what to move thejan B to move this host
in question is this host in joh judge
Gallow speaker our government ready to
rely on those friends of Liberty the
Democratic unionist party to shred the
Liberties of our own people is almost by
definition unembarrassed but I hope this
evening to add to the issues ventilated
in a recent Channel for dispatchers
program
to adumbrate the extent to which the
tragedy in Somalia which so many people
are now becoming aware of is another of
our government's dirty little secrets we
must stop the story in Ethiopia where 4
million people according to the United
Nations are facing
starvation and we 100
20,000 Ethiopian children have just one
month to live according to last week's
media reports television viewers were
shocked to see the pictures last week
about the widespread suffering rolent of
1984 and the Great Famine of that
year the US and Britain immediately
pledged $90 million in famine relief
just one week after its appeal to the
International Community for famine
relief the Ethiopian government
increased its military budget by $50
million to $400
million the regime in Adis Ababa when I
knew them in the 1980s Mr Deputy speaker
they were pro- Albanian mests is the
most militarized and heavily armed in
Africa it is in a state of Perpetual war
or preparation for war with one neighbor
erria it is supporting anti-government
Rebels with Western connivance many
believe in Sudan but most astonishing of
all the government of Ethiopia this
starving country whose little children
fly infested quash your core swollen
famished famin stricken children has
been encouraged armed armed trained
financed and otherwise facilitated to
invade and occupy its neighbor Somalia
and create a reign of terror in that
land which is testified to by this
voluminous Amnesty International report
which if I had time I would extensively
quote
from
Somalia has lost thousands of dead as a
result of the Ethiopian Invasion
Millions have been displaced Somalia
under Ethiopian occupation is the
grimmest prison state in Africa worse
far worse than mugabi's
Zimbabwe and who has done the
encouraging the arming the training the
financing and the
facilitating the same us and British
governments who donated the $90 million
to the same Ethiopian government which
is burning its money and burning The
Villages the neighborhoods and the
people of occupied Somalia this
government is never done talking about
the shortcomings of African leaders just
last week in Rome the Secretary of State
for International Development was
roaring at Robert macabi yet there has
not been a squeak out of him or any
other minister about the much bigger
crime in which we are ourselves deeply
complicit is it any wonder that African
opinion considers so much of what we
have to say about Miss governance in
Africa to be the deepest most cynical
hypocrisy two weeks ago Channel 4's
dispatchers team took terrifying risks
to bring us the latest from occupied mad
disu it was undoubtedly an award-winning
documentary it was memorable for many
reasons not least the scene in in the
FCO when the minister Lord Malik Brown
his face Frozen in horror was confronted
by Adam Hartley with the central case of
the documentary makers which for those
members who didn't see it I know that
the minister will have seen it she could
hardly be sent out to bat on this Wicket
without being shown it was this that in
the grim prison state of occupied
Somalia the Fingerprints of our country
and our government are all over the
scene of the crime the president of the
puppet regime imposed by the Ethiopian
Army in Somalia turns out to be British
he spends much of his time here well
it's dangerous in Somalia after all he
has property here family here he
presides over a gang of torturers
murderers Grand leners
extortionists and then flies back to
England the police chief whose police
officers kidnapped people for ransom
which they extort from people living in
our own country in Leicester in
Birmingham in
London his police officers torture
people they make them disappear they
kill them if their families will not pay
he's British too Mr Deputy speaker and
the former interior Minister who
presides over an interior of mass
refugee camps starvation and misery and
who stands accused of stealing
International Aid of diverting food for
political purposes why he also is
British and guess what who is paying the
wages of the murdering kidnapping
torturing quisling police force in
Ethiopian occupied Somalia that's right
we are the puppet dictatorship in
Somalia is a very British crime
especially as our own government
especially the pocket size Palmerston
the Secretary of State hither to
referred to is so very valuable on other
problems in Africa so how did we get
here how did we get into bed with the
former pro Albanian Mists of the
government in Adis Ababa I'm afraid it's
our old friend our old
acquaintance the policy of my enemy's
enemy is my friend this policy which has
put us in so much
trouble from
Afghanistan to Iraq and many other parts
of the world is what lies behind this
obscene
Paradox we are supporting the Ethiopian
government's occupation of Somalia
because George Bush told us to because
Somalia is a Frontline in George
Bush's ill-conceived
counterproductive utterly discredited
about to be booted out in the United
States so-called war on Terra we are
against the former government of Somalia
