Labour rebel backs BNP policy on Afghanistan
THE former Foreign Office minister Kim Howells, has broken ranks with his Labour colleagues and called for the Government to follow the British National Party’s policy on Afghanistan.
Mr Howells, who is now an adviser to Gordon Brown on intelligence and security, said that the lives of British troops should be saved and billions of pounds redirected from fighting a pointless war on the other side of the world, to defending Britain from terrorist attacks by Islamic extremists.
And the Labour rebel knows what he is talking about – he was the minister with responsibility for Afghanistan up until 2008.
Writing in The Guardian this morning, Kim Howells might well have been quoting (like Sir Andrew Green yesterday) from the British National Party’s manifesto when he called for a “Fortress Britain” security strategy with Britain’s Muslim communities subjected to increased surveillance and greater scrutiny by police and the intelligence services.
Echoing BNP policy again, Kim Howells called for more police patrols, more border officials at harbours and airports, and more inspectors of vehicles and vessels entering Britain.
He told the newspaper:
“It would be better to bring home the great majority of our fighting men and women and concentrate, instead, on using the money saved to secure our own borders and gather intelligence on terrorist activities inside Britain.”
There is, however, one difference between what Mr Howells advocates and the BNP’s thinking on the war in Afghanistan. He would like to see a phased withdrawal of our troops over a number of years – we want our boys brought back home within a matter of days of the decision being made.
* Britain spent £2.6billion on its military involvement in Afghanistan last year.
* Next year British troop levels in Afghanistan rise to 10,000.
* So far 229 UK service personnel have died, this total includes the five soldiers killed yesterday by an Afghan Policeman.
* 2009 is the bloodiest year for the armed forces since the Falklands War, with 94 British soldiers losing their lives.
