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Mr. John Wilkinson (Ruislip-Northwood): I thank my hon. Friend for his judicious and reassuring statement. He has forgotten none of the lessons of his formative military years, that time spent in reconnaissance is never wasted. Can he reassure the House that there will be no diminution of the Royal Air Force's aerial reconnaissance capability, which is so important in this emergency, because it enables us to assess need over huge areas of ground and extremities of range? On the logistics of the emergency, can he tell us whether the Government comprehend the RAF's requirement for a heavy lift capability, such as the C17 aircraft, which can carry huge amounts of kit at rapid speeds to any emergency hot spot around the globe?

Mr. Soames: I am grateful to my hon. Friend for what he said. He is right about the age-old adage in volume 1 of "Staff Duties in the Field", which tells us that time spent on reconnaissance is never wasted: that is critical.

I can confirm that deployment of the Canberra PR9 will not affect the Royal Air Force's reconnaissance efforts elsewhere. As for heavy lift, my hon. Friend is right in saying that it remains an important question for the joint rapid deployment force. I shall draw what he has said to the attention of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State, and I hope that he will continue to raise that serious and important issue.

Mr. Mike Gapes (Ilford, South): The Minister referred to the situation around the south of Lake Kivu. Will he confirm that there are refugees there who have come from Burundi? Will he also confirm that the crisis has led to the displacement of many thousands of Zaireans? Although it is welcome that hundreds of thousands of people have returned to Rwanda, the geography and the complexities are such that there is still a crisis affecting hundreds of thousands of people. The problem has not been solved yet.

Will the Minister also confirm that some of the £10 million of aid that has been announced will be used to assist long-term reconstruction in Rwanda, allowing the possibility of stability, democracy and respect for human rights?

Mr. Soames: I entirely agree with the hon. Gentleman that the crisis is not over yet. He is right to point out that, around Lake Kivu and in the south, there remain possibly a vast number of refugees of whose exact whereabouts and condition we know little. We need to establish those facts. The hon. Gentleman is also right in saying that there are people from Burundi there: that complicates the matter further.

As for the £10 million of aid money, and the hon. Gentleman's desire for it to be deployed in reconstruction, that is a matter for my noble Friend the Minister for Overseas Development. I agree, however, that

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reconstruction, and stability for the people of Rwanda, will be a great prize for those people, and--we hope--will prevent further trouble of this kind.

Mr. Bill Walker (North Tayside): My hon. Friend and his colleagues at the Ministry of Defence are to be congratulated on the way in which they have handled the problem. It is true that the ability of fixed-wing aircraft to be deployed for intelligence gathering and reconnaissance is a vital part of any operation; it is also true that command and control is a vital part of any operation. Many will advise my hon. Friend to encourage African nations to become much more involved, and we welcome their involvement, but what we must never do is commit United Kingdom troops when we are not satisfied that command and control has the experience and expertise to do the job properly.

Mr. Soames: My hon. Friend is right about the importance of photo-reconnaissance. The Canberra PR9 in particular has proved extraordinarily valuable, and has served us for many years. I also endorse his views on command and control. Any follow-on force along the lines that we originally considered would, we hope, largely consist of a number of African nations that have themselves volunteered to take part. We would never involve our own forces--even if we take the point made by the right hon. Member for Tweeddale, Ettrick and Lauderdale (Sir D. Steel) about waiting until it is too late--unless we were absolutely satisfied about command and control.

Mr. Robert N. Wareing (Liverpool, West Derby): I fully support what is now being proposed in regard to humanitarian assistance, but is there not a moral in all this for future defence and foreign policy? On 15 January, in two replies to questions from me, the Minister said that, between 1991 and 1995, this country had provided military assistance for the armies of Rwanda and Zaire. Does that not demonstrate that we should be rather more constrained in choosing the regimes that we provide with training and, in particular, arms?

Mr. Soames: I think that the hon. Gentleman is confused, in his penetrating questioning of me, as between United Nations assistance in Rwanda and assistance elsewhere, but on the more general point, clearly, I agree with him. We are extremely careful and cautious about where we provide military training. British military training teams in South Africa and elsewhere have done a great deal. The House will wish to pay tribute to the work, for example, of the British military training team in South Africa. The team has done so much to help to assimilate all parts of the South African army. On the more general point outside Zaire and Rwanda, I accept what the hon. Gentleman says. We need to be extraordinarily cautious, and we are.

Mr. Jacques Arnold (Gravesham): Bearing in mind the fact that British forces had no operational experience in any of those three countries during colonial times or

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since, can we nevertheless be wary of taking advice from the French, who have such experience, but who have such a colourful and partisan record in those countries?

Mr. Soames: I know that my hon. Friend is seeking to be helpful, but British forces have been engaged in both Rwanda and Angola within the past 18 months.

Mr. D. N. Campbell-Savours (Workington): What is the Government's estimate of the total number of Hutu refugees still in Zaire? What are the Government going to do about a British arms trading company that supplied arms to the region, which was clearly a major component in the strife that is taking place and which may have been in default of UK legislation?

Mr. Soames: The hon. Gentleman asked me first about the number of Hutus remaining. The answer is that we simply do not know. That is one of the reasons why we need to have further and better particulars before we become more heavily engaged.

As to the second point, as the hon. Gentleman knows, the Government have been extremely concerned to learn of allegations that UK companies might have been involved in the supply of arms to Rwandan extremists. The Government have well-established and strict procedures to ensure that any UK arms exports are both responsible and legitimate. There is no allegation that the arms have been exported from the UK, but Her Majesty's Customs and Excise is urgently investigating the matter to establish whether any offence has been committed under UK law.

Mr. Hugh Bayley (York): May I return to the point that I put to the Secretary of State for Defence last Thursday, which follows on from the question that the Minister has just answered? Does he agree that the long-term peace and stability of a region depends on getting arms out of the hands of militias, and that, both in the UK and internationally, further work is needed to identify the sources of those arms and to ensure that those sources are stopped off?

Mr. Soames: As the hon. Gentleman knows, the reasons for the instability in the region go much more widely than the narrow point that he raised. Plainly, as I said, we have strict rules on arms sales. As to the general and wider point of arms sales to irresponsible countries, plainly, everyone would share the hon. Gentleman's view that that is undesirable. He needs to consider more points than just arms sales as the reason for instability between Zaire and Rwanda.

Points of Order

4.3 pm

Sir Terence Higgins (Worthing): On a point of order, Madam Speaker. May I draw to your attention the front page and page 2 of The Guardian today, where there appears a report that purports to record what has taken place in the Select Committee on Standards and Privileges? The best way of handling this may be for the Select Committees concerned to deal with it in the usual way and undertake a leak inquiry. None the less, the matter is obviously of considerable importance and, although fortunately there have been few leaks from Select Committees recently, any leak casts into doubt the integrity of the Select Committee system, especially perhaps in relation to that particular Select Committee. Therefore, Madam Speaker, I should be grateful if you will consider whether other action might appropriately be taken.

Madam Speaker: If there has been a leak, I deprecate it most strongly. As the right hon. Gentleman is aware--he has made the point himself--it is, first, for the Committee itself to look into the matter when there appears to have been unauthorised publication of its proceedings. Once the facts are established, the Committee may make proposals for further action. I am sure that, as a result of his point of order, the Committee will look into the matter, but I shall take considerable interest in its activities on it.

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