Shooting of Bin Laden appalled me, says Ken
KEN Livingstone waded into further controversy yesterday by claiming U. S. special forces were wrong to kill Osama Bin Laden.
To the surprise of observers at a Westminster lunch, the Labour veteran declared that the death of the world’s most notorious terrorist had ‘appalled’ him.
Mr Livingstone – who is trailing Tory Boris Johnson in the London mayoral race – has previously caused anger over terrorism with his outspoken support for Irish republicans and Palestinian militants.
But his comments on the death of a man who masterminded the deaths of thousands of innocent civilians around the world are likely to raise further doubts about his suitability for high office in London, where Al Qaeda bombings killed 52 in July 2005.
He told a lunch for political journalists: ‘I was appalled to see Osama Bin Laden in his pyjamas shot in front of his kid.
‘The best way to demonstrate the values of a Western democracy is you put Osama Bin Laden on trial and challenge what he says.’
Mr Livingstone, whose Left-wing views saw him ostracised by Labour under Tony Blair, also hailed Ed Miliband’s ‘ genuine Labour values’ and suggested that next month’s mayoral contest was a dress rehearsal for the general election expected in 2015.
He said: ‘For the first time in my life I’ve been invited for dinner with the leader of the Labour Party, so there’s a shift there. Ed represents genuine Labour values – that’s why I voted for him and believe he will make a real change if we win.
‘I see this election as a forerunner for the election to come for national government. It’s about the balance between the richest 1 per cent and the other 99 per cent.’ However Mr Living- stone, 66, said he was ‘not persuaded’ of the overall benefits of the mayoral system, warning that cities could be ‘stuck with a loser for four years’.
He said: ‘It concentrates a lot of power in one person’s hands.
‘It’s easy to avoid serious scrutiny because the mayor always gets the last word at every assembly meeting.’
He added: ‘The other weakness of this is it leads to a degree of celebrity politics, which means the issues go down the agenda.’
Mr Livingstone also insisted that his tears at a screening last week of his own party election broadcast were not staged.
At the time he said the sight of ‘ordinary Londoners’ urging him to win had reminded him of his ‘awesome responsibility’.
It later emerged that those appearing in the broadcast had been paid expenses to read an advertising agency’s script.
Yesterday he said: ‘Those tears in the corner of my eye, and that’s all it was, are absolutely bloody genuine, and that’s why I am busting a gut to actually win.’