Blair regrets Iraq victims, but urges action on Iran (2nd Roundup)

Jan 21, 2011, 18:48 GMT

London - Former British prime minister Tony Blair Friday expressed 'deep and profound' regret for the loss of life in the Iraq conflict, but made clear that it was now Iran which posed a 'looming and coming challenge.'

While offering his first public apology over Iraq war victims - something that had long been demanded by relatives of the 179 British soldiers who died in the conflict - Blair said the West should now focus its attention on the threat from Iran.

'I am out in that region the whole time. I see the impact and influence of Iran everywhere. It is negative, destabilizing and supportive of terrorist groups. It is doing everything it can to impede progress in the Middle East peace process,' said Blair, who is a special envoy to the UN Middle East Quartet.

'The West has to get out of what I think is this wretched policy, or posture, of apology for believing that we are causing what the Iranians are doing, or what these extremists are doing. The fact is we are not,' he said.

'The fact is they are doing it because they disagree fundamentally with our way of life and they will carry on doing it unless they are met with the requisite determination and, if necessary, force.'

Blair made his remarks during his appearance in London Friday before Britain's Iraq Inquiry, which is investigating the events and decisions that led to the 2003 invasion and the toppling of Saddam Hussein.

Blair, who was prime minister at the time, first gave evidence to the inquiry a year ago. He said then that he had 'no regrets' about Britain's role in toppling Saddam.

'I wanted to make it clear that, of course, I regret deeply and profoundly the loss of life, whether from our own armed forces, those of other nations, the civilians who helped people in Iraq or the Iraqis themselves,' said Blair.

But he was barraged by some of the relatives attending the inquiry, who said his apology came 'too late.' One mother told him: 'You have lied. Your lies have killed our son.'

Critics have always questioned the legal basis on which Blair took Britain to war, alleging that he pledged his military support to former US president George W Bush long before the parliamentary process in Britain, and United Nations discussions, were completed.

The questions of the legality of the war, and Blair's private notes to Bush in the run-up to the conflict, were at the centre of Friday's hearing.

'You can count on us, but here are the difficulties,' he had told Bush in one of the notes eight months before the invasion, Blair revealed.

Under questioning, Blair conceded that he had 'disregarded' initial advice from Peter Goldsmith, the government's chief legal adviser at the time, that the invasion would be illegal without a second UN resolution.

But he stressed that he considered such guidance as 'provisional.'

With the benefit of hindsight, however, he conceded that he should have paid greater attention to the role of Goldsmith, who has since said that he was 'uncomfortable' with Blair's interpretation of his advice.

Compared with his evidence last year, when Blair delivered a robust defence of his decision to 'stand shoulder to shoulder' with Bush on Iraq, he went to some length Friday to explain how difficult it had been for him, politically at home, to back Bush.

'It was not a great secret that I was right alongside America after September 11,' said Blair. 'But for me, the situation was very, very hot politically,' said Blair, referring to divisions in his own cabinet and the risk that parliament would not back him.

'But whatever the political heat, I wasn't going to back out when the going got tough. I was not going to be in a position where I was going to start putting that problem before the president of the United States before I was in a position where definitely I knew I had to.'

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