Examination of Witnesses (Questions 1660
- 1679)
TUESDAY 10 NOVEMBER 1998
MS ANN
GRANT and MR
CRAIG MURRAY
1660. Do you not think that it should have
at least been passed to Ms Grant or Mr Dales?
(Mr Murray) I do not think so. I was a normal
sieve for such reports going upwards and I think I was entitled
to take the view that this one did not seem particularly good.
Mr Rowlands
1661. Before we go on could you tell us
where does that come from? Where does that intelligence report
come from?
(Mr Murray) I do not think I can, I am sorry.
Obviously as an official it is very difficult to comment or give
any kind of detail about an intelligence report.
Sir John Stanley
1662. Mr Murray, could I ask you this. This
is in relation to the minute that you wrote on 30 March to both
Mr Dales and Miss Grant, following the telephone conversation
that you had with Mr Cedric Andrews of Customs and Excise. In
that minute you said that you had told Mr Andrews on the telephone
that the Foreign Office were not aware of any shipment of arms.
Could you explain to the Committee how you could have come to
minute that to Mr Dales and Miss Grant when you already had on
23 February, quite apart from any intelligence information which
you had received subsequently, the clearest possible evidence
that Sandline were in the business of arms shipments on behalf
of President Kabbah?
(Mr Murray) I think there are a couple of points.
The important thing is what I actually said to Mr Andrews, which
is that, as far as we knew, there had not been a shipment of arms
and, as far as I knew on 30 March, there had not been a shipment.
The other point which I covered with Mr Andrews in our conversation
was the question of Spicer's claim that he had told the Department
all about what was happening and what I was telling him was that
he had not told the Department about the arms.
1663. I have to put it to you—and
this was a point that, as you are well aware, the Chief Clerk
in your Department picked up as a matter of some concern—was
it not pretty disingenuous (let us put it like that) that you
were telling Customs and Excise that you were not aware of any
shipment of arms when you knew very, very well, clearly minuted,
that an arms contract was in existence between Sandline, which
was the company under investigation by Customs and Excise, and
President Kabbah?
(Mr Murray) I certainly was not disingenuous with
Customs at all. The minute was addressed within the Foreign Office
to people who knew the story. It was not addressed to people who
did not know the story of what was going on, and I am quite certain
that you would find that the Customs people at no stage found
me anything other than very open and helpful.
Chairman: Is that
a proper time to adjourn? The Committee will now meet again at
two o'clock in Room 8, so papers will have to be cleared from
this room. Thank you.
The Committee suspended from 1.08 pm to 2.03 pm
Chairman: Ms Grant,
Mr Murray, we thank you for your evidence this morning. You recall
when we concluded Sir John was in the middle of his own questioning
and I will call on Sir John now to continue.
Sir John Stanley
1664. Thank you, Chairman. Ms Grant, this
Committee is responsible for departmental administration and I
put this question to you in all seriousness, following Mr Murray's
evidence to us this morning. Can you tell us in your obviously
long experience of the Foreign Office, is it a normal practice
that a relatively junior official minutes a recall recommendation
in relation to his superior, in other words in grade, Ambassadors,
High Commissioners, and does so without even informing the individual
in question?
(Ms Grant) In my experience it is pretty unusual,
but I would not like to deal with it in grade terms, although
if you look at the Diplomatic Service hierarchy I would not best
describe Mr Murray as a junior, he is fairly senior in the policy
chain, and indeed it is our practice and policy now to push responsibility
and work down to the right level rather than always assume it
has to be dealt with by the head of department. A deputy head
of department in policy terms is a pretty key person, and if he
had concerns or doubts about the policy or any aspect of its implementation
he is quite right to—and indeed I very much welcome the
fact—minute it. It is worth noting perhaps that it was a
confidential and personal minute and designed for a very restricted
audience. I was very pleased he shared his views, had thought
them through and put them on paper so clearly. So as far as I
am concerned it was unusual but not at all out of order for Mr
Murray to minute as he did.
Chairman
1665. If I may add to Sir John's question,
you say "unusual but not out of order", are you aware
in your experience in the Foreign Service of any other occasion
where a person has made such a recommendation in respect of someone
who is in seniority terms above him?
