Examination of Witnesses (Questions 100
- 119)
WEDNESDAY 23 MAY 2007
LORD TRIESMAN
OF TOTTENHAM
AND NEIL
CROMPTON
Q100 Ms Stuart: Can we begin by looking
at the way Her Majesty's Government conducted themselves with
the Security Council? Traditionally, we are conciliatory, we negotiate
and we play a long game, but on this occasion, it appeared that
the Prime Minister called on 27 March for a "different phase".
Subsequently, there were reports in the press that suggested that
Foreign Office officials felt that they were being "bumped
into" an aggressive stance and that we ended up going to
the Security Council far too early, particularly given that the
resolution that we secured in the end was fairly mild mannered
and therefore a tactical mistake with hindsight. The question
is twofold. Was the Foreign Office uneasy at, or driven by, a
push from No. 10 which was not in keeping with its initial instinct?
And, with hindsight, should we probably not have gone to the Security
Council at that stage?
Lord Triesman: If I can put it
in a tiny bit of context, it will be easier to answer your question
precisely. We started off by trying to persuade the Iranians that
we had precise and accurate co-ordinates that were achieved by
good scientific method, which placed the sailors 1.7 nautical
miles in Iraqi waters. As you will know, they responded by coming
in with a completely different set of co-ordinates, but which
also, when we plotted them, put the sailors in Iraqi waters. They
were clearly very surprised when I told them that, and they later
came back with a further set of co-ordinates that placed the sailors
in Iranian waters.
The reason why I mention that is because, during
the first phase, we tried on a bilateral basis to say, "These
kinds of mistakes can happen. Everybody can climb back down the
ladder on the basis that there is a misunderstanding." I
am utterly confident about our co-ordinates, but there is no doubt
that the military inquiry will confirm those points. However,
we thought that at that first stage, there was a real prospect
that we could deal with the issues in a way that allowed everybody
to save face, and without having an unnecessarily protracted international
dispute. By the time they came back with their second set of co-ordinates,
we concluded that they were not willing to do that.
Through a process that went on the entire time
at Cobra, with a meeting every day to work and refine what we
thought we should do next, we all came to the conclusion—I
emphasise that we all came to the conclusion—that it was
imperative to exert international pressure, because we were not
getting anywhere on a straightforward bilateral track. I think
it was a very significant and correct step to take, because from
then on, there was consistent international pressure, which produced
much more flexibility in the dialogue. I do not think it was a
mistake to do it; it would have been extremely hard to have a
good sound negotiation at that stage if we had not done it.
Q101 Ms Stuart: My colleagues will
come back to the issue of co-ordinates. Are you still firm that
you did not simply move from the bilateral to the international?
Was it right to go straight to the Security Council once that
that bilateral basis ceased?
Lord Triesman: We concluded that
we needed significant support from the states in the Gulf, the
Arab League and from people who have not traditionally been as
close to us as we might desire. We needed to do that through international
forums as well as bilateral discussions. The Foreign Secretary
had many such discussions with her opposite numbers in the states
to which I referred. We needed to explode the myth that our sailors
and marines were in Iranian waters for as long as that contention
was being made in public in world forums. That meant going to
the UN and the EU.
In reaching that conclusion, we took a flexible
position. Our position was sufficiently flexible so that when
we got back to the point at which it was possible to have a serious
bilateral discussion, we were able to do so. It was not that we
embarked on a different course that we could then never get off.
The position was constructed to give us the optimum amount of
space for discussion at any stage.
Q102 Mr. Illsley: To expand on what
you said, Lord Triesman, would you refute the Guardian
report that said that the FCO was "bumped into an early escalation
by a gung-ho prime minister"?
Lord Triesman: I can assure the
Committee that that is not what happened. I cannot recall a dissenting
view in the Cobra discussions between anyone there, on any of
the issues I described, and certainly not from the FCO. I mentioned
the FCO, but the same goes for everyone.
