HAMBURG, Feb 6: Germany’s mainstream churches have become the surprise focus of the German anti-war movement, denouncing any kind of pre-emptive strike against Iraq as immoral.

That tough stance has not only dismayed the German political parties that have “Christian” in their name, but has also revealed subtle disagreements with church leaders from neighbouring countries.

Germany’s Catholic bishops said on January 20 that any pre-emptive war to eliminate Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction was “morally impermissible”.

A country could only go to war to defend itself from attack or to prevent grave crimes against humanity, they warned.

Not to be outdone, Manfred Kock, who heads the federation of Germany’s Lutheran and reformed churches, echoed the Catholic stance on Wednesday: war was only justified to prevent imminent attack or when it was the sole means to prevent grave breaches of human rights.

Many European Christian leaders have criticized the rush to war. But the others have tended to leave a door open, suggesting war might be justified as a last resort if Iraqi President Saddam Hussein were to completely exhaust the international community’s patience.

While France’s Catholic bishops issued a tough warning in October that Saddam did not pose the type of threat justifying war, the Catholic bishops of England and Wales were less blunt in November.

The German, Dutch and Scandinavian church leaders, plus World Council of Churches secretary-general Konrad Reiser and three US church officials, said diplomatic means to make Saddam obey UN resolutions had yet to be exhausted.

There have been signs that German Catholic bishops will not be as willing in future to encourage their flocks to vote CDU and CSU.

Cardinal Joachim Meisner of Cologne suggested that the two parties drop the word “Christian” from their names as they were no longer in line with church thinking on many issues.—dpa