British anti-war group plans Monday protest outside parliament

LONDON, April 14 (Xinhua) -- British anti-war campaigners on Saturday condemned the U.S.-led military strikes on Syria, saying that following instruction from U.S. President Donald Trump, British Prime Minister Theresa May deliberately avoided consulting parliament and risked dramatically widening the war before committing UK forces to the joint military strikes on Syria.

Britain's Stop the War Coalition has organised a demonstration Monday outside the Houses of Parliament as a response to the overnight bombing raids on Syria.

The coalition said in a statement: "We strongly condemn the missile attacks on Syria last night which will have only brought the Syrians more misery and destruction. They will have done nothing to end the war or alleviate their suffering."

"In sanctioning killing at the behest of Donald Trump, Theresa May deliberately avoided consulting parliament and risked dramatically widening the war," said the statement.

"The overwhelming majority of people in this country oppose this action just as they have opposed the series of wars of the last seventeen years," it added.

The coalition said it opposes the British establishment's "disastrous addiction to war and its squandering of public resources on militarism."

The coalition has called for a protest in Parliament Square outside the Houses of Parliament on Monday. The protest has been timed to coincide with the re-opening of parliament after the Easter recess.

The Stop the War Coalition was founded in September, 2001 shortly after 9/11 terrorist attacks on the United States.

The coalition in 2003 organised one of the biggest ever demonstrations in Britain when two million people gathered on London's streets to oppose the Iraq war.

In 2013, the coalition was central in mobilising opposition to the bombing by British forces of Syria, as proposed by the then prime minister David Cameron. It led to a decision in parliament when MPs voted against military intervention in Syria. Enditem