The Gulf

Part of the debate – in the House of Commons at 8:57 pm on 15 January 1991.

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Photo of Mr Bernie Grant Mr Bernie Grant , Tottenham 8:57, 15 January 1991

There has been the stench of hypocrisy about this debate, and also the stench of racism. I agree with the hon. Member for Glasgow, Govan (Mr. Sillars) who spoke about Lithuania. The British Government have said that Lithuania is a free and independent country which is not part of the USSR. The USSR has sent troops into Lithuania. Therefore, the British Government should do what it has done about Saddam Hussein, Iraq and Kuwait: it should get the United Nations to send troops to throw the Russians out of Lithuania. There is one reason why they will not do that —the colour of the Russians is different from the colour of the Iraqis and that is a fact.

I spent eight days in Iraq as leader of the peace mission organised by the British branch of the Afro-Asian Solidarity Movement. We were there to find out what the Iraqis thought because the media over here had not been putting the Iraqi point of view. If we are to believe what we hear from President Bush, our own Prime Minister and the gutter press, Saddam Hussein is a half-mad dictator—a devil who rules by brutality alone and does not care about his people. But the fact of the matter is that Saddam Hussein is not mad—he is ruthless, yes, but he is not mad —and he cares about his people. When I was in Baghdad, the Iraqi people told me that they had the greatest respect for Saddam Hussein. The same is true in Jordan. The reason is that Saddam Hussein has made his people feel that the Arab people should be proud of their ethnicity and race. The west takes no account of that.

President Bush says that there should be no linkage. I will tell the House about linkage. I remember when the Americans called a conference to discuss Namibia after the battle of Cuito Cuanavale, at which the South Africans were defeated by the Angolans and the Cubans. The first thing that the Americans said was that they had to have linkage: if they wanted the South Africans out of Namibia, the Cubans had to leave Angola. It had nothing to do with the issue. The Americans are nothing but a load of hypocrites if they think that we will accept the policy of no linkage.

The present situation could be resolved easily if Israel said that she was prepared to go to a conference to discuss the Palestinian issue. Why will the Israelis not do that? It is because Israel wants to maintain her expansionist policy in the middle east—and Israel is allowed to get away with that because the Americans want one power only in the region, and that power must be Israel.

I am opposed to much of what has been said tonight and to sanctions against Iraq. I think that there should be an Arab solution. If the Arabs got together without any pressure from the west, they would be able to resolve the issue. The Palestinian issue must be an integral part of any conference. I believe that there should be a discussion on secure borders for Israel, too, but I certainly feel that unless there is linkage there will be no prospect of peace in the middle east.

If there is war tomorrow, the effects on third-world countries will vastly outweigh the effects within the region. The Minister for Overseas Development has already told us that there will be no extra money for the starving millions of Africa because of the amount of money that will have to be spent on war in the Gulf. That is only one aspect. There will be hunger and starvation the like of which has never been seen before in the oil-importing countries. A report of the United Nations committee on trade and development has already stated that if the price of oil goes to $30 per barrel, $26 billion will be taken away from third-world countries and put back into the coffers of oil-producing countries, including this country. It is clear to me that the world, around America and its allies in the Gulf, is heading for war for one reason and one reason only: it wants control of the middle east.

There is also a subsidiary reason: the people involved are people of colour. I end as I began: if we are talking about white people invading a white country, United States and British forces would never be involved as they are in the Gulf today.