London bomb victim quizzes Australian PM on Iraq

Canberra - An Australian survivor of the London bombings has confronted Prime Minister John Howard from her hospital bed asking whether the attack which left her with a broken neck was linked to the US-led Iraq war.

Sitting on the edge of her bed in a London hospital, Louise Barry surprised Howard with the question, prompting him to defend the military operation in Iraq, which includes Australian troops.

"What do you think? Everyone says it's all...because of the Iraq war," asked Barry, her head held tight in a metal brace, after shaking hands with her prime minister.

Howard, one of the first to join US forces in Iraq, said the London bombings which killed 56 people were not linked to the Iraq war, but motivated by a "twisted and totally immoral depiction of extreme Islam".

"They had a go at us and they had a go at other people before Iraq," said Howard on Wednesday, fresh from talks on Iraq with US President George W Bush in Washington.

Howard was refering to the Septembert 11, 2001, attacks on the United States, and the 2002 nightclub bombings on the Indonesian island of Bali which killed 202 people, including 88 Australians.

But a report by Britain's Royal Institute of International Affairs on Monday said backing the United States in Iraq had put Britain more at risk from terror attacks.

Howard, who is due to hold security talks with British Prime Minister Tony Blair, has rejected any suggestion Australia too was more at risk because of its involvement in Iraq.

"The motivation behind all of these attacks is a motivation based on perverted ideology," Howard told reporters in London, after also visiting Australian Gillian Hicks who has had both legs amputated after the London bombings.

"I think it is an attitude... of a fanatical section of the Islamic community," Howard said.

Australia sent troops to the initial conflict and currently has about 1500 military personnel in and around Iraq to help with security and training for Iraqi forces.

A report from the Australian Strategic Policy Institute in June said 52 per cent of Australians supported the government's stand on Iraq, although 61 per cent said they did not believe the war on Iraq was worth the cost.

Australia has never suffered a major peacetime attack on home soil, although the Australian embassy in Jakarta was bombed in 2004. One Australian was killed in the London blasts and nine other injured.

- REUTERS