because it was an Islamic government
just as we're against the government in
Sudan because it's an Islamic government
just as Ethiopia on our behalf opposes
the government in erria because it's an
Islamic government this
policy having been such a disaster
around the world is now
in full force in Somalia and but for
channel 4's dispatches hardly anyone in
Britain would know anyone about it no
Minister has come to the dispatch box to
explain why British taxpayers money is
being paid to a police force in madesu
which is accused of kidnapping people
and extorting the money for the ransom
from British citizens no British
government Minister has come to explain
unless one takes long Malik Brown's
Frozen face an
explanation why we are so heavily
involved with a puppet regime bereft of
political and public support in
Somalia this policy Mr Deputy speaker of
backing anyone that bush tells us to
this policy of backing anyone who's
against those which we today perceive
ourselves to be against is morally
utterly vacuous but arguably worse than
that it's not only morally vacuous it's
a total dismal failure as we found in
Afghanistan to our bitter bitter cost
not least this very week the very
muahs that Mrs ther's government loaded
and supported and armed are now
murdering and killing our soldiers in
Afghanistan or I beg to move that this
house do now adjourn the question is
this house do now adjourn to George
Galloway I had the adjournment debate it
was scheduled to start at 7:00 for half
an
hour it I've now had 10 minutes and the
country or those interested watching on
Parliament TV will not hear the minister
even
reply theable gentleman has
misunderstood the agerman debate is now
starting at 7:00 he so far had bonus
time time it's one of the systems we
have to go through as far as the house
is concerned well that's truly
magnificent Mr Deputy speaker and uh I
have plenty to say perhaps I can now
quote from Amnesty International in more
detail in the time that I didn't think
I'd have available the point is Mr
Deputy speaker this policy is not only
morally bankrupt it is also politically
disastrous Afghanistan is the perfect
case in point and if Ethiopia which is
presiding the Ethiopian government
presiding over a country where now
famine and mass starvation stalks the
land is being helped militarily to
invade and occupy its neighbors and
threaten other of its
neighbors what can this conceivably do
for our standing in Africa what can this
do for our credibility when we lecture
the government of Sudan or the
government of
Zimbabwe but if our problems on this
were confined to Africa Mr Deputy
speaker
then that would be bad enough but it's
much much worse than
that the Somalians are the tallest
people on the Earth but they're
virtually invisible politically on the
international stage and in our own
country but there are hundreds of
thousands of Somalians in our country
hundreds of thousands either because
they have European Union passports or
because they are refugees from the very
fighting which we inart are
fueling and their young people are
increasingly Furious bitter angry
nursing their WTH as they watch on the
Somali television and Elsewhere on other
Muslim channels the Carnage in their
country 2 million people in a country of
11
million that's almost a fifth of the
population if it were our population it
would be 12 million people
living as refugees if you want to scale
It Up 2 million refugees inside the
country a million refugees in
neighboring countries God knows how many
hundreds of thousand scattered across
the European Union these families in
their bitter Exile are bringing up Sons
maybe daughters too who are bitter and
Furious at the Western role in the
problem that they see rolled out on
their television
screens in their country and we who've
just
spent how many hours trying to deal with
the problem of terrorism cannot see the
connection between this constant policy
of infuriating young Muslim boys and
girls by the double standards and the
Injustice of our policy towards their
countries and the countries their
parents come from we can't see the
connection between the growth of
extremism government's always looking
for a cleric to blame or an organization
to ban for the radicalization of Muslim
youth in Britain but they don't need a
cleric or an organization to radicalize
them Mr Deputy speaker they just have to
watch the news they just have to watch
what our government is doing in Muslim
countries like Somalia now I want to
know from the minister because I know
that she seen the channel 4 dispatches
program I know that she's not going to
stand up and claim that she didn't see
it even though she's answering a debate
on human rights in Somalia in the house
this evening I know that she's seen the
program so I want to ask her to do a
better job than Lord Malik Brown did in
explaining why are we paying for from
our taxes taxes that amongst other
things could be used to help starving
people in Ethiopia or keep our
pensioners warm in the winter or keep
some of our post offices open as the
minister for closing post offices is by
your chair I hope he's in the house and
it's in order for me to refer to him
money that we could have used for a
better purpose is being spent on the
security forces in Somalia which are
Accused by Amnesty International as well
as by Channel 4 of widespread abuses of
