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Tories to urge joined-up security Tory think-tank attacks Iraq war
(about 10 hours later)
The Conservatives are to call for the establishment of a National Security Council to better coordinate the fight against terrorism. The invasion of Iraq is a failed policy that has made the UK more likely to be a terrorist target, says a think-tank's report for the Conservative Party.
Links between foreign policy decisions, such as the Iraq war, and domestic security can no longer be ignored, a key party policy group will say. The National and International Security Policy Group will warn against the UK being the "mute partner" of the US.
It will also urge renewed efforts for political reform in the Middle East. The document, to be unveiled on Monday, calls for an "international framework" uniting Islamic and Western states.
The group, chaired by Dame Pauline Neville Jones, will publish its interim findings on Monday. Tory leader David Cameron is set to back its call for a new body to study the impact of foreign policy.
"We need to recognise that a central element of foreign policy - the intervention in Iraq - has failed in its objectives so badly that the threat to this country is actually greater than it was before it began," the report will say. The proposed UK National Security Council would have interdepartmental staff and would be responsible for making every policy "coherent in the sense that it takes fully into account the likely consequences at home and abroad".
And it will stress that "it is no longer possible to look at domestic security policy and foreign policy separately from each other". What we can't do in future is hang our whole strategy on the military Dame Pauline Neville-Jones
'New framework' Departments involved would include the Foreign and Home Offices, the Department for International Development, the Ministry of Defence, the intelligence agencies and the Cabinet Office.
Dame Pauline is a former head of the joint intelligence committee, which played a central role in advising ministers in the run-up to the Iraq war. The document says foreign and domestic security policy has been hindered by a "lack of balance, lack of careful preparation and lack of coherence".
She backs the Conservatives' longstanding proposal for a dedicated homeland security minister. The Conservatives' longstanding proposal for a dedicated homeland security minister is also likely to be reiterated.
But her report will say the government should go further and set up a cross-departmental National Security Council "so that foreign policy, defence policy and security policy are formulated together rather than apart". The group's interim report will be unveiled at an event attended by leader David Cameron, but its criticism of the invasion may make some Conservatives feel uncomfortable, given the party's support for military action.
Departments involved would include the Foreign and Home Offices, the Department for International Development, the Ministry of Defence, the intelligence agencies and the Cabinet Office, supported by a dedicated cross-departmental staff, the report will suggest. 'Doomed to failure'
"What is needed is a mechanism within which those responsible for action across government... can ensure that, from the start, policy adopted in any of these areas is coherent in the sense that it takes fully into account the likely consequences at home and abroad," it will say. It will call for a Middle East strategy with more "humility and patience", while condemning efforts to impose instant change through a "take it or leave it" set of demands.
The report will also propose "a new form of international framework to promote progressive reform" in the Middle East. Dame Pauline Neville-Jones, the policy group's chairman, said she had supported the invasion and did not believe it had been "doomed to failure", but a number of errors had been made.
Dame Pauline believes there needs to be an approach in which countries in the Middle East are shown that they will miss out on benefits if they do not introduce democratic regimes. She is a former head of the joint intelligence committee, which played a central role in advising ministers in the run-up to the Iraq war.
However, the report admits that democracy does not guarantee political stability. Dame Pauline said: "We now have a very difficult situation from which to extricate ourselves.
It also acknowledges the fact that the wide range of countries and political regimes in the area also hinders the proposed approach. "I'm not saying this decision (to invade) was a mistake, but it did not go right.
"What we can't do in future is hang our whole strategy on the military. We must have a policy that's far more diplomatically interested (in) reform of societies."
She believes there needs to be an approach in which countries in the Middle East are shown that they will miss out on benefits if they do not introduce democratic regimes.