Middle East minister rejects claims Iran views UK as ‘weak’ amid IRGC ban delay
Hamish Falconer MP pointed to 'far-ranging sanctions package'
Middle East minister Hamish Falconer has come under sustained pressure from MPs to explain why the government has yet to proscribe Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) in the current climate of severe repression by the regime in Tehran.
Falconer rejected suggestions that the UK now looked “weak” having not followed the lead of the EU, which proscribed the IRGC last week.
Answering an Urgent Question in the Commons, he claimed:”I don’t think that the Iranian government’s interpretation of the actions of the British government in recent weeks is one of weakness.
“This is a far-ranging sanctions package announced on Monday, and it follows a whole range of actions in response.”
Responding to questions on the matter from MPs from all parties, Falconer said the government was treating proscription as “a matter of urgency” but stressed that, as this was Home Office legislation, it would need to go through parliament “in the usual way.”
The minister also claimed that further sanctions imposed on Iran, including against the entirety of the IRGC, represented a “swift” and tough response by the UK ahead of future proscription of Iran’s main political and military force.
Attempting to explain the delay, Falconer said:”We think the Jonathan Hall review is important – it addresses itself precisely to this question of the difference between a state actor and a terrorist.”
Shadow foreign secretary Priti Patel accused the Government of a “weak” response to the Iranian crackdown.
She said: “These are war-like casualty rates, yet the condemnation and response is weak.”
Patel added: “This is not the time to be silent, and Britain must stand up for the Iranian people and confront this vile despotic regime with strength and resolve.”
She asked what the Government is doing to “neutralise Iran’s tools of repression”, including cracking down on sanctions evasion, ensuring UK financial systems are not facilitating funds used to target Iranian citizens in Britain and introducing legislation to proscribe the IRGC.
Falconer also said Iran is on the top tier of the Foreign Influence Registration Scheme (FIRS), requiring anyone working for the regime to declare any activity in the UK, not just political work.
Asked about the UK’s involvement with any US-Iran talks, he said the Government is in “regular discussions with all those with an interest” and will “support all efforts” to ensure Iran does not develop a nuclear weapon.
He concluded: “I know that for many British-Iranians, there is great anguish about the lack of contact they have been able to have with their families in Iran.
“I feel that most acutely for British people still detained by the Iranian regime, but it is obviously an experience felt quite widely across the country.
“The British-Iranian community make an important contribution to this country, and I understand the anguish they feel over these recent days.”
Falconer also confirmed the government was aware of reports that the Islamic Human Rights Commission, registered as a charity in this country, has been linked to the Iranian regime, and to banners at protests in support of it.
The EU added the IRGC to its terrorist list in response to Tehran’s deadly crackdown on protesters in recent weeks.
“Repression cannot go unanswered,” the bloc’s top diplomat Kaja Kallas said, adding the move would put the IRGC – a major military, economic and political force in Iran – on the same level as jihadists like al-Qaeda and the Islamic State group.
Iran’s Foreign Minister, Abbas Araghchi, said the EU decision was a “stunt” and a “major strategic mistake”.
Australia, Canada and the US have already classified the IRGC as a terror group but it has not been proscribed in the UK.
The Home Office confirmed it was preparing legislation to proscribe hostile state agencies including the IRGC, but said the bill would not be fast-tracked.
It has been drawing up terror-style proscription legislation since May, when Yvette Cooper, then the home secretary, announced she was accepting recommendations from Hall, the government’s independent adviser on terrorism legislation, to introduce a law that would enable agencies such as the IRGC to be banned.
Cooper said that the legislation would enable “much stronger action on state-backed organisations like the IRGC”.
No-one involved in the crackdown on protesters in Iran should be granted asylum in the UK, a former Foreign Office minister said.
Ex-minister Catherine West asked Falconer to work with the Home Office to ensure that a “loud message” is sent.
She asked: “Could he speak with Home Office officials or his counterparts at ministerial level regarding the sophistication required for certain asylum applications which might come forward in the coming months, so that we can ensure that we send a loud message that there will not be any asylum for those who have been part of this recent crackdown?”
Falconer said he would “take that up” with ministerial colleagues.
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