OXFORD Socialist Alliance has condemned the latest escalation of bombing of targets in Iraq by British and US warplanes. The most recent attacks, reportedly against "military installations" in Baghdad follow ten years of continual military offensive and aerial attacks against Iraq which have left over 100 civilians dead.

The unilateral action by Britain and the US has been almost universally condemned as illegal and unwarranted, not least by the British government’s EU partner governments and by former UN envoys to Iraq.

They have stressed the damage and suffering caused by the unremitting sanctions against Iraq, which have led to the deaths of tens of thousands of Iraqi children and deepened the misery of ordinary Iraqi civilians.

JOHN LISTER, the Socialist Alliance’s PPC for Oxford East said:

"This latest military attack, in which six RAF warplanes flew alongside 40 US fighters, sums up the Labour government’s subservience to the Pentagon, and George W Bush. Britain and the US are isolated in this action.

"Tony Blair claims that his government is defending British pilots: but the only reason the pilots are in any danger is because they are daily flying provocatively over Iraqi airspace – with no legal right to do so. This is getting nowhere.

"Ten years of sanctions and bombing have failed in any way to dent the control of Saddam’s regime, but instead have been most cruelly felt by Iraqi children and working people. Any further barbaric attacks by the so-called western democracies will simply rally support around Saddam. The bombing and sanctions must be stopped at once."