Criticism levelled at coalition following Iraq weapons report
UN weapons chief Dr Hans Blix has commented that it is ‘no surprise’ that the CIA-led Iraq Survey Group failed to find evidence of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.
The British Government and the Bush administration have insisted that the document is simply an interim report from the weapons inspection group and claim that it represents evidence that Saddam Hussein was intent on developing banned weapons programmes.
The report stated that the survey group had discovered facilities for the possible development and manufacture of weapons of mass destruction and plans to develop long range missile systems, but had failed to find any stocks of complete weapons.
There has been a great deal of criticism over the use of Iraq’s perceived military threat as a premise for invasion following the publication of the ISG’s evidence.
Dr Blix said that America still had not come up with any evidence that Iraq posed a substantial enough threat to justify war and suggested that the long-term monitoring of Iraqi weapons by the United Nations could have continued.
Andrew Murray, chairman of the Stop The War Coalition, said the report confirmed that the reasons given for going to war were false.
“The Prime Minister now owes the nation an apology,” he said.
The vice-president of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Jay Rockefeller, accused the Republican administration of putting America’s armed forces at risk, based on a threat that appeared not to have existed. There has been no official reaction from the US Government to the report.
UK foreign secretary Jack Straw defended the ISG’s findings, claiming that the contents of the report justified deposing Saddam. He described the report as “further conclusive and incontrovertible evidence” that the Iraqi regime had breached UN resolutions.
Australian prime minister John Howard said he had no regrets over his country’s role in the US-led war on Iraq.
The ISG’s search has cost around $300 million (£180 million) to date and the Bush administration is seeking a further $600 million (£360 million) to continue the searches.
