Labour misled Britain over Iraq role in terror threat – Farron

Commenting on Eliza Manningham-Buller’s evidence to the Chilcot Inquiry, in which she said the conflict in Iraq ‘substantially’ increased the threat to the UK from international terrorism, Co-Chair of the Liberal Democrat Parliamentary Committee on Foreign Affairs and Defence, Tim Farron said:

“This is a shattering blow for Labour’s claim that the Iraq war did not increase the terrorist threat to Britain.

“We already knew that this was a disastrous war for our own brave service personnel and hundreds of thousands of Iraqi civilians. Now we have the head of MI5 at the time saying it increased the threat to Britain – the precise opposite of what Labour claimed it would do.

“As Foreign Secretary in the last Government, David Miliband must come clean on why his administration misled the British people on this issue for so long.”