Britain Says It Would Back US Over Iraq

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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Friday, March 01, 2002

Britain Says It Would Back US Over Iraq

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Britain would back U.S. action against Iraq if the "conditions were right," British Defense Secretary Geoff Hoon said Friday, amid mounting speculation that Washington is preparing to target Iraq in the next phase of the anti-terror war.

"Absolutely no decisions have been taken about any prospect of an attack," Hoon told the BBC.

But he added that the lesson of September 11 was that threats to stability could not be ignored.

Earlier, a former Labor defense minister urged Prime Minister Tony Blair to resist "hawks" in the U.S. administration and their "vendetta" against Iraq.

Hoon said: "I am confident that if the right conditions were set out we would support the United States."

Those conditions for an attack included whether Iraq was observing international law and the U.N. Security Council resolutions on allowing in weapons inspectors, he said.

Iraq denies claims it is hiding away plants making weapons of mass destruction.

But Hoon said: "If there is no evidence of wrong-doing, then I can't understand why Iraq should not allow inspectors to look at various sites."

On Thursday, the Iraqi Government said it was ready to let in British arms inspectors if Britain could say where the weapons of mass destruction are being kept.

"If Blair tells us, and the world, where and when these weaponsare being produced (in Iraq), we are ready to immediately receive a British mission sent by Blair, accompanied by a group of Britishmedia men," a Baghdad government spokesman was quoted by the IraqiNews Agency INA as saying.

Hoon said Britain would examine such an offer, which would be welcome if it allowed full inspections.

He added: "What September 11 did was that it concentrated our minds on those places, those countries in particular, that we had perhaps taken our eye off and had not sufficiently concentrated onand that were a threat to world security."

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