Q103 Mr. Illsley: So there was co-ordination
across the whole of the Government on what you were doing even
prior to the Prime Minister's statement?
Lord Triesman: Yes. That is absolutely
right.
Q104 Mr. Illsley: Is there no need
to review anything that happened in that period in terms of Government
co-ordination in the event of any such future incidents?
Lord Triesman: As colleagues here
will appreciate, I have only limited experience of the operation
of Cobra, but that episode was an example of Cobra at work, and
I can say that it was extremely focused, unified and clear about
the tactical approach. It dealt with the alternatives—after
all, there is always more than one possible tactic. It evaluated
the alternatives and everybody lived with the conclusions, which
was, I think, very helpful.
Q105 Mr. Heathcoat-Amory: Our hostages
started to co-operate with the Iranians very quickly, whether
owing to a lack of training or to other factors about which we
do not yet know. Obviously, that was a big factor for you to consider.
What contact did you have with the Ministry of Defence on the
matter in order to anticipate the behaviour of our personnel?
Lord Triesman: The Ministry of
Defence was represented in all of the Cobra meetings. It is in
a position to make the assessment about the training and preparedness
for such events, which I have no doubt it will put before Sir
Rob Fulton. I am no specialist on commenting on the training of
military personnel.
It was my expectation and that of those who
advised me that the Iranians would probably put our people on
television, probably having put them under duress, because of
what had happened on a past occasion. If anything was to be read
or learned from the past, it was that such actions were certainly
a strong possibility. From my earliest discussions with the Iranian
ambassador, I made it clear that we would find such a step intolerable;
that the parading of our people would be intolerable. I recall
that, in 2004, the Iranians paraded people blindfolded in the
most demeaning circumstances.
The Iranians' explanation this time was that
they wanted the families to see their daughter and sons, to feel
confident that they looked in good health and that they were being
well looked after. I can tell the Committee that I responded in
turn. I regarded it as an outrageous step and an outrageous pressure
on the families, not as a reassurance.
Q106 Mr. Heathcoat-Amory: So you
anticipated the behaviour of the hostages and the fact that they,
including two officers, ended up virtually apologising to the
Iranians? You factored that into your calculations? It has obviously
handed an enormous propaganda coup to the Iranians, who now portray
the whole of our armed services as completely pathetic. Did you
anticipate that and do anything to counter it?
Lord Triesman: There was nothing
that I could do in my discussions with the Iranian ambassador
or the discussions that Geoffrey Adams, the ambassador, had in
Tehran with the foreign ministry there. It is very difficult to
know what people will do, other than that they will be put under
significant pressure. Their own account of it, as you will know,
is that they tried to use very ambiguous turns of phrase and so
on. I suppose that people will judge whether that was successful
in giving their account of what happened. From a personal point
of view, I was not in much doubt that they would be put under
significant pressure. I think that it is very hard to know how
people will deal with that kind of pressure if you are not in
their circumstances.
Q107 Mr. Heathcoat-Amory: Have you
put reforms in train or urged your Ministry of Defence colleagues
to try to prevent that from happening again, so that people are
properly trained for a similar event if it should recur? We are
still in action in that part of the world. Future hostage-taking
is not only possible but, in my view, quite probable.
Lord Triesman: Sir Rob Fulton
is looking at the whole of that—I do not answer in that
way to avoid your question. It is not within my area of knowledge
what training had been provided, whether it was adequate and what
needs to be done in future, but I will be as attentive to the
findings of that part of the investigative process that this country
must go through as anybody else. If there is something that the
FCO can add to it, I will certainly wish to do so.
Chairman: We now come to some issues
relating to the Shatt al-Arab waterway.
Q108 Andrew Mackinlay: Minister,
there are two sets of co-ordinates, which I shall put aside for
a moment—the United Kingdom's co-ordinates and the Iranian
Government's. As I understand those days, the United Kingdom Government
were resolute on one thing—namely, that our service personnel
were in indisputably and internationally recognised Iraqi waters.
