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War Children
6. Dr. Doug Naysmith (Bristol, North-West): What measures her Department is taking to protect children's rights in areas affected by war. [82952]
The Secretary of State for International Development (Clare Short): We are working with the United Nations Secretary-General's special representative for children and armed conflict, key United Nations agencies and the International Committee of the Red Cross to protect the rights of children affected by armed conflict. The important task now is to get beyond general declarations of good intent and to take practical measures better to protect children affected by war, especially child soldiers and abducted children.
Dr. Naysmith: Does my right hon. Friend agree that international pressure should be brought to bear on Governments who employ child soldiers; and that that pressure may usefully come from other Governments, NGOs and Churches?
Clare Short: I agree very much. However, in the list of countries that have child soldiers, which includes Angola, Afghanistan and Sudan, we see some of the most
intractable conflicts in the world, so we have to get more specific and unite in putting pressure on individual Governments. I invite my hon. Friend and the House to put pressure on the Government of Sudan over their disgraceful support for the Lord's Resistance Army, which captures and abducts children from northern Uganda: the girls are abused sexually and the boys are forced to kill members of their own families. The Government of Sudan should be denounced by every decent person in the world--they must stop supporting the Lord's Resistance Army and return every one of those children to their families.
Mrs. Cheryl Gillan (Chesham and Amersham): I do not know whether, in her busy day, the Secretary of State has had time to look at the UNHCR website, where it was reported this morning that children were arriving in Albania with gunshot wounds. There is increasing concern about the Albanian families--about 500,000 of them--who remain in Kosovo, but have been displaced from their homes and are desperate for supplies. In the United States, Julia Taft has announced that from about 27 May, the US is to start air drops, having overcome the Pentagon's objections. However, Bill Frelick of the US Committee for Refugees has said that
- "Air drops indicate the level of desperation we're in".
Clare Short: I had not heard about children with gunshot wounds, but I shall make inquiries. We are extremely worried about displaced families in Kosovo, and we and others have been doing all in our power to get information about their condition: for example, we monitor carefully the state of refugees coming across the border, because that tells us something about levels of nutrition and so on. We have considered the use of air drops from the beginning, but they can be disastrous: for example, when they were tried in northern Iraq we learned that they sometimes kill people, feed aggressor forces or cause people to come out of hiding with the result that they are shot and killed. We do not judge that air drops should be used now, but we are monitoring the situation carefully. Refugees coming over the border are still in relatively good shape, but we are worried and we are watching very closely indeed. The real answer is to defeat Serb aggression, get the refugees home and get humanitarian help into Kosovo.
Refugees and Asylum Seekers
7. Mr. Andrew George (St. Ives): If she will make a statement on her Department's support for refugees and asylum seekers. [82954]
The Secretary of State for International Development (Clare Short): There are now some 22 million refugees in the world, which is the greatest number ever recorded. My Department provides support to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees and to non-governmental organisations to help refugees across the world. Of course, the Home Office is responsible for refugees and asylum seekers in the United Kingdom.
Mr. George: In the light of the recent atrocities in Kosovo, does the right hon. Lady agree that beside the inevitability of armchair generals having the benefit of hindsight, there is an opportunity to reap the benefit of foresight by recognising the problems created for her Department by the Immigration and Asylum Bill? Following her work with the UNHCR, which has been critical of that Bill, what representations has she made to her right hon. Friend the Home Secretary?
Clare Short: I gently suggest that the hon. Gentleman is asking that question of the wrong Department. The previous Government took an exemption--that is not the correct word, but the hon. Gentleman will know what I mean--on the convention on the rights of the child in relation to child refugees. The UNHCR has written to me about the matter, and I have written to the Home Secretary. The hon. Gentleman might wish to follow up the issue with him.
Fiona Mactaggart (Slough): The Secretary of State knows that the vast majority of the 22 million refugees to whom she referred are in the poorest countries of the world. What can the richer countries do to support those refugees and prevent the sorts of crises that create refugees?
Clare Short: My hon. Friend is absolutely correct. I visited Tanzania briefly last week. It is one of the poorest countries in the world and is hosting 330,000 refugees--which is more than in Macedonia--who are mostly from Burundi. Our task is twofold: first, we must help the poorest countries to develop; and, secondly and more important, we must prevent and resolve conflicts so that refugees may return home--which is the overwhelming wish of all refugees.
Mr. Andrew Rowe (Faversham and Mid-Kent): One of the most distressing features of our short visit to Albania and Macedonia was meeting refugees who had sponsors to take them to Germany, the United Kingdom or elsewhere, but were unable to take up those offers because they did not have sufficient identification. Is the Secretary of State prepared to throw her weight against the UNHCR's incompetence and ensure that, when refugees have no papers, they speedily receive sufficient identification so that those who wish to befriend them can take them home?
Clare Short: The hon. Gentleman makes a very important point. Apart from killing, raping and displacing people, the Serbian aggressors in Kosovo have destroyed passports and records of birth and death in an attempt to obliterate the record of a people and thus take away their identity. It is the duty of the UNHCR to record every refugee and to supply documentation. I am afraid that that process has been slow, but there is now a concerted international effort in that regard. A new computer program--let us hope it works--aims to give people the identity documents that they will need in order to exercise their right to travel to other countries and be reunited with family members.
Rev. Martin Smyth (Belfast, South): One recognises the Secretary of State's concern about refugees worldwide and one is also aware of the pressure to remove many refugees from northern Macedonia. Is it not possible to allow those refugees who have been in Albania for five weeks and have friends in the United Kingdom with refugee status to come to this country much sooner so that other refugees in Albania may move south?
Clare Short: There are more than 800,000 refugees in Albania and Macedonia, and large numbers are crossing the border into Albania every day. The Macedonian border has been closed. I appeal to the hon. Gentleman, to the House and to the community at large not to suggest that somehow bringing a small number of refugees to Britain will solve the problem. We must care for people in the region, although those with medical or other special needs, or with family members in other countries, may be cared for elsewhere. If we do not follow that course, we will be doing Milosevic's work for him: he would love to see the refugees dispersed across the world. It has taken time to gear up the number of flights into Britain, but they are now increasing and there will be more under the criteria that I have outlined.
Regional Development Banks
8. Mrs. Christine Butler (Castle Point): What actions she is taking to increase the focus on poverty of the work of regional development banks. [82955]
The Secretary of State for International Development (Clare Short): Since May 1997, we have been working to persuade all the regional development banks that poverty eradication must be their overarching objective. I am very pleased that the new president of the Asian development bank is refocusing the bank's attention on poverty eradication, and the African development bank has also given new emphasis to its poverty focus. My hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State, who is currently attending the annual meeting of the Caribbean development bank, will emphasise the same message.
Mrs. Butler: What steps is the Department taking to encourage further collaboration between the regional agencies and the international financial institutions to reduce poverty?
Clare Short: As I said earlier, there are so many actors in the field of development--the United Nations agencies, bilateral donors, the regional development banks and the World bank--that there is a danger of reinventing the wheel and funding separate projects instead of working on a coherent proposal to strengthen government and economic management and achieve the kind of economic growth and social policy improvements that will lead to sustainable benefits in the lives of the poor. We are working very hard to achieve more international collaboration on international development targets, and the regional banks need to change to achieve that.
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