Three in five people in Britain believe it was a mistake to invade Iraq, according to a BBC poll published yesterday.

Fifty-five percent of respondents said they felt the war in Iraq has made Britain less safe, and only 5 percent said it left them feeling safer, according to the BBC poll commissioned to mark the invasion's fourth anniversary.

"Four years on from the war, most people in the country have now come to the view that the United States and Britain were wrong to take military action against Iraq in 2003," said Nick Sparrow from ICM Research, which conducted the poll.

More than half of respondents, 51 percent, said they would not trust the British government if it said military action was needed elsewhere because a country posed a threat to national security. Thirty-two percent said they would trust the government.

However, 57 percent said they would support sending British troops in overseas for disaster relief missions or to stop genocide 24 percent opposed such missions.

ICM interviewed 1,019 adults across the country by telephone between March 2 and March 4. The poll had a margin of error of plus or minus 3.1 percentage points.

(China Daily via agencies March 21, 2007)