Blair is called to account again over war in Iraq

It is widely documented that, prior to the Iraq war, Lord Goldsmith gave Blair advice that his case for going to war was only "a reasonable one".

In his statement of March 17 Goldsmith says, "In assessing the risks of acting on the basis of a reasonably arguable case, you will wish to take account of the ways in which the matter might be brought before a court".

At the time I read this as a warning that Tony Blair might want to ensure that this matter never ever came before a court. Well, Blair's lawyers might want to re-rehearse those dubious arguments because the day Tony hoped would never materialise is upon him after the families of four soldiers killed in Iraq won their battle in the Court of Appeal to apply for a judicial review of the Government's refusal to hold an independent inquiry into the decision to go to war.

The appeal judges concluded that there was force in the argument that the circumstances leading up to the invasion were insufficiently clear as to warrant an investigation into that, into the lawfulness of the invasion itself and into whether it caused the men’s deaths.

The applicants are relatives of four men who died in military action. They want to force a full public inquiry into why Britain entered the conflict.

Three days were set aside for a hearing in November.

Technically, this will be an application for leave to bring a judicial review against the Government for refusing an inquiry. The judges will hear full arguments from both sides and reach a decision on the merits of the challenge, lawyers said.

Neither the Prime Minister nor any witnesses will attend, but lawyers for each side will submit full evidence in support of their outline arguments.

Phil Shiner, the families’ solicitor, said: “The Government must finally explain how the 13-page equivocal advice from the Attorney-General of March 7, 2003, was changed within ten days to a one-page completely unequivocal advice that an invasion would be legal. In changing his advice, he sent these soldiers to their deaths.”

We probably shouldn't get too excited about this as the families are unlikely to succeed in forcing the government to order a full public inquiry as the ordering of such an enquiry, as the judges pointed out, were “essentially matters for the executive and Parliament”.

Nevertheless, the judges ruling highlights one very important point, "It is at least arguable that the question whether the invasion was lawful, or reasonably thought to have been lawful, as a matter of international law is worthy of investigation."

That question is one that many of us would like to see answered by an international court of law. Was the Iraq war legal? I am strongly of the opinion that it was not.

Tags: Court of Appeal, Iraq war, legal, illegal,