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Blair under new Iraq pressure
10/05/2004 11:21 - (SA)
Robert MacPherson
London - An apology from British Prime Minister Tony Blair over alleged torture of prisoners in Iraq failed to damp down controversy over
the abuse on Monday.
The government was due to make a new
statement in Parliament and a prominent member of Blair's Labour
Party openly called for his resignation.
Defence Minister Geoff Hoon was to address the House of Commons
later in the day on the situation in Iraq, amid speculation that
the furore could further undermine the prime minister's standing as
he prepares for a general election next year.
Lord David Puttnam, a senior member of Blair's governing Labour
Party, and a personal friend of the prime minister, suggested over
the weekend that perhaps the time had come for Blair to bow out.
"The prime minister is synonymous with Iraq, and Iraq will only
deliver bad news," Puttnam told ITV television. "If I were him, I
would go before the summer (parliamentary) recess."
Speaking in Paris to French television on Sunday, Blair
meanwhile said: "We apologise deeply to anyone who has been
mistreated by our soldiers. This is totally unacceptable."
Meanwhile, an ICM poll for the Independent newspaper indicated
that 55 percent of Britons want British troops out of Iraq after
the planned June 30 handover of some power to Iraqis.
The poll, published on Monday, was conducted between April 30 and May 2, just as the prisoner abuse scandal was beginning to unfold.
Britain was pulled into the prisoner torture furore on May 1
when the Daily Mirror ran photos purporting to show a British
soldier beating and urinating on an Iraqi prisoner in
British-controlled southern Iraq.
- AFP
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