Jeremy Corbyn, UK Labour Party, on Iran and British History

UK Parliament Member Jeremy Corbyn on Iran

Jeremy Corbyn (UK Labour Party, Islington, North)

Jeremy Corbyn, British Labour Party Here are the words of British Parliament member Jeremy Corbyn, a left wing member of the Labour party since 1983. They were spoken at Westminster Hall in The House of Commons on the morning of Tuesday, February 27, 2007.

Corbyn describes his platform and background thusly: "I prioritise the needs of the poor and the human rights of all, both at home and abroad... "The needs of minority groups including asylum seekers have also been at the forefront of my work for the past 22 years. "..I have attended and spoken at human rights peace conferences, including Beijing, Mumbai, New Delhi, Rwanda, UN/Geneva and other parts of Europe. Particularly since September 11th I have travelled to many countries speaking out against military efforts to solve problems, and in favour of negotiation. I continue to argue for the rights of the oppressed, in particular the Chagos Islanders and the Palestinians."

Jeremy Corbyn - Westminster Hall - February 27, 2007:

I will take five minutes and no more, I hope.

When the hon. Member for The Wrekin [Mark Pritchard] spoke, he said a great deal about the history of Iran, which was interesting to a point, but highly selective. He did not say anything about the more recent record of the west's relationship with Iran, such as the coup of 1952 [1953], which was promoted by Britain and the United States and which removed an elected Government and brought the Shah into power. Eventually that gave way to the Islamic revolution of 1979. He should be very cautious about direct interference in Iranian affairs, which he appeared to call for throughout his speech.

I am not here to defend the human rights record of Iran since 1979, or during the Shah's period. There are many things going on in Iran that are truly appalling, such as the treatment of religious minorities and trade unionists, and many other issues. All those points should be addressed in a spirit of solidarity with the people who are suffering such human rights abuses. The hon. Gentleman did not acknowledge, however, that there is a widespread unity of opinion among the Iranian exiled community around the world, which is large and diverse. In my constituency, there are Iranian asylum seekers who have sought asylum from every Iranian regime since the late 1950's. Nevertheless, they are, generally speaking, united in their condemnation of the overt and covert threats being made to Iran by the United States and the west, which encourage the belief that somehow or other the west can go to war in Iran and all the problems will be sorted out.

There is no realization of the two effects that those threats have in Iran. First, they allow Ahmadinejad and his friends to ramp up their power and their wish for strong armament for Iran, and secondly, they frighten the Iranian people very much. Surely it is time to recognize that there is a need for dialogue and peace and a need to cut down the threats against Iran.

The question of Iranian nuclear armament and nuclear power is the kernel of the argument. I shall put my cards on the table: I am not a supporter of nuclear power in any form. It is a dangerous, polluting form of energy generation, but I recognize that it is not illegal under international law for any state to develop its own nuclear power. There is no question about it—it is a legal thing to do. If Iran wishes to develop nuclear power, it can do so in much the same way as any other country. I wish that it were not doing that, but it has a right to do so.

There have been allegations that Iran is also developing nuclear weapons. The evidence has been added up to suggest that it is trying to import centrifuges and enrich uranium, automatically leading to the development of plutonium and then to the development of nuclear weapons. The non-proliferation treaty, to which Iran is a signatory, requires all member states to allow inspections to take place. For the most part, those are pre-notified inspections and, under the voluntary protocol, unnotified inspections. Iran has not resigned from the NPT; it has withdrawn from the additional voluntary protocol, and we need to keep a sense of proportion about that. In its obsession with attacking Iran, the United States forced a vote for the first time ever at the UN International Atomic Energy Authority to bring about a resolution that went to the Security Council, which led to sanctions against Iran. I see that as a build-up, in exactly the same way as we were told an awful lot of nonsense about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction, to create sufficient hype for an attack against Iran.

Let us think through the consequences of an attack on Iran. If there is a war or if bombing takes place against Iran by the United States, Israel or anybody else, two things will happen. First, if nuclear establishments are bombed, be they for civil nuclear power or anything else, the danger of fallout will be enormous. Europe has still not got over the fallout of Chernobyl in 1985. Secondly, with Iran active on all fronts, the danger that a war will spread across the whole region into Afghanistan and Iraq will be enormous. I caution hon. Members to be a little more careful in their use of language and think through the consequences of the demands that they are making.

We have been through the disasters of the war in Iraq, and we are still going through them. The war continues in Afghanistan—indeed, following yesterday's statements, Britain's involvement is likely to be much greater. Surely we need to promote peace and dialogue in the region. As if 500,000 and more Iraqi dead were not enough, goodness knows how many would die if we started a war with Iran. Perhaps we should be promoting a nuclear-free middle east, including Israel, which would involve nuclear disarmament and everybody signing up to the NPT. Going to war in Iran would be catastrophic for the entire region and for us as well. I urge caution and a real process of engagement with Iran in order both to prevent a war from taking place and to do something to support those people who quite reasonably demand human rights and justice in their society.