Keir Starmer responds to Air India crash tragedy - 'absolutely devastating'
Keir Starmer said the crash of a Gatwick-bound plane in India with 53 British nationals on board was "absolutely devastating" and that the investigation will "take some time".
Air India Flight 171 erupted into a fireball near Ahmedabad Airport in western India, on Thursday shortly after take-off. Harrowing footage showed the flight's final moments as it rapidly descended - before crashing into a dining hall for medical students.
The Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner aircraft was carrying 230 passengers and 12 crew members at the time. The airline said 169 passengers were Indian nationals, 53 were British, one was Canadian and seven were Portuguese.
British national Vishwash Kumar Ramesh, who is believed to be the only survivor of the Air India crash, has "no idea" how he escaped the plane, his brother has said outside the family's Leicester home on Thursday.
Earlier David Lammy said the Foreign Office has stood up a crisis team in India and the UK. The Foreign Secretary told the Commons: "My thoughts and I'm sure those of the entire House are with those who've been affected by the tragic plane crash in India this morning.
"We know that British nationals were on board and I can confirm that the FCDO is working urgently with local authorities to support British nationals and their families, and has stood up a crisis team in both Delhi and in London."
The King said he was "desperately shocked" by the incident and Buckingham Palace said he was being kept updated on the developing situation.
Follow our Mirror Politics account on Bluesky here. And follow our Mirror Politics team here - Lizzy Buchan, Mikey Smith, Kevin Maguire, Sophie Huskisson, Dave Burke and Ashley Cowburn.
Be first to get the biggest bombshells and breaking news by joining our Politics WhatsApp group here. We also treat our community members to special offers, promotions, and adverts from us and our partners. If you want to leave our community, you can check out any time you like. If you're curious, you can read our Privacy Notice.
Or sign up here to the Mirror's Politics newsletter for all the best exclusives and opinions straight to your inbox.
And listen to our exciting new political podcast The Division Bell, hosted by the Mirror and the Express every Thursday.
In a written message the monarch said: "My wife and I have been desperately shocked by the terrible events in Ahmedabad this morning. Our special prayers and deepest possible sympathy are with the families and friends of all those affected by this appallingly tragic incident across so many nations, as they await news of their loved ones.
"I would like to pay a particular tribute to the heroic efforts of the emergency services and all those providing help and support at this most heartbreaking and traumatic time."
India's PM Narendra Modi said: "The tragedy in Ahmedabad has stunned and saddened us. It is heartbreaking beyond words. In this sad hour, my thoughts are with everyone affected by it. Have been in touch with Ministers and authorities who are working to assist those affected."
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Leader Live
4 minutes ago
- Leader Live
UK to take ‘every diplomatic step' to stop Iran building nuclear weapons
This could include reinstating sanctions lifted under the 2015 nuclear deal with Tehran by triggering the 'snap back' mechanism. The UK's priority is to prevent further escalation after the strikes and 'press for a diplomatic solution', and officials have urged Iran to keep nuclear talks going with Donald Trump, Downing Street said. The US president called for Tehran to make a deal 'before it is too late' in a post on Friday. Sir Keir Starmer had urged 'all parties to step back and reduce tensions urgently' after Israel launched strikes on Tehran overnight, rekindling fears of a full-scale conflict. Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has warned that Israel should expect 'severe punishment' in response, and it was reported on Friday morning that drones had been launched. No 10 said the UK did not participate in Israeli strikes overnight and would not say whether Israel had requested help. The reports of these strikes are concerning and we urge all parties to step back and reduce tensions urgently. Escalation serves no one in the region. Stability in the Middle East must be the priority and we are engaging partners to de-escalate. Now is the time for restraint,… — Keir Starmer (@Keir_Starmer) June 13, 2025 A Downing Street spokesman also refused to say whether Sir Keir had spoken to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu after the strikes or whether Israel had informed the UK of its plans beforehand. 'Our priority is to prevent further escalation in the Middle East, that's in no-one's interest … we're working closely with all our allies to press for that diplomatic solution,' a No 10 spokesman said. Iran's nuclear programme is 'more advanced than ever, and it is a clear threat to international peace and security', he said. 'We've urged Iran to continue engaging with President Trump's offer of a negotiated solution and we continue to liaise closely with our partners on this. 'We remain committed to finding a diplomatic solution but are prepared to take every diplomatic step to prevent Iran from developing nuclear weapons, including through snapback, if necessary.' Sir Keir earlier said it is time for 'restraint, calm and a return to diplomacy'. 'The reports of these strikes are concerning and we urge all parties to step back and reduce tensions urgently. Escalation serves no-one in the region.' The attack appeared to be the most significant Iran has faced since its war with Iraq in the 1980s. Foreign Secretary David Lammy said stability in the Middle East is 'vital' for global security. Stability in the Middle East is vital for global security. I'm concerned to see reports of strikes overnight. Further escalation is a serious threat to peace & stability in the region and in no one's interest. This is a dangerous moment & I urge all parties to show restraint. — David Lammy (@DavidLammy) June 13, 2025 'Further escalation is a serious threat to peace & stability in the region and in no-one's interest,' he said in a post on X. 