Any moves by the US to ease pressure on Putin over Ukraine should be challenged, says foreign affairs committee

The UK must brace itself to stage “uncomfortable conversations” with its closest ally, the United States, to ensure the west maintains a principled stance on sanctions against Russia, the all-party foreign affairs select committee has found in a new report on Anglo-Russian relations.



Donald Trump hinted in January that he would be willing to lift sanctions imposed on Russia in response to its intervention in Ukraine, in exchange for agreement on nuclear arms reduction. But the committee said that any reduction in pressure on Russia would “constitute an abrogation of the international community’s responsibility toward Ukraine and would embolden Russia in its efforts to dictate the terms on which it engages with the west”.

Ukraine ambassador attacks Trump allies' secret peace plan Read more

In a firm warning to Theresa May not to succumb to a potential change in US foreign policy on Russia, the Conservative-led committee said any “withdrawal of the existing sanctions should be linked to Russian compliance with its obligations toward Ukraine, and should not be offered in exchange for Russian cooperation in other areas. This approach would avoid ceding moral and legal legitimacy to Russia and departing from UK values and standards.”

At the same time the committee opposed a UK boycott of the 2018 Fifa World Cup, due to be hosted by Russia, saying any boycott should only be on sporting grounds such as evidence of drug abuse by players.

The committee concluded that UK relations with Russia have reached their lowest point since the end of the cold war.

It recommends the government set out more clearly what Russia is directly required to do in Ukraine to bring about a lifting of sanctions. At present the requirements are placed on Russian supporting groups in eastern Ukraine, rather than Russia itself.

The committee warns the UK faces “the possibility of becoming an isolated actor supporting a policy towards Russia that is failing, partly as other EU nations pull away from sanctions, especially if they become a bargaining tool in the context of Brexit.

“This could lead to further damage to Britain’s long-term ability to influence Russia,” the committee said.

The committee has also warned that a failure by the Foreign Office to produce any evidence that Russia has committed war crimes in Syria is in danger of bolstering Russian claims of western double standards.

It says the government “is right to call out the Russian military for actions that potentially violate international humanitarian law. However, if the government continues to allege that Russia has committed war crimes in Syria without providing a basis for its charge, it risks bolstering the Kremlin’s narrative that Russia is held to unfair double standards by hostile and hypocritical western powers.”

However, the Foreign Office pointed out the UN commission of inquiry on Syria on Wednesday released its latest report condemning human rights violations and abuses committed during the offensive against east Aleppo in the second half of 2016.

Russia and China veto UN resolution to impose sanctions on Syria Read more

The Foreign Office said the commission found that all parties to the conflict had shown “a wilful disregard” for international humanitarian law and said that war crimes were committed.

The MPs also claimed that Foreign Office expertise on Russia had “disintegrated” and that Sir Alan Duncan lacks a minister with enough time to focus on one of the world’s superpowers.



Based on a visit to Russia, the select committee found the Russian government has in some ways entered a less rules-based form of suppression. It says that instead of direct repression by state authorities, proxy groups are allowed – and sometimes encouraged – to harass, intimidate and assault human rights activists, with no clear rules governing their behaviour and little prospect of prosecution in the courts.



The committee also suggested an ideological basis for anti-western Putinism is developing that may solidify anti-western thinking in Russia.

The MPs said: ”The deterioration of human rights is underpinned by the growing official and popular embrace of conservative religious and cultural values, which are defined through negative comparisons with western liberal principles. This narrative associates western liberal standards with instability.”

Overall, the committee says: “Russian foreign policy aims to undermine the current world order, prevent self-determination and independent decisions by neighbouring countries, which it sees as regime change, and to promote Russia’s world view as a legitimate alternative to western values.

“The Russian government’s indifference to human rights, freedom of expression and the rule of law underpins its foreign policy challenge to the international order and lies at the root of the collapse in UK-Russia relations.”