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WHERE HAVE WE HEARD THIS YAPPING BEFORE?
Bush lapdog signals
Iran backing terror, says Blair
In his first major speech since leaving office, Mr. Blair again defended the decision to go to war in Iraq. He urged continued vigilance by the United States, Britain and their allies in combating the threat of extremism. Mr. Blair — now an envoy for the Middle East Quartet — warned against being "forced into retreat" as the world faced a situation similar to "rising fascism in the 1920s." The former PM is still regarded as a staunch ally of the US. He was greeted with a standing ovation even before he spoke. Points to Iran as new target The audience, New York's political and Catholic elite, laughed when he joked that Americans were slowly mastering the English language. But on a more serious note he spoke of what he called an extremist Islamic ideology. "This ideology now has a state — Iran — that is prepared to back and finance terror in the pursuit of destabilizing countries whose people wish to live in peace." "There is a tendency even now, even in some of our own circles, to believe that they are as they are because we have provoked them and if we left them alone they would leave us alone. "I fear this is mistaken. They have no intention of leaving us alone." The charity dinner was held in honor of Al Smith, the former governor of New York who was the first Catholic to be nominated by a major political party to run for US president. |
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