Shaun Shute, is really scraping the barrel with his latest letter (23/02/04) to attempt a justification of the Iraq war. In the wake of the Hutton fiasco, one truth remains unassailed: Tony Blair ordered an unprovoked invasion of another country on a totally false pretext, and that lies and deceptions manufactured in London and Washington caused the deaths of over 20,000 Iraqis and nearly 600 coalition soldiers. More are still dying. The truth is that the Blair government has known, almost from the day it came to office in 1997, that Iraq's weapons of mass destruction were almost certainly destroyed following the 1991 Gulf War - just as Bush's weapons expert, David Kay, has now confirmed. Saddam was certainly evil, but the war was not about human rights, as Bush and Blair's courtship of Uzbekistan and others proves. The situation in Iraq is now quite appaulling. More than 13,000 people are held in concentration camps (many more than Saddam imprisoned in recent years). None have been charged. And since Saddam's capture, uprisings have accelerated, including by groups that were anti-Saddam. This is not surprising in view of the proposed "puppet democracy" and selling off of Iraq assets by the U.S.. However one piece of intelligence we know was true. A report that warned Blair that an attack on Iraq would only increase worldwide terrorism, especially against British interests and citizens. He chose to ignore it, as he chose to ignore the alternatives to war.

Carol Kambites, Gloucestershire Green Party.