Hasn't got a Clwyd

A week ago it wans't like this. George and Tony's press conference in Washington looked like a low point at the time. But now it looks like the calm before the storm. Since then we've had: news of the Haditha massacre, where US marines killed innocent Iraqi civilians in an echo of Vietnam's My Lai; headline news on the BBC about another massacre; the death of two more British servicemen in Basra; the death of two British journalists in Baghdad; the Iraqi prime minister (still unable to appoint a defence or interior minister to his government)declaring a state of emergency in Basra; and the same prime minister saying he wants the troops to go.

Oh, and a serious anti western riot in Kabul, supposedly the safest place in Afghanistan.

Up pops Anne Clwyd MP, Tony Blair's human rights envoy to Iraq, to tell us that these are minor problems. What a grotesque title that is, by the way, coming from a government which has presided over a human rights catastrophe in Iraq and which now tries to minimise atrocities being committed there. Anne Clwyd must be last woman standing to back Tony Blair.

Even some of Washington's hawks are recognising that their grand plan to conquer the world is being thrown off track by events in Iraq. Hence the attempt last week at US diplomacy _not an entire contradiction in terms_aimed at making Iran look unreasonable if it refused an offer of talks coupled with abandoning its nuclear power programme. Not an especially reasonable offer _imagine if Iran offered Britain talks as long as they shut down Sellafield and Sizewell and committed not to rebuild Trident? But it shows the US is boxed in and unable to act easily, especially against the wishes of Russia and China.

The human rights argument has been central to winning liberal opinion in all the recent wars and is being trundled out again over Iran. The one about women's rights is particularly galling for those of us unlike George Bush who believe in women's equality. The Action Iran meeting on Friday night went a long way to dispelling the Anne Clwyd bomb them for liberation approach. Guest of honour was Shirin Ebadi, Nobel Peace Prize winner and campaigner for women's rights. A former judge in Teheran who was forced out of her job, she has more reasons than most to hate the regime but her message was clear. We don't want Bush and Blair bombing, Iranians have to fight for the democracy that they want and that war will make this harder.

I was part of a platform where the only man was Tony Benn. Every speaker talked about women's rights, with Tony pointing out that his grandmother had to fight for the vote and that we didn't have women's equality in Britain. You only have to look at the house of commons to see that, or the boardrooms of the city of London.

A good weekend for women, with that meeting and the military families campaign in the Independent on Sunday, where mothers, grandmothers and wives of serving soldiers spoke out against the war.

Bad weekend for civil liberties and the Muslim community. The raid in Forest Gate involving 250 police looking for a chemical bomb factory led to one man being shot and he and his brother arrested, the next door family also being raided and detained for 12 hours, and much scepticism in the local community. Is it really necessary to shoot in such circumstances? Was there any evidence and has anything been found? The police seem to be backtracking already. And should attending a mosque regularly and growing a beard be seen as evidence of suspected terrorism?

Now where's Tony Blair's human rights envoy when you need her?