- Geoff Hoon, the Defence Secretary, issued a veiled rebuke
to his cabinet colleague Clare Short yesterday when he insisted that Britain
was prepared to launch a nuclear strike on Iraq "in the right conditions".
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- Ms Short, the International Development Secretary, had
declared on Friday that she could foresee no scenario in which a retaliatory
nuclear strike would serve any useful purpose, even if Saddam Hussein used
biological and chemical weapons.
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- But Mr Hoon told BBC's Breakfast with Frost that the
Iraqi leader "can be absolutely confident" the UK was willing
to use nuclear weapons "in conditions of extreme self- defence".
The Defence Secretary said: "We have always made it clear that we
would reserve the right to use nuclear weapons."
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- His remarks came as John Reid, the Labour Party chairman,
became the first cabinet minister to hit back at Nelson Mandela's criticism
of Tony Blair yesterday, claiming that the former South African president
was "not infallible".
-
- Mr Reid also declared that President Jacques Chirac would
soon agree with Britain that a second UN resolution was essential to force
Baghdad to disarm its weapons of mass destruction.
-
- A possible split in the Labour Party was underlined yesterday
when normally loyal Labour MPs said they would rebel if Britain took part
in military action without a second resolution.
-
- Mr Reid confirmed that Labour whips had been contacting
backbenchers to gauge opposition to Britain's backing for a United States-led
assault on Iraq. But he told the Politics Show on BBC1: "We have strained
every muscle to go down the route of the UN, to bring in not only the European
countries but the US itself. We want to see a second resolution Ð incidentally
it's not the second Ð it's the 12th resolution.
-
- In a reference to possible opposition by Russia or China,
he said: "The only circumstances under which we would consider it
legitimate to envisage military conflict without such a second resolution
is if the inspectors themselves came back and said there has been a material
breach, but for some national interest reason one country puts a veto on
that."
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- © 2002 Independent Digital (UK) Ltd
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