Gulf veterans `bullied'

Earl Howe, the defence minister, has promised to investigate claims made in the House of Lords yesterday that soldiers who became ill in the Gulf war are being bullied by Ministry of Defence interrogators.

Around 1,200 soldiers who served in the Gulf are taking legal action against the MoD after becoming sick from the so-called Gulf-war illnesses.

Yesterday, the Countess of Mar asked Earl Howe to look into the cases of three Gulf veterans whom she said had been subjected to "bully-boy tactics" by the MoD, which, she said, had set up a team of inquisitors to recover information passed by soldiers to their doctors and solicitors. The MoD denied its actions were unreasonable. Ian Burrell