human rights of torture of order of
disappearance of kidnapping extortion
and Grand
larsoning why are we allowing the
minister of the interior of Somalia to
travel back and forward into our country
unmolested when he's Accused by Aid
agencies of pining International Aid
desperately needed emergency aid for
Hungry people for himself and for
political purposes for his political
plan why isn't the government stopping
him at the border questioning him about
where the money went that was put into
Somalia and has
disappeared Aid agencies will not set
foot by and large now in Somalia so
catastrophic has the situation
become I want to ask the
minister why we are
supporting a president an interior
Minister a chief of police in Somalia
allowing them freely to come and go
without answering the charges that are
being made against them when will the
government at least condemn the human
rights abuses in
Somalia Amnesty International has
voluminously recorded them but not a
squeak from the government that's never
done roaring at Sudan or Zimbabwe why
because we are deeply complicit and
indeed we are paying for it we are
paying for the security services that
are committing these crimes in Somalia
now the government may
think that because most Somali in
Britain don't have votes for one reason
or another that tall as they are they
can be ignored but the truth is this is
a ticking Time Bomb inside our own
country the
loathing from the somal community in
Britain of the actions of our government
is a ticking time bomb in
Britain I if not she I'm constantly
exposed in my own constituency and in
Birmingham and Leicester and other
places to the anger of these young somal
it's a disaster waiting to happen Mr
Deputy speaker and I hope that the
minister will announce today that she
will in the in the wake of channel 4's
Revelations investigate properly these
invest these uh
allegations and she will report to the
house her findings on that matter
the truth is Mr Deputy speaker our
government's foreign policy towards this
Horn of
Africa towards Afghanistan and not just
this government previous British
governments too I sat in the opposition
accusing the then prime minister Mrs
thata of having opened the gates to the
barbarians with her support for the
so-called mujahadin in Afghanistan all
those many years ago Mr Deputy speaker
you will perhaps recall it yourself this
policy which our governments have
followed of my enemy's enemy is my
friend is a fatally flawed policy it's
fatally flawed everywhere that it's been
tried and it's now being tried all over
again in Somalia so for the sake of the
many Somali who are watching
this because the world is out in the
Somali Community about this debate this
evening for the sake of the people on
universal TV and other Somali Channels
who will show this debate I hope that
the
minister will come clean about the
Dreadful problems that exist and I hope
she'll say to the Ethiopian
government
the the giving away can I congratulate
him on on on his success in getting this
uh debate this evening I apologize that
I've arrived late Mr Deputy speaker
caught me slightly unawares um what's
best for the Somalian people and Somalia
itself of course is security does The
Honorable gentleman accept that the
Ethiopian government are providing
Security in Somalia at the moment and
they want to withdraw from Somalia the
earliest possible moment and would he
join me in encouraging the United
Nations and an Amazon and also the
African Union to ensure that troops are
put back into Somalia in order to give
somalis that security that they need
Ethiopian troops want to return to Adis
Ababa well I don't accept it I don't
accept it at all Mr Deputy speaker and I
know the Ethiopian government rather
better it seems than the honorable
gentleman as I explained before he came
in I knew them when they were Pro
Albanian Mist guillas in the tplf I you
all their leaders who are now the
government ministers I know that they
have no intention of withdrawing from
Somalia unless they're forced to they
want to occupy Somalia because they've
been paid to do do so and they were paid
to do so by the governments of the
United States and by our own government
they're doing a job for what they imagin
to be the
Western International western part of
the International Community well the
minister for closing post offices laughs
but he has many Somali in his
constituency as I have in mind and I
hope that the camera caught him laughing
the truth is
I do apologize for intervening on The
Honorable jent I didn't anything he's
been saying so far well
uh I I'll not go further down that uh
track perhaps the camera caught the uh
very
similitude the truth is that the
Ethiopian government is carrying out a
service for the people who give it
weapons for the people who give it money
and for the people who give it
diplomatic and political support they're
having a
in the Ethiopian Embassy next week
perhaps The Honorable gentleman is going
you'll certainly get an invitation in
the post after he's after his uh
intervention on my speech they're having
a bino to celebrate the 17th anniversary
in the Ethiopian Embassy in London of
their coming to power it's going to be a
very Grand Event this at a time when
their own people are starving to death
their children are starving to death
120,000 of them with a month to live
and they're invading and occupying their