(Ms Grant) I have had quite a bit of experience
of people having difficulties and doubts with their heads of posts
abroad—
1666. That was not the question.
(Ms Grant) I do not recall myself; I have not
been involved in anything so considered on paper. But, as I say,
I put that to Mr Murray's credit, that instead of complaining
or speaking off-the-record, as it were, he was prepared to think
through and put down his comments in the context of the policy.
Sir John Stanley
1667. Earlier this year I tabled a question
to the Foreign Secretary which he answered on 21st May at Written
Answers, Column 526, and the question which I tabled to him was
whether the UK sanctions Order implementing the United Nations
Security Council Resolution 1132 was put to a minister for approval
before it was laid before Parliament. Mr Cook replied that it
was indeed put to a minister for approval and it was put to Mr
Lloyd. Could I ask you, Ms Grant, in that submission to Mr Lloyd
was it made clear to him that the legal ambit of the UK sanctions
Order was in fact very different from the publicly stated position
of the Foreign Office up to that point as to what was the intention
behind the United Nations Security Council Resolution, in other
words that the publicly stated position of the Foreign Office
was that it was an embargo on arms to the junta but as of course
we all know the United Kingdom sanctions Order made that embargo
legally binding on all parties in Sierra Leone to the Sierra Leone
conflict? Was that made clear to Mr Lloyd in the submission?
(Ms Grant) Two points on that. As you may recall
from this morning, one of the weaknesses the Legg Report identified
in the system, and which I recalled, was not a weakness in my
department. The submission on the Order in Council did not come
from the Africa Command, it was the responsibility of the legal
advisers consulting with the United Nations Department, and they
process all Order in Councils, it is not the geographical department
that initiates this process. Indeed it was one of the Legg Report's
observations which I very much support. It was most unfortunate
we were not consulted in that process. So the submission did not
go from me, it went from the legal advisers in consultation with
the UN Department. We did get a side copy but we were not involved
in the process of recommendation. I am sorry, what was your second
point?
Sir John Stanley: I
wanted to know what was the content of the submission and, as
I expected, it did not come from your section. I would be grateful
if you could provide the Committee with a copy of that submission,
and I should be grateful if we could have it by the end of this
week please?
Chairman
1668. Are you willing to provide it?
(Ms Grant) It is really not for me to say but
I do not suppose there will be any objection.
Sir John Stanley
1669. Given the fact we have had the entire
briefing to your ministers for all their parliamentary debates
on this subject, I cannot believe there can be any difficulty
about us having the briefing in relation to this statutory instrument.
Could we now turn to the speech Mr Lloyd made in the Adjournment
Debate on 12th March? In that debate he stated in Column 841,
"We were instrumental in drawing up the UN Security Council
Resolution 1132 which imposed sanctions on the military junta."
The words he used there were exactly the words which officials
advised him to use in the draft speech which they put to Mr Lloyd
for that debate. Those words were inaccurate. Can you explain
to the Committee why inaccurate wording was put before Mr Lloyd
for that debate and, of course, that is the wording that appears
in Hansard?
(Ms Grant) I am sorry, that recalls your earlier
point, which was whether there was a difference in meaning or
scope between the Order in Council and the UN Resolution. I think
the Resolution does indeed impose sanctions on the junta; it does
not only impose sanctions on the junta. I do not think therefore
it is misleading, I think it is incomplete.
1670. I am sorry, let me make it absolutely
clear. That was not actually the point I made. The point I made,
which I hope is borne out in the transcript but I will repeat
it now so it is absolutely clear, what I said was that the publicly
stated position of the Foreign Office, not least in the press
report which the Foreign Office issued at the moment the Resolution
was passed, and the press line to take which was issued and the
press line to take which was in telegrams all round the world,
including to Mr Penfold, was in all cases that the British Government
had been instrumental in passing this Resolution which imposed
an arms ban on the junta. The point I was making was that there
was a discrepancy between that public position, which may be quite
different from the legal position, and the legal ambit of the
sanctions order, and you would recognise there is a difference
between the wording.
(Ms Grant) I think the public position of the
UK Government was at all points based upon the Resolution. In
the press statement and in making points, and as I say trying
to explain the policy elsewhere, including to the House, we focused
on its most important effect, which we hoped would be to squeeze
the junta.
