§ Sir Frederic Bennettasked the Minister of Overseas Development whether she will now list those countries where concern for human rights issues has affected the programme.
§ Mrs. HartThe human rights policies of individual countries are among the factors we always take into account in considering the distribution of aid. Countries where we have cut off or significantly reduced our aid on human rights grounds include Chile, Uganda, Ethiopia, Kampuchea, Vietnam, the People's Democratic Republic of Yemen, and Bolivia. In the case of Bolivia, I replied to a question by my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Walton (Mr. Heffer) on 21 February—[Vol. 963, c. 236]—to the effect that the considerations which led me to suspend my Ministry's support for the re-equipment programme of the mining sector there no longer apply. In the case of Chile, we provide aid through nongovernmental channels. In certain countries where human rights abuses have occurred, we continue to provide modest aid, usually in the form of technical cooperation, which is designed to benefit the poorer sections of the community. There are of course, other countries where we have refrained from beginning an aid programme on human rights grounds.