I put it to you that that is not true—that they were in
waters recognised by us but not indisputably internationally recognised
as Iraqi. The Russian Federation and some others close to the
Security Council took a different view, saying that it was a grey
area.
Is it not a fact that we overstated our case
there and, as often happens with waterways around the world, that
ownership of those waters was a grey area even long before the
existing regime? There is a fudge. Often it does not matter, because
the waterways are not disputed, but is it not the case that the
waters in which our service personnel were found were disputed,
even using United Kingdom co-ordinates? What say you?
Lord Triesman: I do not think
that they were disputed, in two senses. First, I have made the
point that I am very confident about the co-ordinates with which
we were provided and the basis for obtaining those co-ordinates.
As I have said, rather than two, there were three sets of co-ordinates
at play, because the—
Q109 Andrew Mackinlay: Take any one
of three, or all three; my question still stands.
Lord Triesman: The Iranians did
not dispute, for the time being and at the time, what the international
barrier at sea was between Iraqi and Iranian waters in the upper
Persian Gulf. There is a process by which that is agreed, because
it is true that sand banks and other physical entities move in
those waters. When it is thought that those movements have been
significant, there is an international mechanism by which people
can address that question and ask whether the international boundary
needs to change to reflect it. I can tell you that Iran did not
at any stage raise any question about where the border was. It
was absolutely confident, as we were, that we knew at that point
where the border was.
Q110 Andrew Mackinlay: Why did the
Russian Federation and other people on the Security Council baulk
at, or hesitate to support, the United Kingdom's very definite
view that these were indisputably internationally recognised waters?
Lord Triesman: I want to choose
these words very carefully, but the propensity of the Russian
Federation to disagree with a number of things that I would regard
as self-evidently right seems to me to increase in the Security
Council by the day.
Q111 Andrew Mackinlay: The French?
Lord Triesman: I do not believe
the French satellite readings were any different from ours, nor
do I believe they had a fundamental difference of any kind about
where the border was.
Q112 Andrew Mackinlay: But the Security
Council did not support us in our definitive statement that these
were indisputably internationally recognised Iraqi waters, did
they? There was doubt in the international community.
Lord Triesman: I do not think
there was a great deal of discussion about that particular proposition.
I do not know whether Neil has anything to add to that, but the
bulk of the discussion was about the extent to which the international
community should intervene to help us to secure the release of
the sailors. There was not a great deal of technical exchange
on that question. Some may have had it in their minds but it never
emerged as an issue and, most significantly for me, was the fact
that the Iranians themselves had no question at all about where
the border was at that time.
Q113 Mr. Keetch: Lord Triesman, this
is not the first time that a Royal Navy boat has been captured
in that stretch of waterway by Iranian Revolutionary Guards. To
lose one set of sailors might be unfortunate; to lose two might
be regarded as careless. Why is it that the rules of engagement,
which are drawn up by the Ministry of Defence in conjunction with
the Foreign Office, did not assume that there might be an attempt
to repeat what had happened a few years earlier? Undoubtedly it
has provided for the Iranians, some would suggest, something of
a propaganda coup. Why did we allow this to happen a second time?
Lord Triesman: Without trying
to trespass on what Sir Robert will investigate and say in his
report, which I think it will go into that kind of issue in some
detail, I can tell the Committee that when we talked with senior
military personnel at each stage during the Cobra exercise they
repeated their confidence in the rules of engagement that they
had. Obviously one must feel satisfied that one is dealing with
these things properly, but something that it is quite hard not
to accept is the serious advice of the senior military personnel
about the quality of the rules of engagement and how they interpret
them.
