BRITAIN: Some British intelligence experts were unhappy with the strength of language used in a now-famous dossier on Iraq's weaponry, an inquiry into the death of government scientist Dr David Kelly heard yesterday.
Dr Brian Jones, who headed a team of weapons experts which formed part of the Ministry of Defence's intelligence service, said some of his staff felt the language in the September 2002 dossier, which helped the British Prime Minister, Mr Tony Blair, make a case for war, was too strong.
Dr Jones, now retired, said he thought Dr Kelly knew of those concerns. BBC reporter Andrew Gilligan alleged that Mr Blair's communications chief Alastair Campbell, who resigned last week, included in the dossier a claim that Saddam Hussein could let loose banned weapons at just 45 minutes' notice, knowing it was probably wrong.
"I had some concerns about the 45-minute point myself," Dr Jones told the inquiry under Lord Hutton.
"Some of my staff had said that they were unhappy with all of the detail that was in the dossier. My expert analyst on chemical weapons expressed particular concern." The inquiry has unearthed no evidence that Mr Campbell pushed information into the dossier without the sanction of intelligence chiefs.
Dr Jones said his team's concerns were passed up the command chain. Some were accepted but key ones were ignored.
"We at no stage argued that this intelligence should not be included in the dossier," he said. But the language in key parts of the paper was "too strong".
There was a tendency to "overegg certain assessments", said Dr Jones, who wrote formally to his superiors to express his reservations.
The inquiry also heard from "Mr A" - a friend of Dr Kelly and sometime employee of the Ministry of Defence who has also worked with weapons search teams with Iraq.
Speaking anonymously via an audio link, he said the perception in intelligence circles was that the dossier had "been round the houses" several times in an attempt to harden it up to support political ends.
In an e-mail to Dr Kelly, "Mr A" said: "You and I should have been more involved in this than the spin merchants of this administration." But he said he and colleagues thought the dossier taken as a whole, was a reasonable summation.
"The central question here . . . is still whether Britain went to war against Iraq on a flawed prospectus, either because of inadequate intelligence or the mishandling of intelligence by the government," Liberal Democrat foreign affairs spokesman Mr Menzies Campbell said.
The police chief who led investigations into Dr Kelly's death told the inquiry he was in no doubt the scientist had killed himself. "I remain confident that he met his death at his own hand," Assistant Chief Constable Michael Page said.
The pathologist who examined Dr Kelly's body, found slumped against a tree with a slashed wrist, said he had probably died from blood loss. - (Reuters)