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Lord Alexander opines (Read 2287 times)
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Lord Alexander opines
Feb 2nd, 2004, 2:59pm
 
Lord Alexander of Weedon, the prominent QC who ran the NatWest Bank for 10 years, offers new insights into the Hutton Report in the FT.  He says, in part:

Perhaps the central problem of the report is that Lord Hutton's remit was limited. Yet he brought out facts that would otherwise have remained buried. He sets out the changes in the draft dossiers in September 2002 in a particularly illuminating way. The September 16 draft told us that Saddam Hussein was "prepared to use nuclear and biological weapons if he believes his regime is under threat". Number 10 encouraged the intelligence services to consider whether they could properly make a change to this statement to strengthen the case. By September 20 the caveat that the regime would have to be under threat had disappeared. The important distinction between aggressive and defensive use had become blurred. And no mention was made throughout of the fact that these were battlefield weapons.

Lord Hutton also brings out a striking statement in the first draft of the prime minister's foreword to the dossier. He said: "The case I make is not that Saddam could launch a nuclear attack on London or another part of the UK. (He could not)." This was deleted from the final dossier for reasons that are wholly unexplained.

By highlighting this material, Lord Hutton - whether intentionally or otherwise - strengthens the case for a full public inquiry into the war......

Lord Hutton may have shied away from criticisms of the government. What he has done is a great service by bringing out some of the facts that need to be pursued in a more wide-ranging investigation.


(Subscription to FT.com required for full article).
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