Former British prime minister Tony Blair has admitted that the Iraq War and the removal of Saddam Hussein in 2003 were partially the cause of the rise of Islamic State (ISIS).
In an US television interview, Blair expressed his regret over the failure to plan properly for the aftermath of the toppling of Saddam Hussein that led to the rise of ISIS, reports the Guardian.
The interview is due to be broadcast by CNN Europe on Sunday.
Replying to a query if the war was the principal cause of the rise of the ISIS, the former UK PM said: “I think there are elements of truth in that. Of course you can’t say those of us who removed Saddam in 2003 bear no responsibility for the situation in 2015.”
Talking about the war, he said: “I apologise for the fact that the intelligence we received was wrong. I also apologise for some of the mistakes in planning and, certainly, our mistake in our understanding of what would happen once you removed the regime.”
Later, one of Blair's spokeswoman said: “Tony Blair has always apologised for the intelligence being wrong and for mistakes in planning. He has always also said, and says again here, that he does not however think it was wrong to remove Saddam.
“He did not say the decision to remove Saddam in 2003 ‘caused ISIS’ and pointed out that ISIS was barely heard of at the end of 2008, when al-Qaida was basically beaten.
“He went on to say in 2009, Iraq was relatively more stable. What then happened was a combination of two things: there was a sectarian policy pursued by the government of Iraq, which were mistaken policies.
“But also when the Arab spring began, ISIS moved from Iraq into Syria, built themselves from Syria and then came back into Iraq.
“All of this he has said before.”
On the other hand, the First Minister of Scottish Nicola Sturgeon accused Blair of starting to prepare the ground for expected criticisms when the long-delayed report of the Chilcot inquiry is finally published.
“The Blair spin operation begins but the country still awaits the truth,” the Scottish National Party leader posted on Twitter. “The delay to Chilcot report is a scandal.”
Even six years after the inquiry was set up by then prime minister Gordon Brown, no date has been fixed for the release of the final conclusions.
However, the process was severely delayed by a process known as “Maxwellisation” and the relatives of soldiers killed in the conflict have threatened legal action if a date is not fixed soon.
Lord Blunkett, who was home secretary at the time of the decision to join the military action, said: “Tony was not able to say what was going to happen when combat operations were over. He just decided to trust [Dick] Cheney and [Donald] Rumsfeld.
“With the benefit of hindsight, we now know that they had decided to embark on the complete de-Ba’athification of Saddam’s Iraq by dismantling the entire government infrastructure.”
He added: “This led to the disintegration of any form of functioning government, creating a complete power vacuum. Terrorists infiltrated Iraq and stirred discontent. I am not seeking to scapegoat Tony Blair; we were all collectively to blame for deluding ourselves into believing that we had much greater sway over Washington.”