Backing U.S. in Iraq put UK at risk, think tank says

Backing U.S. in Iraq put UK at risk, think tank says

Paul Majendie
Reuters/London

An influential think-tank said on Monday that backing the United
States in Iraq put Britain more at risk from terrorist attacks,
an accusation forcefully rejected by Prime Minister Tony Blair's
government.

Security experts said the Iraq war had boosted recruitment and
fund-raising for al-Qaeda, suspected of being behind London
bombings on July 7 that killed 55 people.

The report was issued as Britain's interior minister, Charles
Clarke, met opposition party leaders to seek a consensus in
drawing up tougher anti-terror legislation, such as outlawing
acts preparing or inciting acts of terrorism.

Police probing the London underground train and bus attacks
say they have found no indication the bombs carried timers. That
would mean they were manually detonated by the four bombers,
caught on CCTV camera heading off on their deadly mission.

The report from the respected Royal Institute of International
Affairs said Britain had suffered by playing "pillion passenger"
to Washington.

"The UK is at particular risk because it is the closest ally
of the United States," said security experts Frank Gregory and
Paul Wilkinson.

The report provoked a strikingly robust rebuttal.

Foreign Secretary Jack Straw said: "The time for excuses for
terrorism is over. The terrorists have struck across the world,
in countries allied with the United States, backing the war in
Iraq, and in countries which had nothing whatever to do with the
war in Iraq.

"They struck in Kenya, in Tanzania, in Indonesia, in the
Yemen, they struck this weekend in Turkey which was not
supporting our action in Iraq."

Blair, whose trust ratings plummeted due to the Iraq conflict,
has always refuted the notion that Britain's role in wars in Iraq
and Afghanistan has made the country less safe.

He argues that terrorism, including the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks
on the United States, was a threat well before those conflicts
and has affected many different countries.

In their report, the security experts said British
intelligence services had been preoccupied with Irish Republican
extremists and had looked in the wrong direction for years.

"As a result of giving low priority to international
terrorism, the British authorities did not fully appreciate the
threat from al-Qaeda," they said.

Wilkinson and Gregory said conducting counter-terrorism
measures shoulder to shoulder with the U.S. was a key problem
because London was in no way an equal partner.

"Riding pillion with a powerful ally has proved costly in
terms of British and U.S. military lives, Iraqi lives, military
expenditure and the damage caused to the counter-terrorism
campaign," they said.

They said al-Qaeda's profile has also been raised by the war
in Iraq.

"It gave a boost to the al-Qaeda network's propaganda,
recruitment and fundraising," the report concluded.

Defense Secretary John Reid added his voice to the
government's dismissal of the report, arguing the whole
international community had to confront terrorism.

"One of the lessons of history is that if you run away from
this it doesn't actually get better," Reid told the BBC.