Blair attacked by Scots soldier's mum

Unlawful wounding charge

Treatment of son, 19, ‘unfair’

THE mother of a Scots soldier who faces trial over the shooting of a 13-year-old Iraqi boy today hit out at the Government - branding his treatment "unfair".

Isabelle Johnston, of Shotts, Lanarkshire, condemned the authorities’ treatment of her "hero" son, who she said had risked his life for Iraq freedom.

Private Alexander Johnston, of the 1st Battalion, the King’s Own Scottish Borderers, has been charged with the unlawful wounding of a boy shot in al-Uzayr, south of Amarah, last September.

Pte Johnston was on guard duty at the time. The boy survived but the Ministry of Defence refused to give details of his condition.

The 19-year-old could face an alternative charge of "negligent handling of a weapon", the Attorney General’s office said.

Mrs Johnston said: "Tony Blair makes the bullets and my boy fires them. The politicians sit in Westminster twiddling their thumbs while my son is out there ducking bullets, risking his life.

"He went out there to defend people from a dictator, to give them their freedom. Tony Blair wasn’t out there putting his life on the line and they [the authorities] treat him like this. It’s very unfair and I’m very angry. My son is a hero."

Pte Johnston is the fifth British soldier to be charged over events in Iraq. Four Royal Fusiliers already face court martial over allegations that they abused Iraqis.

No date has yet been set for his trial or preliminary hearing.

The venue for the trial is also undecided but a spokeswoman for Attorney General Lord Goldsmith said: "The general approach is these things should be held in Iraq."

Colonel Bob Stewart, a former British UN Commander in Bosnia, welcomed the decision to hold a trial. "Everyone is responsible for their own weapon as a professional soldier," he said. "If a soldier is carrying a lethal weapon, if he’s negligent - if he puts a round into the breech and discharges that weapon without due cause - he is responsible for what happens and where the bullet goes.

"It is no good blaming the Army or anyone else. The wounding may have been non-fatal, but it certainly might have ruined this boy’s life.

"At least by prosecuting, the Army would accept this had happened and then some form of restitution may be made to the boy."

Three US soldiers are also facing trial after being charged with manslaughter over the death of an Iraqi man forced to jump off a bridge into the Tigris River north of Baghdad in January. He drowned.

Meanwhile, it emerged today that British servicemen have been deployed to Iraq without undergoing training courses intended to bring them up to speed with likely threats.

A number of personnel have missed out on week-long "tactical awareness" training sessions, Op TAG, which arm them with the latest assessments of dangers. It was today reported that, instead, they have been given "waiver" letters confirming they have not received the recommended briefings.

A newspaper quoted one such letter as saying: "The following individual, [name] has had to be deployed into theatre without having had Op TAG training. Due to the importance of the task and the limited pool of personnel to select from, this eventuality has been unavoidable."

A Ministry of Defence spokesman said theatre-specific training was normally compulsory for RAF and Army personnel due for deployment to Iraq.

However, there were "exceptional" circumstances in which the requirement was waived, for example where operational imperatives demanded a short-notice, short-term deployment to a well-established, well-protected base.

The spokesman said the four soldiers featured in the newspaper story had previously undertaken such training

"These cases are very exceptional," the spokesman stressed.