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Britain's Prince Charles arrives to participate in the traditional Saudi dancing known as 'Arda' during the Janadriya culture festival at Der'iya in Riyadh, in February, 2014.
Britain’s Prince Charles arrives to participate in the traditional Saudi dancing known as ‘Arda’ during the Janadriya culture festival at Der’iya in Riyadh, in February, 2014. Photograph: POOL/REUTERS
Britain’s Prince Charles arrives to participate in the traditional Saudi dancing known as ‘Arda’ during the Janadriya culture festival at Der’iya in Riyadh, in February, 2014. Photograph: POOL/REUTERS

Saudi Arabia unashamedly championed in UK security review

This article is more than 8 years old
  • UK defence and security review places emphasis on human rights
  • Yet describes es yet describes Saudi Arabia as “vital partner”

In its trumpeting of Britain’s global “soft power” influence, the government’s Strategic Defence and Security Review (SDSR) unveiled on Monday contains a glaring contradiction.

More than once, it stressed the importance of promoting “our values and interests ”, promoting “stability, good governance and human rights”, and “civil liberties”.

Twenty pages on, the document says the UK will continue to work with close allies, including “vital partners, such as Saudi Arabia, in the Middle East”.

It notes that the UK’s relations with six Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) states - Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates - “are broad and deep”.

It refers to a “new Gulf Strategy ” building a “permanent and more subtantial UK military presence” - a reference, among other projects, to a new UK naval base in Bahrain.

This is the Bahrain whose security forces, according to a new report by Human Rights Watch, are continuing to torture detainees during interrogation, despite claims by the British government that Bahrain has reformed its practices.

Saudi Arabia is the UK’s largest single market for arms. Saudi courts continue to hand down severe sentences, recording the highest number of executions there since 1995, according to human rights groups.

On 17 November, a Saudi court sentenced Ashraf Fayadh, an artist and poet, to death on charges of apostasy. (Karl Andree, a Britain who has lived in Saudi Arabia for 25 years accused of violating the kingdom’s strict prohibition on alcohol, was sentenced to 350 lashes. His family attributed Saudi Arabia’s decision to relent to intense media publicity in Britain. British foreign secretary, Philip Hammond, said Andree’s release was testimony to the strength of the UK’s relations with Riyadh.)

The former Lib Dem leader, Lord Ashdown, on Tuesday said there had been a “failure to put pressure on the Gulf states, especially Saudi Arabia and Qatar, to stop funding the salafists and wahhabists.

Saudi money has promoted the messianic radical wahhabism that, an increasing number of commentators are pointing out, Isis has fed on. As one observed this week referring to the Arabic acronym for Isis: “Daesh has a mother: the invasion of Iraq. But it also has a father: Saudi Arabia and its religious-industrial complex”.

This is Britain’s “vital partner”. The Guardian reported last month how leaked diplomatic cables revealed that Britain conducted secret vote-trading deals with Saudi Arabia to ensure both states were elected to the UN human rights council (UNHRC).

The SDSR paper contains other observations. “We cannot rule out the possibility that [Russia] may feel tempted to act aggressively against Nato allies”, it says, though its adds this was “highly unlikely”. Russia is presumably more concerned about Isis and terrorism, a view reflected in Vladimir Putin’s reportedly more cooperative approach on Syria.

And, interestingly, given the forthcoming “in out” referendum, the SDSR document emphasises the importance of the EU. It says the government will strengthen Britain’s defence and security relationship with France, and will “intensify” its defence and security relationship with Germany.

Under the heading, European Union, it notes: “A secure and prosperous Europe is essential for a secure and prosperous UK”. The statement reflects the importance Britain’s defence and security establishment - and the chancellor, George Osborne - attaches to the UK’s continuing membership of the EU.

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