Blair believes God will judge him on Iraq war (AFP) Updated: 2006-03-04 21:35
British Prime Minister Tony Blair said believes God will judge him on his
decision to go to war with Iraq.
British Prime
Minister Tony Blair, seen here in 2004, said he believes God will judge
him on his decision to go to war with Iraq.
[AFP] | In an interview with chat show host
Michael Parkinson to be broadcast on Britain's ITV1 television Saturday, Blair
said he made policy decisions according to his conscience, which is guided by
his Christian faith.
Asked about joining the US-led invasion in March 2003, he said: "That
decision has to be taken and has to be lived with, and in the end there is a
judgment that -- well, I think if you have faith about these things then you
realise that judgment is made by other people."
Pushed to clarify what he meant, Blair, a devout Christian, replied: "If you
believe in God, it's made by God as well."
He said: "This is not just a matter of a policy here or a thing there, but of
their lives and in some case their death ... the only way you can take a
decision like that is to try to do the right thing, according to your conscience
and for the rest of it you leave it to the judgment that history will make."
Parkinson asked Blair whether he prays to God when making a decision such as
going to war.
He responded: "Well, I don't want to get into something like that."
Pressed on the subject Blair answered: "Of course you struggle with your own
conscience about it because people's lives are affected and it's one of these
situations that I suppose very few people ever find themselves in. In the end
you do what you think is the right thing."
In October last year US president George W. Bush US allegedly said God told
him to invade Iraq and Afghanistan, according to a report.
Blair's comments were immediately criticised by opposition political parties
and families of some of the 103 British soldiers who have died since the start
of the conflict.
Menzies Campbell, leader of the smaller opposition Liberal Democrats, which
opposed military action, said: "Going to war isn't just an act of faith, it
requires rigorous analysis of the legality of doing so, the likelihood of
success, the number of possible casualties and the long-term consquences.
"My complaint of the prime minister is that while he may have believed what
he was doing was right, the prospect for military action was flawed."
His Lib Dem colleague Evan Harris, an honorary associate of campaign group
the National Secular Society, agreed.
"Our political system relies on decisions being made by accountable and
elected politicians, not by their or anyone else's gods," Harris said.
"It's a bizarre and shocking revelation that the prime minister claims to
have been guided by the supernatural in this matter, especially given the
particular religious sensitivities in the Middle East.
"Politicians should avoid references to deities in their public life. We
don't want Bush or Khomeini-type fundamentalism in our politics."
Reg Keys, whose son Tom was one of six Royal Military Police officers killed
by an Iraqi mob in June 2003, said god and religion had nothing to do with the
conflict.
"This is his (Blair's) effort to fudge it. War should be the final option
that a prime minister takes when all avenues have failed," said Keys, who stood
against the prime minister in the last general election on an anti-war ticket.
"In my view those other avenues hadn't failed. He is using God as a get-out
for total strategic failure and I find it abhorrent."
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