---

Ministry of Defence

Answer

Alan Simpson: :To ask the Secretary of State for Defence in respect of the attack by allied aircraft on 19 July in the Qadissiya province of Iraq, how many salvos were fired during the mission, what hostile acts the target area had been responsible for in provoking the attack and how many of the people injured and killed were deemed to be military personnel. [73684] Mr. Adam Ingram: :On the night of 18 July, when the incident in question occurred, coalition aircraft responded to multiple attacks on them by Iraqi air defence weapons, including anti-aircraft artillery and missiles, by releasing precision guided munitions. Coalition aircraft conduct patrols of the Iraqi no fly zones in support of UN SCR 688 which demanded that Saddam Hussein end the brutal repression of his own people. The pilots conducting these wholly legitimate patrols are regularly shot at by Iraqi air defences. They are authorised to respond in self-defence to efforts to shoot them down. This is the only basis on which weapons have been released over Iraq since Operation Desert Fox in December 1998. The coalition targets Iraqi air defence facilities that pose a threat to its forces patrolling the no fly zones. Exceptional lengths are taken to ensure civilian casualties are kept to the absolute minimum possible, including the employment of very carefully controlled targeting procedures and precision guided munitions. It is in Saddam's interests to distort the truth in his attempts to convince the world that the coalition is responsible for causing widespread suffering to the Iraqi civilian populace. Saddam would readily persecute these people, as he has done in the past, if we did not patrol the no fly zones. We are not prepared to abandon these people.

Secondary information

Type

Written question

Reference

73684; 390 c11-2W;390 c451-2W

Session

2001-02

Subjects

Armed forces Death Bombings Injuries Iraq International cooperation Peacekeeping operations Military aircraft Military alliances

Link

View this Written question on www.publications.parliament.uk