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The turmoil within the Labour Party deepened today following the suggestion that pro-Blair supporters have railroaded the Party machine in an attempt to depose Jeremy Corbyn prior to the publication next Wednesday of the Chilcot Report on the circumstances in the run-up to the Iraq War in 2003.

The comment was made at this evening's pro-Corbyn rally in Cambridge.

Speaking to cheers and applause in front of 200 supporters at Great St Mary's Church in front of King's College, Sarah Payne of CamPeace said: "Anything they can do to stop Jeremy from being at the Despatch Box on Wednesday when the Chilcot report is published they will do. This is an incredibly important moment for our country."

The rally comes after the Labour Party has been thrown into turmoil by an attempted leadership coup this week.

"Colleagues have contrived a "vote of no confidence" that has absolutely no basis in the rule book," wrote Labour MP for Hackney North and Stoke Newington Diane Abbott in The Guardian today.

"There was no notice. It was tabled on Monday and the vote held the following day. No institution would run an important ballot in this way. And it was a secret ballot."

The rally's organiser, James Youd, the branch secretary of Cambridge Unite, added: "Jeremy has said that if there were revelations that war crimes were committed then he's going to push the button on Tony Blair, if that proves to be the case.

"It's an organised, undemocratic, coup and they have no plan, there's no successor in mind, it's just about getting rid of him."

The Chilcot Inquiry was set up in 2009: 150 witnesses including all the senior figures of the Labour Party at the time were asked to give evidence and the report is 2.5 million words long.

It has been claimed that it will be "absolutely savage" in terms of its verdict on the process of going to war with Iraq, and its immediate aftermath. The official inquiry has apparently had no redactions.

Speakers at the highly vocal rally also said the recent events following the EU referendum on Friday which saw a majority of the populace voting to leave the European union had voted as they did because of "austerity cuts by the Tory Government and the injustices of capitalism".

A spokesperson from the Labour Party was unavailable for comment.



Read more at http://www.cambridge-news.co.uk/corbyn/story-29459516-detail/story.html#Fh79k9gRxesYdBfr.99