Cook challenges Government over death of Dr Kelly
A judicial inquiry into the Iraq war could have prevented the death of Dr David Kelly, Robin Cook alleged yesterday.
Robin Cook argued that the evidence produced by Lord Hutton’s inquiry in the circumstances surrounding Dr Kelly’s suicide meant little value would be gained in conducting a full scale judicial inquiry into the justification of the Iraq war.
In another universe, the former foreign secretary and leader of the Commons implied an inquiry in May would have avoided the Dr Kelly’s compulsion to spill the story to the BBC that someone in Downing Street had “sexed up” intelligence reports on Iraq’s capacity to launch lethal weapons.
Dr Kelly committed suicide after he was “outed” as the Ministry of Defence “mole” in Andrew Gilligan’s story on the BBC’s Today programme.
Mr Cook, the MP for Livingston, who resigned from the Cabinet in protest at the military action, said he had demanded a judicial inquiry in May.
“I think it would have been very useful if we had it then because then we could possibly have spared the tragedy of David Kelly’s suicide and we wouldn’t have needed the Hutton Inquiry,” he told the BBC’s Breakfast with Frost.
“We know Saddam was not a threat, we know there were no weapons of mass destruction. We also know tragically we were not prepared to know what to do next when we went in,” he said.
Mr Cook insists that Mr Blair was aware that Saddam Hussein posed no “imminent” threat when he ordered British troops to join US soldiers in combat.
“The whole of Britain understands now that Saddam was not a threat.
“We did not attack Iraq because there was any imminent or serious or immediate threat. We attacked Iraq because it was weak and we knew he could not resist.”
Mr Cook explained his decision to leave the Cabinet in published diaries, serialised last month by The Sunday Times.
Labour MP Glenda Jackson yesterday repeated her call for the PM’s resignation.
“I think the government would be in an infinitely stronger position if he did actually bite the bullet, resign and the party could engage in the process of selecting and electing a new leader,” she said.
