War
Criminal Tony Blair's Astonishing Attack On Jeremy
Corbyn
By Charlie Cooper
June 08, 2016 "Information
Clearing House"
- "The
Independent"
-
Jeremy Corbyn
represents the “politics of protest”
and is standing by while people are
“bombed, beaten and starved into
submission” in Syria,
Tony Blair has said, in his most
vehement attack on the Labour leader
yet.
The former Prime Minister, who is
awaiting the publication of the
Chilcot Report into the Iraq
War, dismissed Mr Corbyn as the “guy
with the placard” and suggested he
was incapable of making the
“difficult decisions” required of a
world leader.
Attacking Mr Corbyn, who has
suggested that Mr Blair should face
a war crimes investigation, the
former Labour leader told Bloomberg:
“I’m accused of being a war criminal
for removing Saddam Hussein – who by
the way was a war criminal – and yet
Jeremy is seen as a progressive icon
as we stand by and watch the people
of Syria barrel-bombed, beaten and
starved into submission and do
nothing.”
He said that both Mr Corbyn and US
Republican presidential nominee
Donald Trump had benefitted from the
“revolutionary phenomenon” of social
media, which he said could win mass
support for political figures on
“waves of sentiment and emotion”.
Outlining how he felt his style of
politics differed to Mr Corbyn’s, he
said: “There’s a guy whose face is
on the placard. That’s me: hate that
guy. You’re the person in power
taking difficult decisions. Jeremy
is the guy with the placard, he’s
the guy holding it. One’s the
politics of power and the other’s
the politics of protest.”
Blair
hints he could reject the findings of the
Chilcot inquiry
Last year,
Mr Corbyn said the former prime minister could be
made to stand trial for war crimes, saying that he
thought the Iraq War was an illegal one and that Mr
Blair "has to explain that".
“We went
into a war that was catastrophic, that was illegal,
that cost us a lot of money, that lost a lot of
lives,” he told Newsnight in August. “The
consequences are still played out with migrant
deaths in the Mediterranean, refugees all over the
region,” he said.
In response
to Mr Blair's astonishing attack, a spokesman for Mr
Corbyn said: "What Tony Blair says is a matter for
him. If he is suggesting that Jeremy Corbyn is
leading a politics of protest, I would say that's
not correct. Jeremy Corbyn is leading the Opposition
and building support against a Conservative
Government."
Tony Blair: A career of
controversies
He added
that the Labour leader will not budge from his
refusal to share platforms with Conservatives or the
cross-party Stronger In campaign in the last few
days before the EU referendum.
Mr Corbyn
has been criticised from all sides for refusing to
share platforms with Conservative opponents of
Brexit during the referendum and been urged to make
a stronger case for the Remain camp.
Asked
whether he would be prepared to appear alongside Mr
Blair on pro-EU platforms, the Labour leader's
spokesman said: "I think Tony Blair has been
involved in the Stronger In campaign. We have made
it absolutely clear Jeremy is only working on the
Labour In campaign. We are not sharing platforms
with the Stronger In campaign and we are not sharing
platforms with the Tories."
He added:
"There are no plans to share a platform with Tony
Blair ... We are not asking Tony Blair to do that,
let's be clear about that."
On Tuesday,
it was reported Mr Blair is expected to defend
himself against the findings by claiming the
situation in the
Middle East would have been worse if Saddam Hussein
had been left in power.
Assad
close to
being knighted under Blair
Asma and
Bashar al-Assad meeting the Queen during their 2002
visit (Kirsty Wigglesworth/Scott Barbour)
TONY
BLAIR’S government considered asking the Queen to
bestow an honorary knighthood on President Bashar
al-Assad, the Syrian dictator, official papers
reveal.
The
decision to court Assad came despite the Syrian
leader attacking Israel and comparing
pro-Palestinian terrorists to the French resistance
at an event attended by Blair.
Discussions
about the honour took place ahead of Assad’s visit
to Britain in 2002 during which he sought “as much
pomp and ceremony as possible”. The Arab leader was
granted audiences with the Queen and the Prince of
Wales, lunch with Blair at Downing Street, a
platform in parliament and many other privileges.
http://www.thesundaytimes.co.uk/sto/news/uk_news/National/article1072174.ece
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