Chairman: Surely it
was not a question of focusing, it was highly selective and distorting
as to the effect of that Resolution?
Sir John Stanley
1671. It was profoundly misleading, I must
put it to you; profoundly misleading. Because the legal effect
was not just imposing the arms ban on the junta, you were imposing
an arms ban on the very government, the democratic government,
which the British Government repeatedly said it wanted to see
back in control in Sierra Leone.
(Ms Grant) Indeed I think that is quite clear
from the Resolution. My understanding and my memory from the time
is that in order to impose an arms embargo on the junta, various
options were considered. The only practical one which seemed to
apply at the time to make it effective was to make the scope geographic.
I also believe that it was not actually a severe imposition on
any of the other parties to impose an arms embargo. I very much
agree with Mr Murray, lack of arms was not the problem in restoring
President Kabbah's Government. The problem was the nature and
the way in which forces could be used to assist them, which had
to be in the context of a Security Council Resolution.
1672. Would you not agree, Ms Grant, it
would have been much better if officials had accurately briefed
Mr Lloyd on what to say on this point in the debate? The wording
of his speech, surely, should have been that the Government through
the Order had imposed an arms embargo on all parties to the Sierra
Leone conflict. Should that not have been the briefing for Mr
Lloyd?
(Ms Grant) I think there are two questions. Mr
Lloyd, I think, was quite clear about the terms and scope of the
Resolution—
1673. But Parliament was not.
(Ms Grant) I have seen nothing to indicate that
he was not. What we were doing during the course of his speech,
as I say which was designed to explain our policy towards Sierra
Leone, was to account for the effect of the Resolution as far
as the junta was concerned. As you say, it is different from reading
out the legal position, a press statement is different from reading
out the legal position, but I think there was no doubt to anyone
reading the Resolution what the scope of it was. All our statements
were based on that Resolution.
Chairman
1674. It was not surely so clear, because
the legal advisers to the Secretary General have said that the
mischief in that was the junta and in their judgment it did not
apply to ECOMOG and ECOWAS. So if it confuses the legal advisers
to the UN, it is not quite as crystal clear as you suggest.
(Ms Grant) I think the only dispute as far as
I recall the legal advisers at the UN had, was whether or not
there was any exemption for ECOMOG or ECOWAS. I do not think they
were ever in any doubt that it covered everyone else.
1675. Why did you not ever say so, or ministers
through you?
(Ms Grant) In response to what, I am sorry?
1676. When opportunities arose, either in
the press line or in statements to the House.
(Ms Grant) Because the thrust of our policy was
the restoration of President Kabbah's Government and the squeeze
on the junta which had displaced him. That was the focus of our
briefing and our policy statement.
1677. There is no doubt about that, but
why did you not say that the Order in Council has the effect of
barring arms to all parties in Sierra Leone?
(Ms Grant) Because that did not seem as central
to our policy as the need to remove the junta and return President
Kabbah.
Sir John Stanley
1678. There is a suspicion—and it
is not just my suspicion, it is reflected in the Legg Report,
and you know the paragraph as well as I do—that officials
took a deliberate view to produce what was a very imperfect representation
of the effect of the sanctions Order in order not to encounter
any difficulty suggesting that there may not be a ban on arms
supplies to the Nigerian forces, because of the Nigerian dimension,
and also because they did not want to expose the fact we actually
had put an arms ban on the very government that had democratic
credentials that we were trying to restore. Was there an argument
of political convenience behind the press line that was rigorously
adhered to right from the moment the United Nations Security Council
Resolution was published?
(Ms Grant) That was never part of my thinking.
As I say, I had no problems about preventing the supply of arms
even to President Kabbah. I did not think it would damage or disadvantage
him in any way, so there was no offsetting political convenience
there. I realised that the whole question of use of force by Nigerians
would have to be tackled in a subsequent resolution anyway.
Chairman
1679. Because?
(Ms Grant) It was never part of my thinking that
we should be somehow doctoring the terms of the Resolution. As
I say, I would not have expected any of my colleagues around the
world to rely on a press statement when a Resolution was available,
I think the press statement is designed to highlight key points
that we want to make and not to repeat a legal document.
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