HL Deb 22 April 1969 vol 301 cc390-3

3.35 p.m.

LORD CHALFONT

My Lords, with the permission of the House, I should like to answer the Question asked earlier by the noble Earl, Lord Dundee. I am grateful to the noble Marquess, Lord Salisbury, for allowing me to make the Statement before he speaks. I should like, with the leave of the House, to answer the Question by rep-eating the Answer being given by my right honourable friend the Foreign and Commonwealth Secretary to a similar Question in another place. The Answer is as follows:

"In an article in Izvestiya on the 28th of December, 1967, it was hinted that fresh charges might be brought against Mr. Brooke. Since then we have frequently impressed upon the Soviet authorities the very serious consequences which any re-trial of Mr. Brooke would have for Anglo-Soviet relations. I myself last spoke to the Soviet Ambassador about this on the 1st of April.

"In yesterday's Evening News it was again suggested that fresh charges were to be brought against Mr. Brooke. We made immediate inquiries of the Soviet Embassy about this report, but without result. I also instructed Her Majesty's Ambassador in Moscow to pursue the matter with the Soviet Government. I await his report."

THE EARL OF DUNDEE

My Lords, I [hank the noble Lord for repeating this Statement. May I ask him whether Her Majesty's Government will impress strongly on the Soviet Government, and on their diplomatic representatives here, that most people in the Free World are genuinely anxious to be friends with Russia, and that if the Russian authorities insist on behaving like uncivilised savages it can only do harm to their own interests and reputation? Will further representations be made as soon as the report from our Ambassador, which the noble Lord mentioned in his Answer, is received?

LORD GLADWYN

My Lords, while welcoming what Her Majesty's Government say in the Statement, namely, that any retrial of Mr. Brooke would have the most serious consequences to Anglo-Soviet relations, may I ask the Minister whether he would agree that it would be quite intolerable to enter into any kind of bargain with the Soviet Government for the release of the Krogers—which I believe, is what they are after; in other words, to get an agreement that spies are always released in exchange for some other alleged spy. This is not a principle which we could possibly accept, and I trust therefore that the Krogers will in no circumstances be released for that reason.

LORD CHALFONT

My Lords, I am grateful for the comments of the two noble Lords who have spoken. I am in some difficulty here because, while I sympathise completely with the sense of outrage that was reflected in their comments, I am anxious to do nothing and to say nothing that might make the position of Mr. Brooke worse than it is now. We have made clear to the Soviet authorities and to their Embassy that Anglo-Soviet relations are bound to suffer very gravely if they take action of this kind. I do not think it would help in the present circumstances for me to specify the steps that we might be obliged to take, but certainly we shall continue to impress this upon the Soviet Union.

So far as what the noble Lord, Lord Gladwyn, said about the Krogers is concerned, we have repeatedly made it clear to the Soviet Union that these two cases are in no way comparable. The Krogers are spies, and they are not Soviet citizens: Mr. Brooke is not a spy, and he is a British subject.

THE EARL OF DUNDEE

My Lords, everybody will appreciate that Her Majesty's Government do not want to do or say anything that might have an adverse effect on the interests of Mr. Gerald Brooke himself. But do Her Majesty's Government agree that the Soviet Government always act in these matters entirely in accordance with what they conceive to be their own interests? They will not act for or against Mr. Brooke unless they think it is to their interests to do so. Will Her Majesty's Government seriously impress upon them that we do want better relations with them, and that it is against their own interests to behave in this way?

LORD CHALFONT

My Lords, yes; of course this is a point we shall continue to make to the Government of the Soviet Union. They know—and we have repeated it often—that one of the cardinal points of our foreign policy is to bring about a détente, an improvement in our relations with Eastern European countries, and especially with the Soviet Union. As I have made clear, we shall impress upon them the grave effects on this policy of any action of the kind that has been adumbrated in the Press.

Perhaps I might, with your Lordships' leave, take this opportunity to say that Mrs. Brooke, who seems to me to be behaving in an altogether admirable way over all this—she is someone for whom I personally have come to have the greatest admiration over the past years—has said that she does not see what else can be done. In spite of the distress in which she obviously finds herself, she has indicated that she believes that Her Majesty's Government have done, and are doing, all that they can.