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Daily Record
Daily Record
Politics
Peter Davidson

George Bush in embarrassing gaffe as he condemns 'unjustified invasion of Iraq' in Ukraine mix-up

Former US President George Bush made an embarrassing gaffe when he hit out at the "unjustified and brutal" invasion of Iraq when he meant to say Ukraine.

The 75-year-old was delivering a speech at the presidential centre in Dallas, Texas, when he was speaking about the war in Ukraine.

Speaking about the importance of democracy and the lack of it in Russia, Bush said it gave Vladimir Putin the green light to attack its neighbour.

He told a crowd: "Russian elections are rigged. Political opponents are imprisoned or otherwise eliminated from participating in the electoral process.

"The result is an absence of checks and balances in Russia and the decision of one man to launch a wholly unjustified and brutal invasion of Iraq. I mean of Ukraine."

After a number of people in the audience were left in shock, Bush appeared to say: "Iraq too, but anyway."

The 43rd president of the United States then went on to blame his age for the slip of the tongue, simply saying: "75".

George Bush Jnr was the president of the US when it invaded Iraq alongside the UK in a bid to find mass destruction that were never found.

The war in 2003 killed hundreds of thousands of civilians and displaced many more.

For Bush and Tony Blair, the UK prime minister at the time, they will always be associated with the war in Iraq.

Bush also spoke to Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky about the conflict in his country while he compared him to wartime leader Winston Churchill, for the way that he has rallied his nation in the face of the threat from Russia.

He said: "The way countries conduct elections is indicative of how their leaders treat their own people, and how nations behave toward other nations.

"And nowhere is this on display more clearly than Ukraine."

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