Labour and Conservatives in bitter row over migrant deaths

Ed Miliband has been accused of a “shameful” bid to make political capital from the Mediterranean refugee crisis as Labour switched its fire against David Cameron’s foreign policy.

The Opposition leader is to use a keynote General Election campaign speech to suggest the deaths of hundreds of refugees fleeing North Africa are “in part a direct result” of the Prime Minister’s intervention in Libya.

“The tragedy is that this could have been anticipated,” he is due to tell the Chatham House think-tank the day after Mr Cameron attended an emergency EU summit to deal with the escalating situation.

“Since the action, the failure of post-conflict planning has become obvious. David Cameron was wrong to assume that Libya’s political culture and institutions could be left to evolve and transform on their own.

“It should have been avoided. And Britain could have played its part in ensuring the international community stood by the people of Libya in practice rather than standing behind the unfounded hopes of potential progress only in principle,” Mr Miliband is due to say.

But his words – which echo a similar charge levelled by Ukip leader Nigel Farage at the weekend – met with an angry response from the Conservatives.

A senior source said: “This is a deeply provocative and shameful intervention by a leader clearly rattled by two very bad polls last night. This takes Labour’s relentless negative campaigning to a new low.

“Ed Miliband should now apologise for trying to score political points from the terrible events we have witnessed in the Mediterranean.”

But Labour’s Shadow Foreign Secretary Douglas Alexander defended his leader’s stance.

He told BBC News: “There has been a failure by the internationalcommunity of post-conflict planning in Libya. That’s not a matter of dispute,that’s simply a fact.

“What we are witnessing is Tory spokespeople being sent out this morning who, rather like on domestic policy, on foreign policy simply cannot defend the record of the Conservative Party.

“Instead, they invent allegations and make charges against the Labour Party rather than trying to defend their record.

“The tragic scenes that are being witnessed in the Mediterranean today have a range of different accounts, explanations and responsibilities.

“Of course the people traffickers bear responsibility. Of course the fact there is conflict, not just in Libya today but across the Middle East, also helps explain the fact large numbers of people are now trying to transit through Libya to come to Europe.

“But it is also simply a fact that the reason they are using Libya as that departure point is it is effectively ungoverned space and one of the consequences of the conflict has been the ungoverned space has emerged as a result of the failure of post-conflict planning.”