Hope for inquiry into UK soldiers' deaths in Iraq

Relatives of four British soldiers killed in Iraq started Wednesday a legal appeal against the government's refusal to hold an independent inquiry into the circumstances of their deaths.

Rose Gentle, Peter Brierley, Beverley Clarke and Susan Smith were challenging a High Court decision not to allow a judicial review at the Court of Appeal in London.

The four were demanding that Home Secretary John Reid orders an investigation into the process leading up to the declaration by The Attorney General that military action was lawful.

Acting for the claimants, Phil Shiner, of Public Interest Lawyers, said there is a "significant doubt in the minds of these families as to whether their loved ones died in circumstances where the military orders requiring them to be in Iraq were illegal." "The families cannot hope for closure until an independent inquiry establishes once and for all whether this was an illegal war," Shiner said.

The lawyers were arguing that the legal basis upon which British soldiers were ordered into Iraq remains unclear and that had it been established there was no clear lawful basis prior to the invasion, the servicemen would have been unlikely to have been sent there.

Their appeal was based upon the circumstances surrounding the deaths and a procedural requirement to hold an independent and effective investigation under European Convention on Human Rights.

Brierley, whose son Shaun was killed in March 2003, said that as events have unfolded since his death, "I have come to the conclusion that the real reason for going to war was regime change." "I understand that this is not a legal basis for going to war. I would like to see Tony Blair and all the UK Government brought to account by means of an independent inquiry, so that there can be independent scrutiny of the reasons for the war," he said.

"Being able to establish once and for all whether the war was legal or otherwise would help my family and I come to terms with the tragedy of Shaun's death," he added.