Fifty-two former British diplomats delivered a damning critique on Monday of Prime Minister Tony Blair's close alliance with US President George W. Bush and their "doomed" Middle East policy.
The former diplomats, many of whom served as ambassadors in Israel, Iraq, Saudi Arabia and other parts of the region, sent a joint letter to Downing Street and released it to the media.
Among those signing the letter are former ambassadors to Israel, Iraq and other Middle Eastern capitals, as well as senior British envoys to the UN. They accused both governments of abandoning important principles of impartiality in the Holy Land, while engaging in poor planning and military overkill against Iraqi resistance forces in the Sunni Muslim areas west of Baghdad and in Shiite Muslim strongholds around Najaf.
PHOTO: REUTERS
They told Blair they had "watched with deepening concern the policies which you have followed on the Arab-Israel problem and Iraq, in close cooperation with the United States." They condemned a US strategy in Iraq they see as over-reliant on force.
"Heavy weapons unsuited to the task in hand, inflammatory language, the current confrontations in Najaf and Falluja, all these have built up rather than isolated the opposition," they said.
But the spark for the letter came from an abrupt change in policy towards the Palestinians announced by Bush in Washington last month and apparently endorsed by Blair. Bush, after meeting Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, supported the continuation of the bulk of the illegal Jewish settlements on the West Bank.
Such a letter from diplomats with wide experience in the region -- one of them, Richard Muir, was ambassador to Kuwait until 2002 -- is an embarrassment for Blair.
The former diplomats said Blair needed to show as a "matter of the highest urgency" he has real influence in Washington.
"If that is unacceptable or unwelcome, there is no case for supporting policies which are doomed to failure," they wrote.
A Downing Street spokesman played down the criticism: "The [government's] position on the issues raised in this letter are well-known. The authors of the letter are entitled to express their views."
The spokesman defended the government's policies as energetic in the pursuit of peace and stability. He insisted that the Sharon plan offered an opportunity to return to peace negotiations.
Foreign Office minister Mike O'Brien said yesterday that Britain has to be ``realistic'' about the limits of its influence on the US. He said the government had exerted some influence on Bush's policies, especially in encouraging him to accept the principle of a Palestinian state.
"I think we have got to be realistic. We can influence the United States but we can't control the superpower. They listen to our quiet diplomacy but they also have their own policy,'' O'Brien said in an interview with BBC radio.
South Korea’s air force yesterday apologized for a 2021 midair collision involving two fighter jets, a day after auditors said the pilots were taking selfies and filming during the flight and held them responsible for the accident. “We sincerely apologize to the public for the concern caused by the accident that occurred in 2021,” an air force spokesman told a news conference, adding that one of the pilots involved had been suspended from flying duties, received severe disciplinary action and has since left the military. The apology followed a report released on Wednesday by the South Korean Board of Audit and Inspection,
Indonesian police have arrested 13 people after shocking images of alleged abuse against small children at a daycare center went viral, sparking outrage across the nation, officials said on Monday. Police on Friday last week raided Little Aresha, a daycare center in Yogyakarta on Java island, following a report from a former employee. CCTV footage circulating on social media showed children, most younger than two, lying on the floor wearing only diapers, their hands and feet bound with rags. The police have confirmed that the footage is authentic. Police said they also found 20 children crammed into a room just 3m by 3m. “So
About 240 Indians claiming descent from a Biblical tribe landed at Tel Aviv airport on Thursday as part of a government operation to relocate them to Israel. The newcomers passed under a balloon arch in blue and white, the colors of the Israeli flag, as dozens of well-wishers welcomed them with a traditional Jewish song. They were the first “bnei Menashe” (“sons of Manasseh”) to arrive in Israel since the government in November last year announced funding for the immigration of about 6,000 members of the community from the states of Manipur and Mizoram in northeast India. The community claims to descend from
‘TROUBLING’: The firing of Phelan, who was an adviser to a nonprofit that supported the defense of Taiwan, was another example of ‘dysfunction’ under Trump, a US senator said US Secretary of the Navy John Phelan has been fired, a US official and a person familiar with the matter said on Wednesday, in another wartime shakeup at the Pentagon coming just weeks after US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth ousted the Army’s top general. The Pentagon announced his departure in a brief statement, saying he was leaving the administration “effective immediately,” but it did not provide a reason or say whether it was his decision to go. The sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said Phelan was dismissed in part because he was moving too slowly to implement reforms to
RSS