Scottish Secretary Helen Liddell has launched a fierce attack on the Scottish National Party over its stance on Iraq.

She described former party leader Alex Salmond as the ''toast of Baghdad" for his opposition to military action without United Nations backing.

However, he hit back by accusing Mrs Liddell of a "spectacular piece of crassness".

Alex Salmond opposes military action

At the SNP's conference in Inverness last week leader John Swinney and Mr Salmond, who is now the party's Westminster group leader, spoke out against any action being taken without United Nations support.

On Thursday Mr Salmond said that the credibility of the UN was at stake if America and the UK launch their own military action against Saddam Hussein's regime.

His stance won the support of delegates as they backed an emergency motion which said a unilateral attack "cannot be justified" and called for a peaceful resolution to the crisis.

Mr Salmond also accused Tony Blair of blindly following American foreign policy.

'Unpardonable folly'

However, Mrs Liddell was due to mount an attack on Mr Swinney in an address to delegates attending the Labour party conference in Blackpool.

Speaking earlier to BBC Scotland's Holyrood programme, she referred to his famous comments that NATO action in Kosovo was an ''unpardonable folly''.

Mrs Liddell said that his stance on Iraq showed that Mr Salmond has "learned nothing" from the controversy which followed those comments.

"I think it is ill-advised and it has come at a most inappropriate time," she said.

These foolish and crass remarks make you wonder which parallel universe Mrs Liddell is now living in

Alex Salmond

"It has made him the toast of Baghdad as well as the toast of Belgrade."

However, Mr Salmond said: "The SNP have been opposing the murderous regime of Saddam Hussein for many years - at a time when British governments were selling him weapons of mass destruction, like the Iraqi supergun.

"Right now, on this issue, the SNP's argument of the primacy of the United Nations is supported by 80% of the country. Helen Liddell isn't even backed by a majority of the Labour Party.

"These foolish and crass remarks make you wonder which parallel universe Mrs Liddell is now living in."