British Prime Minister Tony Blair has said his government did not fabricate evidence of Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction to justify the war on Iraq.
Mr Blair, who is facing a domestic controversy over the issue, did not specifically address the allegation that his office hyped up intelligence reports to strengthen its case for war.
"The idea that we authorised or made our intelligence agencies invent some piece of evidence is completely absurd," Mr Blair said in Poland today. "Saddam's history of weapons of mass destruction is not some invention of the British security services".
Widespread international cynicism about British and American justification for war was stoked this week by a BBC report claiming an intelligence dossier had been altered on the request of Blair's office to make it "sexier" by adding that Saddam's weapons could be readied for use within 45 minutes.
The controversy has also been fuelled by comments from the two top US defence officials that the US decision to stress the weapons' threat was taken for "bureaucratic" reasons and that Iraq may have destroyed them before the war.
No chemical or biological weapons have been found in Iraq despite repeated assertions by Mr Blair and US President George W. Bush before the March 20th invasion that the threat posed by Saddam's stocks warranted a war to eliminate them.
Mr Blair said new investigations of alleged sites had only just begun but "we have found two trailers, both of which we believe were used to produce biological and chemical weapons. You have just got to have a little bit of patience".
But in Britain, newspaper headlines like "Sex it Up!" and "Lies, Lies, Lies" piled the pressure on the government to prove that it did not mislead parliament or the public.
More than 70 disgruntled members of parliament have signed up to a motion urging the government to give evidence to parliament on Saddam's weapons and its motives for going to war.