A WORSLEY MP has accused the leaders of Britain and the US of using "bribery and corruption" to secure a second resolution against Iraq.

Terry Lewis launched a scathing attack on the two Governments who he claims are destroying the ethos of the United Nations by bullying other nations to toe the US line.

In a letter to the Bolton Evening News, the outspoken Labour MP, urged Tony Blair to avoid war with Iraq describing as "folly" any participation in a conflict inspired by Washington.

However, despite growing pressure, he backed the Prime Minister to continue in office and criticised fellow anti-war MP Clare Short for "going over the top".

Speaking from the the House of Commons, Mr Lewis said: "I will not support a war even if a second resolution comes about through the weight of bribery and corruption which has been taking place.

"Smaller nations are being threatened with the loss of aid and the stronger nations are being bribed. It has destroyed the whole ethos of the United Nations."

Mr Lewis added that the "huge opposition" to war in Labour's Westminster ranks would remain intact even if a second resolution was achieved.

In the letter, he said: "The case for war has not yet been made and the more the Government has sought to justify its position, the greater the inconstancies which have emerged.

"It has been discredited at every twist and turn of events since George W Bush announced his war on his 'Axis of Evil'."

He added that the reasons for the impending war with Iraq had nothing to do with the arguments being put forward by Mr Blair and his foreign secretary, Jack Straw.

Mr Lewis dismissed the argument that it was necessary to clamp down on unstable regimes with weapons of mass destruction by pointing to the examples of Pakistan and North Korea who are not being targeted.

He said the notion of an extension of the war on terrorism had also been dropped when a link between Saddam Hussein and Al Queda was rubbished by security services on both sides of the Atlantic.

Mr Lewis now believes the war is being justified by Saddam's gassing of his own people in the 1980s.

He writes: "In 1988, 67 MPs, myself included, urged the then Government to act against the regime through the UN, as a response to the gas attack on the town of Halabja.

"No members of the present Government, who were in a position to do so, supported the back-bench motion those years ago."