Examination of Witnesses (Questions 93-99)
2 DECEMBER 2003
RT HON
JACK STRAW
MP, MR JOHN
SAWERS AND
MR EDWARD
OAKDEN
Chairman: Foreign Secretary, we would
like to focus in our questions to you on the war on terrorism
and al-Qaeda. Since our last meeting we have had a terrorist outrage
on our Consulate General in Istanbul and on that I have written
to give the condolences of the Committee to our Ambassador in
Turkey. Sir John?
Q93 Sir John Stanley: Can I say at the
outset that I, and I am sure the rest of the Committee, appreciated
greatly the fact that you were able to make a very quick flight
to Turkey and Istanbul. I am sure that that was hugely valued
by the British community in Turkey and obviously most particularly
by Embassy staff and those who have suffered bereavement. Could
I start by asking you again the question which I put to you on
the floor of the House last week which is whether, following the
synagogue bombings the previous Saturday, requests were made by
the British Embassy in Ankara and/or the Consulate General in
Istanbul for additional security measures for the Consulate General
in Istanbul?
Mr Straw: The answer to that is,
in the light of each security problem that was faced in Istanbul,
security was reviewed and measures taken to enhance it in what
was thought to be an appropriate manner, and that was certainly
the case in the light of the bombings of the synagogues five days
before. A lot of work had been put into the safety and security
of our staff and it is a great sadness that that, in the event,
was not sufficient to protect quite a number of them against this
terrible outrage.
Q94 Sir John Stanley: Can you, therefore,
against what you have just answered the Committee give us any
explanation as to why members of staff and the Consul General
himself were working in unprotected temporary office accommodation
at the front of the building just a matter of days after the synagogue
outrages took place, and clearly pointed to the fact that there
was an active al-Qaeda terrorist cell in operation in Istanbul?
Mr Straw: The answer to that is,
first of all, Pera House—and I think you may have been to
Istanbul—which is the main part of the compound suffered
a fire three years ago and was basically being rebuilt so only
a few staff could be housed in Pera House so there was an issue
of where they should be housed instead. A judgment was made, which
I think was the right one, that they would be better housed in
the compound, albeit on the perimeter, than outside the compound
and accommodation had to be found for them. Now, as I saw myself,
the buildings were less well protected than, by definition, was
the building in the middle but what one has to do in all these
situations is make the best judgments one can prospectively. As
we found in Northern Ireland, and you will recall, you can take
the best precautions that you think are available and with the
greatest possible application of a duty of care and still find
that the terrorists have discovered a way through that, and it
does not mean there is any fault necessarily on your side or by
your staff: it means you are dealing with people even more evil
and devious than you thought and, although the review of the security
measures continues, that is a conclusion we will come to.
Q95 Sir John Stanley: Could you comment
on this which has appeared: namely, that a view taken in a very
selfless way within the Consulate General was that Turkish pressure
to erect serious road blocks in the vicinity of the Consulate
General should not immediately be accepted in the interests of
safeguarding Turkish businesses in the adjacent area?
Mr Straw: I have not seen that,
and am not aware of that suggestion at all. Could I just say more
generally, however, that I am very grateful, Sir John, for what
you said about my visit. I thought it right to visit straight
away and, as I have explained in a more detailed letter which
I have sent to you, Mr Chairman, I took with me I think about
18 members of the Foreign Office staff as part of this rapid deployment
team, and an equivalent number of people from New Scotland Yard
and other agencies, and I think it does indicate some robustness
of the new contingency plans that, within two hours of the news
coming through we had arranged for a large enough aeroplane to
take us all there and we were there by the early evening that
day. I also am grateful to all of you for the tribute you made
in respect of Roger Short, the Consulate General and all his staff,
because he was a very fine diplomat and public servant and expert
on Turkey.
Q96 Sir John Stanley: Could you clarify
this very important operational policy point? Is it the position
of the Foreign Office that the responsibility for taking security
measures beyond the boundaries of a Consulate General or an Embassy
lies with the host country and, where the host country wants to
impose certain protective measures, they should be absolutely
free to do so, or do we take a view that that is a decision in
which we should be involved as well?
Mr Straw: Well, the formal legal
responsibility is plainly that of the host country. It is under
the Vienna Convention and there is no dubiety about that, just
as we are responsible in London for the security of all the diplomatic
posts in London, as it were, beyond their front doors. There is
no question about that at all. It is best done in co-operation
with the post concerned, and far from having any complaints I
have a great deal of gratitude to the Turkish authorities for
the co-operation we have received over the years, and not least
since the bombing.
Q97 Sir John Stanley: In your letter
to the Chairman to which you referred, your letter of November
26[2]
you referred to the involvement of FCO security experts in reviewing
premises which are particularly vulnerable. Could I ask you this,
against the background of a similar situation which we faced in
the early 80s when we had suicide truck bombers directing themselves
against buildings occupied by military personnel, and I am referring
particularly to the situation in Beirut, where on that occasion
we found it necessary under the direction of the then Prime Minister
to involve very senior and expert people inside the Ministry of
Defence to give proper advice as to what it took to resist a determined
suicide truck bomber: against that background, Foreign Secretary,
are you considering utilising Ministry of Defence appropriate
personnel in the review you are undertaking?
Mr Straw: Just allow me to say
this, that we use expertise from all the agencies apart from the
Foreign Office, which obviously includes the Security Service
and may include military personnel as appropriate. We try to avoid
giving any details about who these people are in public but we
pick up expertise from anywhere that is appropriate, and obviously
those two departments have a great deal of expertise.
Sir John Stanley: Thank you. I think
there are probably additional questions we want to put to you
in writing but I am grateful for the answers you have given.
Chairman: Two of the members of the Committee
were at the Consulate meeting the late Mr Short shortly before
the outrage, so I would like to call on Mr Hamilton and Mr Chidgey
to make any further comments.
Q98 Mr Hamilton: Let me just add to what
Sir John has said in thanks for the very swift reaction you and
the Foreign Office took. When we read about outrages like this
in the press or on television we are always shocked, but it is
even more shocking when just days earlier one was with one of
the people who was murdered as a result, and I think myself and
David Chidgey have written separately to Mrs Short. One of the
things we discovered when we were there on 6 November looking
at visas and entry clearance, Istanbul having been one of our
busiest posts in the world, I think, was that a small explosive
device had been used against the front door of the visa section
which is a public entrance on the main street. Press reports,
however, have made it out to be—and I assuming they are
talking about the same attack—a precursor to this, and I
am wondering whether you can perhaps put the record straight.
Our understanding was that this was no more than a huge firework
that blew the door off and was as a result of somebody who was
a bit irritated at not getting a visa. Is that underplaying it
or not?
Mr Oakden: Such evidence as we
have points to the April attack, the one you have just referred
to, as having been perpetrated by a local extremist group but
without further connections, and specifically not a connection
to al-Qaeda and specifically different from the IBDA-C local group
that, with AQ, seems to have claimed responsibility for, and we
think with some justification, the attack two weeks ago.
Q99 Mr Hamilton: So it was perfectly
reasonable to regard that as a one-off incident and not a precursor
of what subsequently happened in November?
Mr Oakden: I think so, yes.
2 Ev. 59. Back
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