ILLEGITIMATE IRAQ INVASION

The 2003 US-led invasion of Iraq lacked legitimacy under international law, an independent commission probing Dutch political support for the still controversial action said. “There was insufficient legitimacy” for the invasion for which the Netherlands gave political but no military backing, commission chairman Willibrord Davids told journalists in The Hague. The commission’s report said the wording of UN resolution 1441 “cannot reasonably be interpreted (as the Dutch government did) as authorising individual member states to use military force to compel Iraq to comply with the Security Council’s resolutions.” The Dutch commission, which started its work in March last, was set up by the government following pressure from opposition politicians and the public for a probe of claims that crucial data had been withheld from Dutch decision-makers who opted to support the US-led action.