Serious flaws in Iraq intelligence but Blair in clear

LONDON - An official inquiry into the quality of British intelligence on Iraqi weapons of mass destruction said early today that some sources were "seriously flawed" or "unreliable" but found no evidence of "deliberate distortion or culpable negligence".

The report contradicted a central claim made by Prime Minister Tony Blair and found that, before the outbreak of war in March 2003, Iraq "did not have significant, if any, stocks of chemical or biological weapons in a state fit for deployment or developed plans for using them."

Lord Butler's report said a key dossier prepared by Blair's Government on the threat posed by Saddam Hussein pushed its case to the limits of available intelligence.

He found that vital caveats on the limits of the available intelligence were left out of the September 2002 dossier.

The report was highly critical of British intelligence-gathering in Iraq.

"Validation of human intelligence sources after the war has thrown doubt on a high proportion of those sources and of their reports, and hence on the quality of the intelligence assessments received by ministers and officials in the period from summer 2002 to the outbreak of hostilities," it said.

The report acknowledged that its conclusions would probably lead to calls for the resignation of John Scarlett, who as chairman of the Joint Intelligence Committee, drew up the dossier. He has since been appointed the chief of MI6, Britain's secret intelligence service.

The report, however, said it hoped Scarlett would stay on. "We have a high regard for his abilities and his record."

Butler told a news conference that failures were "collective" and Scarlett should not bear sole responsibility.

The informality of the procedures within Blair's Government for forming policies on the risks posed by Iraq "reduced the scope for informed collective political judgment," the report found.

And in a dramatic turnaround by one of Washington's biggest backers in the global war on terrorism, the Philippines said last night that it had begun withdrawing its small peacekeeping contingent from Iraq early. This apparently was giving in to the demand of kidnappers threatening to kill a captive Filipino truck driver.

It was a blow to the United States-led international contingent in Iraq, hit by Spain's pullout.

US officials, echoed by Australia and Iraq's new interim Government, had expressed displeasure that Manila was even considering caving in to the kidnappers' demand.

"The Foreign Affairs Ministry is co-ordinating the pullout of the humanitarian contingent with the Ministry of National Defence," Foreign Secretary Delia Albert said. "As of today, our head count is down from 51 to 43."

The announcement did not clarify when the pullout would be finished. Angelo Dela Cruz's captors said they would treat him like a prisoner of war if Manila made a good-faith move towards withdrawing early and would free him if the pullout was completed by July 20.

Washington had no immediate reaction.

- REUTERS

The Butler Report:
Review of Intelligence on Weapons of Mass Destruction
[PDF 216 pages 0.99MB]

Herald Feature: Iraq