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| Trident opponent Ken Livingstone joins Labour defence review | Trident opponent Ken Livingstone joins Labour defence review |
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| The Labour leadership has drafted in Ken Livingstone, the former London mayor who is a strong opponent of the Trident nuclear weapons programme, to help oversee the party’s defence review. | The Labour leadership has drafted in Ken Livingstone, the former London mayor who is a strong opponent of the Trident nuclear weapons programme, to help oversee the party’s defence review. |
| As Jeremy Corbyn intensifies his efforts to drop Labour’s support for Trident, Livingstone has been appointed to serve alongside the shadow defence secretary, Maria Eagle, as a co-convenor of the party’s defence review. | As Jeremy Corbyn intensifies his efforts to drop Labour’s support for Trident, Livingstone has been appointed to serve alongside the shadow defence secretary, Maria Eagle, as a co-convenor of the party’s defence review. |
| Eagle supports Trident and infuriated the Labour leader recently when she backed Gen Sir Nicholas Houghton, the chief of the defence staff, after he questioned the Labour leader’s statement that he would never endorse the use of Trident. | |
| Livingstone will co-convene the defence review in his capacity as a member of Labour’s national executive committee. Corbyn had hoped to take steps towards dropping Labour’s support for Trident at this year’s Labour conference. | Livingstone will co-convene the defence review in his capacity as a member of Labour’s national executive committee. Corbyn had hoped to take steps towards dropping Labour’s support for Trident at this year’s Labour conference. |
| A bid to hold a vote on whether to support the renewal of Trident failed after Corbyn could not win the support of the major trade unions. Corbyn is hoping that the defence review will lead to a change of policy at Labour’s national policy forum. | |
| But Labour may face an earlier challenge on Trident. The SNP is planning to hold a Commons vote on Trident next week. Labour is still officially in favour of Trident, raising the prospect that frontbenchers could vote in different ways. The Labour leadership is understood to be pressing for Labour MPs to abstain. | But Labour may face an earlier challenge on Trident. The SNP is planning to hold a Commons vote on Trident next week. Labour is still officially in favour of Trident, raising the prospect that frontbenchers could vote in different ways. The Labour leadership is understood to be pressing for Labour MPs to abstain. |
| Livingstone threw his weight behind Corbyn on Tuesday when he supported his call for any extension of RAF airstrikes against Islamic State into Syria to be agreed by the UN. Livingstone told the PM programme on BBC Radio 4: “Britain and America are so discredited because of our record in Afghanistan and Iraq. This has got to be a UN-led coalition. We need to bring on board countries like China, Nigeria, Brazil. It can’t just be seen as Britain and America interfering in the Middle East again.” | Livingstone threw his weight behind Corbyn on Tuesday when he supported his call for any extension of RAF airstrikes against Islamic State into Syria to be agreed by the UN. Livingstone told the PM programme on BBC Radio 4: “Britain and America are so discredited because of our record in Afghanistan and Iraq. This has got to be a UN-led coalition. We need to bring on board countries like China, Nigeria, Brazil. It can’t just be seen as Britain and America interfering in the Middle East again.” |
| Asked whether he would support the strikes if a UN security council resolution were agreed, Livingstone said: “Of course, because Isis is an absolutely horrendous organisation. It’s not just the threat they pose to us here in London, but it is the appalling regime they inflict on people living in Syria and Iraq, beheading them, raping their women. They should be defeated, they should be overthrown. But it has got to be a UN-led coalition. It can’t just be the west interfering again.” | Asked whether he would support the strikes if a UN security council resolution were agreed, Livingstone said: “Of course, because Isis is an absolutely horrendous organisation. It’s not just the threat they pose to us here in London, but it is the appalling regime they inflict on people living in Syria and Iraq, beheading them, raping their women. They should be defeated, they should be overthrown. But it has got to be a UN-led coalition. It can’t just be the west interfering again.” |
| Tensions within the Labour party have burst into the open after a succession of MPs, including two frontbenchers, openly challenged Corbyn’s authority in the House of Commons over his response to the Islamic State threat. |