neighboring countries and nobody says
boo about it in fact far from saying buo
they say here's some more military and
some more financial aid to do it because
the government of President Bush utterly
discredited on its way out with
virtually nowhere to go except Downing
Street on Sunday for one last photoc
call regards that the defeat of the
former Islamic government in Somalia as
part of its war on terror that's what
this is all about Ethiopia is playing
the
role of hammer in the Horn of Africa for
the United States policy and its war on
Terra that's what Ethiopia are doing and
therefore they will not withdraw until a
new American government hopefully with a
Kenyan
Affiliated president tells them that
actually this policy is deeply
flawed because the puppet regime of
British citizens imposed on Somalia by
the Ethiopian Invasion wouldn't last 5
minutes if the Ethiopian forces withdrew
they'd have to withdraw with it and so
any government that's going to come to
power in Somalia in the future will be
filled with hatred of Britain and the
United States this is the problem we
keep making everywhere we intervene
either to prop up tyrants or to support
tyrants because we don't like the
tyrants they're fighting
against and then we generate still more
problems for ourselves and we wonder why
and we agonizingly debate anti-terrorism
laws why so many people in the Muslim
World want to hurt us why so many young
people in the Muslim world are so bitter
and angry about us that they want to
hurt us well is it any Wonder can it be
any Wonder to any same person I'm giving
way in a second to The Honorable
gentleman can it be any Wonder it's
these kind of policies I I I beg the
minister to believe me because I'm
talking to somalis all the time the rage
felt in the Somali community in Britain
and around the world about Britain and
America's role in their country is
generating a terrorist let me spell it
out as the uh right honorable gentleman
who saved the government's bacon earlier
uh this evening is now in his place let
me spell it out as we spent so many
hours discussing anti-terrorism we are
making new terrorists in Britain with
our policy towards Somalia with our
double standards with our hypocrisy I
give way to The Honorable gentleman The
Honorable gentleman he's being very
generous whilst the uh government of
Ethiopia is not perfect and indeed there
are governments closer to home uh that
aren't perfect and it's absolutely right
the human rights abuses by the Somali
Security Services are fully investigated
does nevertheless he accept that if
Ethiopian troops at this current time
withdrew that would create a security
vacuum into which terrorist groups
including Al-Qaeda would create Mayhem
in the Horn of Africa a key and
strategic location and that would come
back to haunt us but Mr Deputy speaker I
said in this house over there when we
recall the house just a few days after
the atrocity of 9/11 if you'll forgive
me quoting myself I said said if we
handle this the wrong way we'll make
10,000 new bin laddin and we have
handled it the wrong way and we have
made 10,000 new bin ladans and the
problem of al-Qaeda in Somalia has been
made worse by the Western intervention
and the Ethiopian Invasion far more
people have been recruited to a narrow
fundamentalist separatist violent
islamism by our policy than ever would
have been if the policy had never been
formed the honorable gentleman obviously
hasn't read this Amnesty International
document the Ethiopian forces are not
providing security they're providing
mass murder and mass Terror in the
occupied Somalia the refugee camps are
full of 2 million people no one can walk
on the streets of madesu channel 4's
reporters were almost killed making
their program some of their team on the
same vehicle with them were shot dead
live on television Vision Bales well
they were making well The Honorable
gentleman from a sedentary position says
Bales I don't know if they were balies
or by Ethiopians the point is the
country has been plunged into utter
lawlessness and to pretend that the
Ethiopian government is providing
Security in a
country with whom security should never
be mentioned in the same sentence is
completely ridiculous there may be a
need for African Union forces there may
be a need for AR League forces and I
hope in conclusion and I'm sorry I
apologize to the minister for taking a
minute more than I ought to but I'll
close on this point there may be a need
for other forces this conflict is going
to go on I hope the minister is not
going to claim that the deal reached
this week is any kind of deal for
solving this problem because the people
who are doing the fighting are not
involved in the deal it would be like a
peace process in the north of Ireland uh
which excluded the people who were doing
the fighting that's what's been reached
uh with relation to Somalia in the last
few days so I'm grateful to you Mr
Deputy speaker even more grateful for
the extra time that I got and I
apologize for myish point of order which
turned out to be entirely misconstrued
and I do hope that we get some answers
from the minister this
evening
magman thank you Mr Deputy speaker and I
welcome the opportunity to reply to the
member for Bethel green and B on this
debate I see this as an excellent chance
to highlight how the foreign and
Commonwealth office seeks to address a
number of issues relating to Somalia as