UK repeating Iraq mistakes in Afghanistan, says former minister
London, May 2, IRNA – The British occupation of southern Iraq has ended in unmitigated disaster with the withdrawal of UK troops leaving Basra in a much worse condition than they found it, according to former British Labour cabinet minister Tony Benn.
“The withdrawal of the British troops leaves Iraq in no better state than when they arrived,” said Benn, who is president of the Stop the War Coalition (STWC).
“The decision to move the troops to Afghanistan is a repetition of the same mistakes for which we will pay dearly,” the veteran politician warned.
His warning comes as STWC, Britain’s biggest peace group network, is focusing its campaign on getting UK troops out of Afghanistan following the end of military operations in Basra this week.
A new petition has been launched to be delivered to Prime Minister Gordon Brown after he announced a change in strategy in Afghanistan, temporarily increasing the number of the UK troops to 9,000 and turning more attention to the mountainous border with Pakistan.
“Only the Afghan people themselves can generate a political solution to their country’s problems,” said the petition, which blames Nato’s military intervention of the deteriorating situation and calls for a complete withdrawal of all UK troops.
SWTC said that it was an “unwinnable war” in Afghanistan. “The new strategy is more of the same -- more troops waging more war, more civilian deaths, more destruction,” with more Afghans joining the resistance to oppose the occupation of their country.
"Afghanistan and Pakistan are the breeding ground, the crucible of terrorism. A chain of terror links these areas to the streets of many of the capital cities of the world," Brown said last week, while visiting UK troops in Helmand province.
STWC said that the British premier was right. “The more terror the US and British armed forces rain down on Afghanistan and Pakistan, the more the victims who survive will be driven to acts of desperation against the perpetrators,” it said.
It calculated that 103 times more people have been killed in Iraq & Afghanistan than in all terrorist attacks between 1993 and 2004, based upon figures of the lowest credible estimates.
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