Tasmina Ahmed-Sheikh – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Tasmina Ahmed-Sheikh on 2016-01-27.

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, pursuant to the Answer of 4 January 2016 to Question 20769, how many individuals have been subject to sanctions imposed by the UK Government for (a) brokering oil deals between Daesh and the Assad regime and (b) other matters covered by UN Security Council Resolution 2253.

Mr Tobias Ellwood

The UK implements the EU’s Syria Sanctions Regime. The EU has listed George Haswani due to his role as a middleman in the purchase of oil from Daesh by the Syrian Regime. In doing so he helps the regime’s military effort against the Syrian people.

There are an additional 26 Daesh related individuals/entities on the UN list that the UK takes action against, five of whom the UK proposed in September, and the majority of whom we have co-sponsored with partners. This was the first time the British Government asked the UN to add Britons associated with Daesh to its ‘Daesh and Al-Qaeda Sanctions list’, which UNSCR 2253 renewed. We will continue to consider whether more individuals should be subjected to the sanctions.

The UK implements all UN Daesh/AQ sanctions fully following the adoptions of UN Security Council Resolution 2253 on 17 December 2015.

Our primary focus remains bringing individuals supporting terrorist organisations to justice; for example the recent conviction of Tareena Shakil who had been a member of Daesh in Syria and encouraged acts of terror.