'This is a dangerous moment & I urge all parties to show restraint.' It is understood that Mr Lammy had been due to travel to the US on Friday, but is now remaining in London. Mr Netanyahu said on Friday morning that the 'operation will continue for as many days as it takes to remove this threat'. In a clip posted on social media, he said Israel 'struck at the heart of Iran's nuclear enrichment programme' and 'the heart of Iran's nuclear weaponisation programme'. Iranian state television reported that the leader of the paramilitary Revolutionary Guard, Hossein Salami, was killed as well as chief of staff of the Iranian armed forces, General Mohammad Bagheri. US secretary of state Marco Rubio said Israel acted unilaterally. In a post on X, Mr Rubio said 'we are not involved in strikes against Iran and our top priority is protecting American forces in the region'. Mr Trump said he 'gave Iran chance after chance to make a deal' and warned that Israel has 'a lot of' US military equipment, and they 'know how to use it'. 'Iran must make a deal, before there is nothing left … JUST DO IT, BEFORE IT IS TOO LATE,' he posted on Truth Social. Shadow foreign secretary Dame Priti Patel said the UK 'must use our influence and diplomacy' to deliver 'stability in the Middle East'. In a post on X, she wrote: 'We must use our influence and diplomacy to work closely with all of our allies in the region and beyond to resolve conflicts, and deliver peace and stability in the Middle East.' Conservative Party leader Kemi Badenoch said 'warm words' would not stop Iran, and that she did not see Israel's action as an escalation. 'If Israel sees Iran getting nuclear weapons, I don't think it should sit back and put its feet up and say: 'Well, we're de-escalating'. 'Because the person, the country, that will escalate is Iran, and that would be absolutely disastrous for the entire world,' she told journalists in Scotland.
The Independent
25 minutes ago
- The Independent
Will Israel's war on Iran force Keir Starmer to raise defence spending even more?
One of the curiosities of Rachel Reeves's spending review was that the defence budget is planned to rise in 2027 and then stay at that level. In two years' time, defence spending is expected to rise from 2.3 to 2.5 per cent of national income, but to rise no further after that. This is despite Keir Starmer committing just days ago to the 'ambition' of raising it to 3 per cent 'in the next parliament when economic and fiscal conditions allow'. The prime minister spoke in sombre tones at the launch of the strategic defence review last week about the need to prepare for war and for the country to move to a state of 'war-fighting readiness'. Yet all his chancellor did on Wednesday to increase defence spending further was to redefine 'defence spending' to include the intelligence budget, which takes the plateau to 2.6 per cent. Given that the increase from 2.6 to 3 per cent is a substantial one, we might have expected Rachel Reeves to set out a rising trend towards it. But no. All the prime minister's talk of a changed world in which we must be prepared to fight wars again is backed up by an increase in spending that will take us back to the level of 2010, which will be paid for by cutting the aid budget, and then … nothing more. So far, Starmer has resisted pressure from Mark Rutte, the former Dutch prime minister who is secretary general of Nato, and from John Healey, his own defence secretary, to put a date on his 'ambition' of 3 per cent. Just before the strategic defence review was published, Healey and Starmer clashed in private when Healey said in an interview that there was 'no doubt' that the 3 per cent would be reached in the next parliament. Leaving aside the constitutional pedantry that no parliament can bind its successor, Starmer was annoyed at this attempt to bounce him into making a firm, expensive commitment. Healey was sent out to do more interviews in which the 3 per cent figure was once again downgraded to an 'ambition'. But there will be a Nato summit in the Hague on 24 June, at which Starmer will come under further pressure. Rutte visited London this week and – after his meeting with the prime minister – made a speech in which he publicly raised the bar. 'I expect allied leaders to agree to spend 5 per cent of GDP on defence,' he said. This is a number designed to impress Donald Trump, who has demanded that other Nato members spend 5 per cent, even though the US itself spends only 3.4 per cent of its national income on defence. The small print of Rutte's demand adds another layer of complication, as his 5 per cent figure is made up of 3.5 per cent as conventionally defined (including intelligence spending in the new British definition) plus 1.5 per cent on cybersecurity and defence-related spending. But his message to the British people was blunt: if we are not prepared to increase defence budgets to 3.5 per cent, he said, 'you had better learn to speak Russian'. Given that Starmer refuses to put a date on the lower target of 3 per cent, this means that there is a yawning gap to be bridged at the Hague in 11 days' time. Because the UK is one of the higher spending Nato members, there is some irritation in Downing Street and the Ministry of Defence at signals from Italy and Canada, which currently spend less than 1.5 per cent on defence, that they will sign up for the 3.5 per cent figure. The Israeli bombing of Iran will add to the sense that conflicts around the world are increasingly dangerous and that the post-Cold War peace dividend has been exhausted. The main pressure on European Nato members to increase defence spending, however, remains the war in Ukraine and the reluctance of the Trump administration to pay for it – as Rutte suggested on Monday. Britain will no doubt continue to help Israel defend itself against Iranian counterattacks, including through proxies such as the Houthis in Yemen, although Starmer's response to the attacks on Iran was more neutral than in the past. But Israel vs Iran is not a war that Nato is likely to join. The real pressure for higher Nato defence spending remains the need to prevent Vladimir Putin from advancing in Ukraine and to deter him from threatening his other European neighbours.
