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— LONDON (Reuters) - Britain on Monday ordered Iraq's two diplomats in London to leave within a week due to the U.S.-led war against Iraq.

The pair, who work at a scaled-down mission called an Interests Section via the Jordanian embassy in the absence of formal diplomatic ties between Britain and Iraq, were given five working days to leave.

"The Foreign Office has today decided that the Head of the Iraqi Interests Section in the Embassy of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan is persona non grata and the Administrative Attache of the Iraqi Interests Section is not acceptable as a member of the Embassy," the government said in a statement.

A Foreign Office spokesman said the two, section head Mudhafar Amin and attache Akram Muslih, were being expelled because "their presence is no longer welcome given the coalition operations in Iraq."

Amin, stationed in London for more than three years, has denounced the U.S.-British stance on Iraq, even before war started last week.

Britain has had no diplomatic staff in Baghdad since the 1991 Gulf War which ended Iraq's seven-month occupation of Kuwait.

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