Via Norm comes the news that Labour MP Harry Barnes who founded Labour Against the War has resigned from the group. According to Barnes:
“Labour Against the War hasn’t adopted a creditable analysis of the changed position and adopts an approach which aids terrorist, religious extremist and anti-democratic forces in the Middle East.”
The North East Derbyshire MP opposed the war in every Commons vote but says that the group, which includes Commons warhorses such as Alice Mahon MP, Jeremy Corbyn MP and Alan Simpson MP, has failed to understand the new realities of Iraq: “Unfortunately, the invasion took place but this led to a situation where the options facing the Iraqi people changed.”
Mr Barnes says that “I thought it was right to oppose the war. But history moves on and the Iraqi people now have a golden opportunity to take back their country and build a decent non-sectarian democracy based on social justice. There are huge obstacles but I hope that parts of the left don’t make themselves part of the problem by ignoring the urgent need to back the new Iraqi labour movement. Labour Against the War is standing in the way of solidarity and I have resigned to help alert the wider movement to the need to support Grassroots Iraq.”