At the United Nations and in Washington

From the 26th - 30th October 2009, Fabian Hamilton took part in a Parliamentary Foreign Affairs visit to the United Nations and Washington. The Committee is deeply involved in scrutinising all aspects of UK foreign policy and its effectiveness. Members of the commitee visit the United Nations and Washington annually as it is perhaps the most important world forum for meetings and to understand how the UK position is percieved by the government of other countries. The members of the committee are listed at the bottom of this page.

Fabian and his colleagues remarked straight away on the transformation of the atmosphere in New York that has been brought about by the election of Barrak Obahma as President of the United States. Under the Bush adminstration the United Nations has been viewed with some disdain by the USA to the extent that the USA share of United Nations costs was being witheld. Now, under the dymanic leadership of Susan Wright, the new USA Ambassador to the UN, 1.2 billion dollars of outstanding contribution has been paid and there is now a real commitment by the USA government to see the work of the United Nations succeed.The USA is no longer seeking to isolate iteself from United Nations initiatives on such issues as nuclear weapons proliferation and climate change. A serious discussion has begun on the USA signing the comprehensive Test Ban Treaty. To date the US has resisted signing up to this commitment to outlaw the testing of nuclear devices which has held up the implementation of the treaty throughout the world. If the US does commit, the treaty becomes international law and would then further isolate states such as North Korea and Iran if they continued to develop and test nuclear weapons.

While in Washington Fabian and his colleagues were also able to meet with the the Russian and French Ambassadors USA, US Senators on the Foreign Relations Committee and Pentagon officials from the US State Department.

After his visit Fabian was asked what was the value of such visits to the constituents in Leeds North East. He replied as follows.

"The constituency I represent is one of the most internationally diverse in the north of England. In my experience as an MP very concerned with foreign affairs, I think every single world crisis or controversy has been the subject of correspondence or meetings with constituents, many of whom have relatives, friends and business connections in many parts of the world touched by problems such as political unrest and national disasters. The UK depends for its living on International Trade and so does the livelyhood of many constituents who are employed in the diverse economy of our city. UK foreign policy is of crucial importance for the well being and future of our country and the Foreign Affairs Committee is one of the main groups with repsonsibility for understanding whether our governments policies are effective in protecting the interests of UK citizens. Being an MP means fighting for justice for your constituents but it does not mean being parochial and failing to play a part to ensure that our government is effective abroad as well as at home. The privilege of serving on the Foreign Affairs Committee has helped me enormously with constituents' case work particularly on issues such as immigraton and asylum seeking. I believe I have also been able to help build community relations in Leeds NE because of the insight I have gained into the hopes, aspirations and anxieties of the many different minority ethnic communities who co-oexist harmoniously in our constituency."

Members of the Foreign Affairs Committee

All members with the exception of Mr Ken Purchase and the Rt Hon. David Heathcote Amery visited the United Nations and Washington.