It is obviously possible that Sir Robert will
reach whatever conclusion he reaches on those things. It must
be a matter of disappointment that this event happened twice,
but there is no doubt in my mind that it represented an incursion
into Iraqi waters by Iranians from the Revolutionary Guards part
of their naval force, undertaken at speed. Plainly our response
was not rapid enough to ensure that those sailors and marines
were kept on our side of affairs, if I can put it that way.
Q114 Mr. Keetch: We do not have Sir
Robert Fulton in front of us. Indeed, he is looking at the military
aspects, and I want to concentrate on the diplomatic aspects.
Is it true that there was a warning or a threat issued some weeks
before this incident by Revolutionary Guards in the south of Iran
that they wanted to capture blond British sailors? Was that recognised
at the time?
Neil Crompton: The threat I am
aware of was not made particularly in that context; it was made
by someone affiliated to a Revolutionary Guards organisation,
and it was made as a response to the American operations against
Revolutionary Guards personnel in January this year. Certainly
I do not recall any specific reference to Britain.
Q115 Mr. Keetch: So there was no
specific threat to capture blond British sailors; there was a
threat to try to capture somebody in that area by the Iranians?
Neil Crompton: I do not think
the threat to which you refer was made by an Iranian Government
representative. It appeared on one of the many websites that one
sees in Iran that are affiliated to different factions, some of
which have connections with the Government, while some do not.
Q116 Mr. Keetch: I am not saying
that it was made by the Iranian Government or the President of
Iran, but we all know that the Iranian Revolutionary Guard does
not always act under instructions. Indeed, in the previous incident
when the sailors were taken originally, there was some dispute
at the time about whether that action had been sanctioned by the
Iranian Government. I want to be quite clear. There was a threat
around the time that somebody associated with the Iranian Revolutionary
Guard wanted to capture—if not "blond British sailors"—somebody.
Lord Triesman: I paused because
I wanted to be certain in my mind about the nature of the threats
that were around and not to make any misleading comment about
it. It was my understanding that it was one of the things that
had appeared on one of the multiple websites. If we look at all
of the websites that are available, I suspect that we would find
all sorts of things and threats. I do not draw the conclusion
from that that the threats are not serious. On the contrary, I
take all such threats very seriously. It means that there must
be real caution when operating in the upper Persian Gulf.
Q117 Mr. Keetch: Given what happened
in the first incident, presumably the advice of the Foreign Office
about the rules of engagement would have been to the Ministry
of Defence that the threat of British sailors being captured again
was a real threat and that its operations should take into account
that threat.
Lord Triesman: I agree with you.
My understanding of the rules of engagement was that they were
designed to deal with such threats and that it was believed that
they would be adequate for those purposes, not least because the
thalweg—the navigable channel—and how it moves makes
it important to be accurate on facts and accurate on response.
One of the significant things that came out of the process of
discussion with the Iranians was that wherever anybody felt anyone
was, there was no mechanism in place for people to alert each
other to what they might regard as a serious problem—something
that you would do if you were trying to take the heat out of a
difficult international environment. That is a very important
fact.
Chairman: We want to come to another
important issue, which is whether the hostage release was or was
not part of a wider deal.
Q118 Mr. Moss: Were there any discussions
between the Government and the United States regarding consular
access to those Iranian detainees at Irbil in Iraq?
Lord Triesman: No, there was none.
Q119 Mr. Moss: Do you know of any
discussions that took place between the United States and Iran
over that issue?
Lord Triesman: I am not aware
of any. I can say with absolute confidence from the first meeting
that I had in my sequence of meetings—the same points were
repeated to Geoffrey Adams in Tehran—that the Iranians said
from the beginning that they wished to make no connections whatever
with any other bilateral problem or multilateral problem with
which we were all concerned. I confirmed immediately that that
would be my understanding of all the subsequent discussions. There
were technical questions about where the sailors and marines had
been. I made some comments about how we tried to deal with that,
but the concept of any exchange of consular access or exchange
of personnel was ruled out on the first day and was never pursued.
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