The Guardian
28 minutes ago
- The Guardian
UK government admits being ‘too slow' to spot US mistreatment of prisoners after 9/11
The UK government has admitted its intelligence agencies were 'too slow' to realise the CIA was mistreating prisoners in its post-9/11 torture programme, acknowledging in court for the first time involvement in US detention operations. The admission was made during a trial that concluded on Friday at the investigatory powers tribunal, which has been investigating claims that British intelligence was complicit in the mistreatment of two men who were repeatedly tortured by the CIA in the early 2000s. In court, arguments were heard about whether legal protections that authorise the intelligence services to commit criminal offences extend to cover complicity in torture and other forms of cruel and degrading mistreatment. The cases have been brought by lawyers representing Mustafa al-Hawsawi, who is accused by the US of aiding the hijackers behind the 9/11 terrorist attacks, and Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri, who is alleged to have plotted al-Qaida's bombing of a US naval ship in 2000. Both men have been detained in a US military prison at Guantánamo Bay since 2006. They face charges carrying the death penalty, though their cases have not yet gone to trial. Captured by the CIA in 2002 and 2003, the men spent several years in secret prisons known as 'black sites'. The tribunal heard how Hawsawi and Nashiri were held for several years in incommunicado at the black sites, where they were 'systematically' tortured and subjected to an array of brutal interrogation techniques, resulting in permanent physical and psychological damage. Lawyers for the men have argued there is credible evidence to infer that UK spy agencies, including MI5 and MI6, unlawfully aided, abetted, conspired or 'were otherwise complicit' in their torture and serious mistreatment by the CIA. The government would 'neither confirm nor deny' the allegations in open court, saying it had addressed the claims in secret proceedings before the tribunal, a special court with unique powers to obtain and consider classified evidence. However, the government admitted the intelligence agencies 'were too slow to appreciate the risk of mistreatment to detainees in CIA detention' and 'more detailed guidance should have been in place' to 'cover their broader engagement with the US in this context'. Sam Raphael, a professor at the University of Westminster and expert on the CIA's black site operations, said it was a 'startling' admission that went further than previous official statements because it 'appeared to explicitly concede for the first time that UK agencies were involved in the CIA's detention programme'. Hawsawi and Nashiri's lawyers argued that aiding or abetting torture and mistreatment by a foreign state would fall outside the scope of legal powers such as section 7 of the Intelligence Services Act 1994 – sometimes described as the 'James Bond clause' – which creates protections for spies to commit criminal activities abroad. 'They do not have unlimited powers,' said Hugh Southey KC, representing Nashiri. He argued that the law 'cannot be interpreted as permitting the UK agencies to facilitate acts of torture'. While the government claimed the UK did not participate in, encourage or condone the use of torture or other forms of cruel treatment 'for any purpose', its lawyers said the intelligence agencies nevertheless possessed powers that could be used to authorise a broad range of criminal conduct. Edward Craven KC, for Hawsawi, urged the tribunal to 'treat any denial of wrongdoing' by the intelligence agencies 'with an appropriate degree of caution'. He noted that MI5 was facing allegations that it gave 'false evidence' in a separate case before the tribunal. The tribunal will now hold a series of closed-door hearings, where the findings of its investigation will be considered in secret.
