Blair rejects WMD claims
The Prime Minister Tony Blair has emphatically restated his rejection of claims that Number Ten doctored security information in order to garner public support for war against Iraq.
The allegations arose from comments made to the BBC by an unnamed senior British official, who reportedly claimed that a document on Saddam Hussein’s alleged weapons of mass destruction (WMD) had been rewritten to make it ‘sexier’.
The dossier was published last September and memorably warned that the Iraqi leader had the capability to unleash his biological and chemical weapons in just 45 minutes.
However, the 45-minute figure had not appeared in the original dossier because the source of this information was deemed unreliable, the source apparently maintained.
Speaking at Prime Minister’s Questions this afternoon, Mr Blair said that he had recently conferred with the chairman of the Joint Intelligence Committee (JIC) and remained adamant that ‘there was no attempt at any time by any official or minister or member of No 10 staff to override the intelligence, judgements of the JIC’.
‘Their judgements, including the judgement about the so-called 45 minutes, was a judgement made by the JIC and by them alone’.
Playing down opposition calls for a public inquiry into the affair, Mr Blair said that the all-party Intelligence and Security Committee had already requested that it look into the handling of the WMD evidence and that its request had been accepted.
Conservative leader Iain Duncan-Smith welcomed this confirmation, but raised concern about the openness of any such inquiry.
He warned that the Prime Minister would only allow the intelligence committee to see the reports that he wanted them to see.
‘It reports directly to them, and he can withhold any part or all of its reports’, IDS remarked.
However, Mr Blair insisted that he would give the committee all the JIC assessments in respect of Iraq.
‘In addition they can in accordance with their normal practice interview those people in the security services who drew up the JIC reports’, the PM said.
The Leader of the House, Dr John Reid, said earlier today that ‘rogue elements’ in the intelligence services had been briefing misinformation to the media in an attempt to undermine the Government.
Appearing in the Commons this afternoon, the PM backed his cabinet colleague’s claims, but added that he did not believe that the leak had emanated from a member of the Joint Intelligence Committee.
With regard to the failure so far to unearth weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, Mr Blair restated his call for patience.
The Iraq survey group was ‘just begining its work’ in this area, he said, arguing that the priority immediately after the conflict had been to rebuild Iraq and to make sure that humanitarian concerns were dealt with.
And the PM maintained: ‘It was accepted by the entire international community and not least by the UN security council that Saddam Hussein did indeed have weapons of mass destruction’
