Syria rift widens as MPs defy Sturgeon

First Minister at odds with deputy over intervention

AN SNP split on Syria has deepened after a second senior MP ruled out support for bombing Islamic State terrorist strongholds without UN backing.

Deputy leader Stewart Hosie insisted air strikes would not be legal without a Security Council resolution, echoing comments by Alex Salmond last week.

Both men have now undermined First Minister Nicola Sturgeon, who had made clear she was prepared to listen to Prime Minister David Cameron’s case regardless.

She is now facing calls to rein in her MPs and stop Westminster politicians dictating SNP foreign policy from London.

The UN did pass a resolution in support of ‘all necessary measures’ on Friday, but fell short of invoking Chapter VII of the Charter, which would authorise military action.

Requiring a UN mandate would allow Russia a veto over UK action, even as President Putin wages his own bombing campaign against IS.

Mr Cameron has made clear he would ‘not outsource to Russian veto the decisions that we need to keep our country safe’.

A Daily Mail poll last week revealed six in ten Britons support bombing IS and Miss Sturgeon – with 55 MPs, the leader of the UK’s third largest party – has admitted the Paris atrocities changed attitudes on military action.

Mr Hosie told Sunday Politics Scotland yesterday: ‘The First Minister has said she will listen, we’ve been very clear throughout this that there may be a case for military action, as part of a bigger solution. But we’ve been very clear indeed that we need to have a UN resolution, which actually permits military action so that it’s legal.’

Mr Hosie said there also needed to be confirmation of the ‘ethicacy’ of intervention and a post-conflict plan before air strikes began.

Asked if Miss Sturgeon endorsed this view, a spokesman for the First Minister pointed to an SNP statement issued on Friday which said UK military action ‘must be in line with international law’, but made clear the First Minister was prepared to hear Mr Cameron’s case.

The SNP would find it very difficult to support intervention without a UN resolution, having attacked Tony Blair over Iraq.

Tory MSP Alex Johnstone said: ‘This is not the first time the Nationalists have been in disagreement within their own party ranks and it’s time for Sturgeon to rein her MPs in.’