Syria vote: MPs to decide whether to bomb IS targets

A 10-hour House of Commons debate will culminate in a vote on whether the UK should join the US, France, Russia and others bombing targets in Raqqa, the group's stronghold, and other areas.

UK Prime Minister David Cameron says IS is a threat to Britain's security.

Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn opposes bombing but has given MPs a free vote amid divisions within his own ranks.

With up to 50 Labour MPs likely to back the government, and both the Democratic Unionist Party and the Liberal Democrats also giving their backing, Mr Cameron is expected to win parliamentary approval for the UK to intervene militarily in the four-year conflict in Syria.

'Contemptible slur'

The prime minister caused controversy on the eve of the vote by urging Tory MPs not to "sit on their hands" or "walk through the lobbies" with Mr Corbyn and others he described as "a bunch of terrorist sympathisers".

Addressing a meeting of the 1922 Conservative backbench committee, Mr Cameron warned that if Tory MPs voted against airstrikes they risked undermining a strong message that the UK was standing alongside its allies already engaged in military action.

The BBC's political editor Laura Kuenssberg said the comments were a departure from the "carefully crafted" language that Mr Cameron has used on Syria over the past week.

They come amid reports that Downing Street - which has been trying to court Labour MPs - was keen to carry the vote through a combination of its own MPs and the party's "natural allies", such as the DUP.

A spokesman for Mr Corbyn said they were a "contemptible slur" and showed the prime minister was losing the argument.

(BBC)