[Sir Nicholas Winterton in the Chair] — Inter-Parliamentary Union

Part of the debate – in Westminster Hall at 2:36 pm on 22 November 2007.

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Photo of Ann Clwyd Ann Clwyd Special Envoy to PM on Human Rights in Iraq 2:36, 22 November 2007

My hon. Friend points out that the Minister was once a Whip, but, if I remember rightly, he was a benign Whip. Perhaps he would like to share some of his experiences with us later.

Many hon. Members are interested in pursuing the case of Zimbabwe. Although the Zimbabwean Parliament debated the beating of two Opposition MPs, Mr. Biti and Mr. Chamisa, by law enforcement officers at a prayer meeting on 11 March, and a subsequent brutal attack on Mr. Chamisa at Harare international airport, it does not seem to have taken any action to ensure that those criminal acts were duly investigated and the perpetrators brought to justice.

Opposition parliamentarians have allegedly been tortured. Mr. Madzore was arrested on 28 March, and allegedly tortured before being released when charges were withdrawn in August, and Mr. Job Sikhala was allegedly tortured in January 2003. The IPU committee has noted on several occasions that in those cases the Zimbabwean authorities did nothing to comply with their constitutional duties, and the Parliament failed to exercise its oversight functions effectively. On the contrary, law enforcement agencies were allowed to continue torturing and ill-treating even Members of Parliament with impunity. That is unsatisfactory.

When I chaired the committee for three years—it was made up of five members of Parliament from various countries—we had representatives of Zimbabwe appear before it, and the leader of the Zimbabwean delegation, instead of addressing the cases that we brought before him, always said that it was the fault of the British. We never got beyond that, so on one occasion I asked one of my committee colleagues, who was the Speaker of the Niger Parliament, to take the chair to see if he would be treated differently, but he was also blamed for the British, and the delegation refused to address the cases that we brought before it.

I have said before, and I say again, that ill treatment of parliamentarians is often just the tip of the iceberg in countries where human rights abuse is common. If members of Parliament are subject to abuse, it is more than likely that the people whom they are supposed to represent suffer even more. When lobbying for them, we are often able to address the plight of the wider community, such as activists, journalists, human rights defenders, anti-corruption campaigners, and the poor, the marginalised and the oppressed ethnic communities. To that end, while I have been chair, I have initiated a link with the all-party parliamentary human rights group, which now provides briefings for our members on the human rights situation in the country in question, and they supplement information from the Foreign and Commonwealth Office.

I thank all my colleagues who have raised specific human rights issues when on delegations and in bilateral meetings. Some recent discussions with parliamentary counterparts in which I have been involved have been free and frank, but to address the issues that really matter, one inevitably touches a raw nerve sometimes. On 13 November, The Times reported a private meeting of the British group with the Iranian delegation at the IPU assembly in April this year. Details of that meeting were provided following a request under the Freedom of Information Act 2000 to the FCO.

Minutes taken at that meeting by an FCO official describe a member of our delegation referring to the hangings in Iran of Mahmoud Asgari and Ayaz Marhoni in 2005 in Iran. They were killed for alleged homosexual activities, although they were juveniles at the time of their arrest. The leader of the Iranian delegation was unflinching. The record states that he explained that according to Islam, homosexuality and lesbianism are not permitted. He also said that if homosexual activity was in private, there was no problem, but that those taking part in overt activity should be executed. He argued that homosexuality was against human nature, because humans were here to reproduce and homosexuals did not reproduce. The sort of discussion that our delegation had with the Iranians following those statements can be imagined. That is concrete evidence of the sort of challenging discussions that we have, and shows that we do not flinch from raising such issues with our counterparts from other countries.

I want to mention the work of two British IPU members. My hon. Friend Mr. Dismore and Lord Morris of Aberavon were appointed rapporteurs for their respective committees. They are helping to ensure that the IPU addresses timely and important topics.

Lord Morris is co-rapporteur of the committee on peace and international security, which is tasked with producing and presenting a report on "The role of parliaments in striking a balance between national security, human security and individual freedoms and in averting the threat to democracy." He will have to incorporate feedback received from the last IPU assembly before producing a final joint report and draft resolution with his co-rapporteurs from South Africa and India at the next IPU assembly in April 2008 in Cape Town, South Africa.

My hon. Friend the Member for Hendon is co-rapporteur of the committee that is looking at democracy and human rights, and working on the topic, "Migrant workers, people trafficking, xenophobia and human rights" with his co-rapporteur from Mexico. Some of the position papers produced for some of the specialist committees are excellent, and I only wish that there was a system by which every member country of the IPU could debate some of those reports. I am thinking particularly of a paper on missing people, and it can be imagined how many countries provided information and took part in that debate. Perhaps an hon. Member here might want to raise that topic at some time.

The IPU internationally is undergoing reform. To date, it has been relatively little known on the international stage, except among those who are closely involved with its work. It has been viewed at best as a worthy talking shop, and at worst as a costly irrelevance. Of course, I believe that it is a useful forum for parliamentarians to engage with one another, and to work together for the common good. However, it is right to review its procedures and effectiveness, because there is definitely room for improvement.

We need greater opportunity for meaningful dialogue and interaction, instead of what tends to happen, which, as colleagues who have attended IPU conferences know, is that representatives make token set-piece speeches. Sometimes that may continue all day. If representatives of 146 countries all want their few minutes on the platform, yet their remarks do not relate to any previous speeches in the debate, it is frustrating for all those who believe in proper debate. AIDS, poverty, corruption, gender discrimination and ethnic persecution have all been the subject of major debates.

The Geneva headquarters of the IPU should consolidate its mechanisms and revise its working methods. The committee that I chaired for three years, and of which I was a member for five years, works on a shoestring budget with limited support from the wider organisation, yet the members of the secretariat who work on that committee are dedicated to their work. It is generally not known that the IPU secretariat and the secretary-general deal with a lot of cases in private. We get people out of jail, we ensure that parliamentarians can exercise their mandates and we get people out of detention. However, that takes a lot of effort by individuals, and a great number of people have come to the House of Commons—all my hon. Friends will know of such occasions—to thank members of the IPU for their efforts in getting people out of jail. The former deputy Prime Minister of Malaysia is a case in point, but we could name several others.