“We mustn’t be a country that turns our back on the world,” Miliband told a public inquiry into the Iraq War, saying that would be the wrong response to divisions over the US-led invasion of 2003.Miliband said Britain’s involvement in the United Nations, European Union, NATO and the Commonwealth, combined with its cultural ties, gave it an influence beyond the reach of most medium-sized countries. Britain faces an election by June and the next government will have to reduce a budget deficit forecast to exceed 12 percent of GDP this year -- posing questions about the future of military spending.
Miliband, who took over as foreign secretary in 2007, said pressing ahead with the invasion of Iraq divisions among major powers had not harmed the work of the UN in New York. “It’s quite striking the extent to which the waters in New York close over and work carries on,” he told the inquiry, set up to learn lessons from the Iraq War. He said the authority of the UN would have been “severely dented” if nothing had been done to disarm former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein.
