, with more to come in Africa.

  • Chris Bryant (Rhondda) (Lab) 

    I hope that global Britain is also about being extremely robust where there are strategic issues in Europe that we have to address, such as Nord Stream 2. Will the Foreign Secretary make it absolutely clear that Russia has systematically been bullying smaller countries in Europe for years through its energy policy and we will assist the Danes and the Germans if they want to make sure this does not go ahead?

  • Boris Johnson 

    As the hon. Gentleman knows, the Germans import a great deal of their gas from Russia and they are conflicted in that matter, but we continue to raise the concerns that he mentions with our German friends and of course with all the other states on the periphery of the EU that are threatened, as he says, by Russian gas politics.