Former UK foreign secretary 'deeply regrets' support for Iraq invasion

Former Foreign Secretary of the United Kingdom David Miliband has stated that his backing for the Iraq invasion was "one of the deepest regrets" of his political career.

The former foreign secretary also stated that the 2003 war and its aftermath inflicted "real damage" to Western claims to uphold core values of international order and justice, reports British media The Guardian.

"I voted for the war. I supported the government's position," he told a Hay Festival audience in Wales. "There's no question in my mind about how serious a mistake that was."

He went on to call the war a "strategic mistake," owing in part to "the global lesson that it allowed to be taught."

"I don't believe, myself, that it excuses what's happened subsequently in Ukraine," he said, but agreed that some may see the west as being hypocritical in its anti-Russia stance. "I think it's a very, very serious point."

Miliband expressed deep concern about the way he saw the world divided. "Ukraine has united the west, but it's divided the west and wider parts of the world," he said.

Despite knowing that "a grotesque abuse of international law" has occurred, countries representing more than half of the world's population have failed to support the censure of Russia.

While just five countries have supported Russia at the UN, "40 or 50 countries have refused to join any condemnation, not because they support the invasion of Ukraine, but they feel that the west has been guilty of hypocrisy and weakness in dealing with global problems over the last 30 years", Miliband said.

Miliband, who is also the chief executive of the International Rescue Committee encouraged the audience to read Kenyan President William Ruto's speeches, who "talks about how the effort in Ukraine should be contrasted with the effort to tackle those other wars in other parts of the world".

Miliband said Ruto and others like him have made the point that "yes, Ukraine has enormous poverty and crimes against its own population, but what about Ethiopia, what about Afghanistan, what about Palestine?

"And I think that's what we have to take very, very seriously if we want to understand what's the role of the west, never mind the UK, in global politics."