One Hundred Thousand Deaths Too High a "Blood Price"

8.54.26pm GMT Sun 31st Oct 2004

The news that 100,000 Iraqi civilians, many of them women and children, have died since the US invaded Iraq is the final confirmation of the obscene nature of Tony Blair's foreign policy, say local Liberal Democrats.

A survey published in the top medical science journal The Lancet shows that the level of violent deaths soared 58 fold - mainly as a result of US air strikes - following the invasion. The total death rate in Iraq is now between one and a half and two and a half times the rate before the war started.

Liberal Democrat parliamentary spokesperson Richard Allanach said:

"Everything about this news is horrifying. These are absolutely needless deaths. As horrifying is the government's indifference to the plight of Iraqi civilians. In the UK every aspect of our life is subject to government measurement, control and targets - from the number of LPG vehicles used by government departments to the number of song birds in our fields. Yet the government has made no attempt to measure the number of people killed by its policies in Iraq. It is left to an independent group of scientists to show the horrific impact of Tony Blair's decision to go to war."

"It is no wonder that Andy King is not prepared to defend his decision to back this war in public. The only honourable course open to him now is to resign."