HUNDREDS of people opposed to a war with Iraq attended a public meeting and rally on Saturday.

More than 300 filled the lecture theatre in Sunderland University's Bob Murray Library for the event, organised by the Sunderland Stop the War Coalition.

Among the speakers were Professor Malcolm Hooper, chief medical advisor to the Gulf War Veterans' Association, who is conducting research into the incidence of birth defects - thought to be caused by depleted uranium from shell tips - among British personnel who fought in the first Gulf War.

He showed pictures of an American veteran's child and an Iraqi child, both of whom had birth defects.

Meeting organiser Dennis McDonald said: "The meeting was a fantastic success and a lot of the people were apolitical. Most people are unconvinced by what the Government is saying.

"The war is about oil and the assertion of US military force, backed by its industrial-military complex."

The meeting raised £350, some of which will go to the charity Medical Aid to Iraq, and the rest to help fund travel to an anti-war rally in London later this month.

Meanwhile, a poll of 1,015 people in the Prime Minister's Sedgefield consituency revealed most are opposed to war with Iraq without UN backing, a poll has revealed. Two-thirds questioned Tony Blair's leadership and 70 per cent would not support a war in Iraq without UN backing.

* Sedgefield Against War, a non-political group, stages its second Silent Vigil for Peace, on Sedgefield village green on Saturday, at 11am.