Sophist Captious or fallacious reasoner, quibbler.

Or, as I'd put it, someone who doesn't really believe the arguments they are putting forward, but is going through the motions because it's their job. Which seems pretty evidently to be the situation of the representatives of the British Government on this issue.
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"If we really believe in the basic truths of equality for women..." which has of course been advanced so effectively in Iraq by the invasion...