| Topic: |
Politics > Politics-USA |
| User: |
"TruthIsStrongerThanDeceit" |
| Date: |
10 Sep 2004 08:24:54 PM |
| Object: |
Blair on the ropes, soon to be Bush's turn. |
Friday, September 10, 2004 by the Guardian/UK
New Blow to Blair Over Iraq
Report concludes no WMD as PM completes reshuffle
by Michael White, Patrick Wintour and Kevin Maguire
Tony Blair will be confronted with a fresh challenge over Iraq within the
next two weeks when the long-awaited final report of the Iraq Survey Group
concludes there were no weapons of mass destruction in the country at the
time of the US-UK invasion.
The Guardian has learned that the team of weapons inspectors sent in by
Washington and London at the end of the war to comb Iraq will find that
though the threat of Saddam Hussein was real, there were no stockpiles.
The absence of banned weapons has long been suspected, but the finality of
the report's conclusion, together with its timing on the eve of the Labour
party conference in Brighton, will be controversial.
It may encourage Labour critics who want a show of repentance from Mr Blair
and a promise of no more pre-emptive wars to be more vocal. The prime
minister had hoped to focus the conference on domestic issues.
The news of the latest Iraq threat to Mr Blair's political leadership came
as he completed a reshuffle designed to shore up his embattled premiership.
Alan Milburn, the new policy supremo, attended the week's cabinet and urged
his colleagues to "pull together".
Although it has been obvious since last year that the Iraq Survey Group was
unlikely to unearth anything, its final verdict is an embarrassment to
President Bush and Mr Blair.
Before the invasion, both governments claimed Saddam had a covert programme
to produce chemical and biological weapons, to manufacture ballistic
missiles and had renewed its search for a nuclear bomb. Mr Blair did,
however, soften his stance in July, telling MPs: "I have to accept that we
have not found them and that we may not find them."
The prime minister also faces other looming difficulties which could further
rock his political stability through the autumn. They include:
· Hunting. The latest compromise - a total ban but preceded by a two-year
delay - was designed in part to assuage Labour backbenchers worried about
government drift. But critics of the hunting bill have been incensed by the
timeframe and are threatening to tear the legislation apart. Since the
pro-hunting peers are also determined to wreck the compromise, No 10 may be
back to square one.
· TUC conference. Mr Blair faces persistent resentment and a potentially
hostile reception from the TUC next week when he speaks in Brighton. The
leader of the Transport and General Workers' Union today launches an attack
on "politicians squabbling like ferrets in a sack" and warns that a fragile
truce between government and unions would be shattered if manifesto promises
are broken.
In today's Guardian, Tony Woodley, the union's general secretary, warns the
prime minister that the reform package agreed at July's party policy forum
meeting in Warwick is an inviolable base line.
"It is one of the unfortunate weaknesses in the way 'new Labour' does its
business that whenever unity appears to be breaking out in the party,
division and discord is stirred up again," he writes.
Five days of clashes at the top of government have left critics of Mr Blair
inside the party emboldened. Some prominent backbench figures say if the
prime minister makes one more serious misjudgment, they will trigger a
challenge to his leadership.
In the short term, Mr Blair's hand has been strengthened by a reshuffle that
saw the return of his key ally, Mr Milburn, the former health secretary, to
run the coming election campaign in place of Gordon Brown. Yesterday the
prime minister went further when he plucked the 36-year-old highflyer Ruth
Kelly from the chancellor's Treasury team to be Mr Milburn's deputy.
Touring the TV and radio studios, Mr Milburn dismissed suggestions that Mr
Brown is being sidelined as "complete nonsense". This did not disguise
bitterness in the Brown camp over the apparent reduction of his election
campaign role. "When I hear people saying that somebody who is such a
towering figure as Gordon - who has played such a big part in this
government and its achievements - isn't going to have a key role in this
general election campaign, that is cloud-cuckoo land," Mr Milburn insisted.
The return of Mr Milburn has undoubtedly upset the chancellor's camp, though
one official played this down yesterday. "If Gordon is being excluded and is
not playing the same role as in the last two big victories, we will shrug
our shoulders and get on with the job," he said.
Ten junior posts swapped hands yesterday without a sacking. Douglas
Alexander, a Brown protege who gave up the honorific title Chancellor of the
Duchy of Lancaster to Mr Milburn, also lost his Cabinet Office job working
on policy to Ms Kelly.He takes Mike O'Brien's trade brief at the Foreign
Office while Stephen Timms moves back to the Treasury in Ms Kelly's old job,
financial secretary, and Mr O'Brien gets Mr Timms' post of energy minister.
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines04/0910-01.htm
--
They Knew...
Despite the whitewash, we now know that the Bush administration was warned
before the war that its Iraq claims were weak
http://www.inthesetimes.com/site/main/article/they_knew_0802/
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