Last year’s US-led invasion of Iraq and ousting of President Saddam Hussein has made the world more dangerous, French President Jacques Chirac said on the eve of a state visit to key US ally Britain.

The French leader’s interview with the British Broadcasting Corporation, excerpts of which were aired yesterday, indicate little chance of success for British Prime Minister Tony Blair’s efforts to mend Franco-American ties damaged by the Iraq war. “I’m not at all sure that one can say the world is safer,” Chirac said. “There is no doubt there has been an increase in terrorism.” “To a certain extent Saddam Hussein’s departure was a positive thing but it also provoked reaction such as the mobilisation in a number of countries of men and women of Islam which has made the world more dangerous.”

Chirac, whose strong opposition to the war prompted US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld to dismiss France as part of “Old Europe” has questioned what Blair has gained from his unstinting support of the invasion.

BAGHDAD

<B>British woman hostage believed to be dead</B>

■ The British-Iraqi woman kidnapped in Iraq has probably been killed by her captors, her family and diplomats said on Tuesday after a video tape surfaced apparently showing a hooded gunman shooting her in the head. Diplomats said the video, sent to Arabic news channel Al Jazeera, appeared to show the killing of Margaret Hassan, Iraq country director for aid organisation Care International, who was seized in Baghdad last month. If confirmed, the murder of Dublin-born Hassan would be the first killing of a foreign woman taken hostage by militants in Iraq.