US senate report to criticise spy agencies over Iraq intelligence

1.00pm - By TABASSUM ZAKARIA

WASHINGTON - A US Senate Intelligence Committee report will criticise US intelligence agencies for the prewar assessment that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction, the chairman of the panel said on Monday.

"I can tell you that our report does not paint a flattering picture of the performance of our intelligence community as they developed their prewar assessments," Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Pat Roberts, a Kansas Republican, said.

The findings are still classified, but the final report should be completed by June, Roberts said in a speech at Kansas State University, a copy of which was released here.

The Bush administration cited a threat from Iraqi weapons of mass destruction as the main justification for going to war against Baghdad last year, but since the invasion no chemical, biological or nuclear weapons have been found.

"It is my view this was clearly an intelligence failure as opposed to alleged manipulation," Roberts said.

Democrats have accused the Republican White House of exaggerating the threat from Iraq to gather support for the war, which now has become a key political issue ahead of the presidential election in November.

"There are serious problems with both the collection and analysis of the intelligence that went into the prewar intelligence assessments regarding Iraq," Roberts said.

He added that, "it is unlikely that we are going to find stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq as was predicted by US intelligence."

Momentum is growing for reforming the US intelligence structure. "Our conclusions within the inquiry literally beg for reform," Roberts said.

One proposal being debated in Washington is to create a director of national intelligence to oversee the 15 spy agencies, a role that currently is held by the CIA director.

Another is whether to take the domestic intelligence function away from the FBI and create an agency similar to Britain's MI5, a proposal that the FBI director opposes.

Roberts raised a third: "Do we need to create a new Human Intelligence agency to do what the CIA can't or won't do?"

An issue that troubles most lawmakers is accountability, given that no one has been disciplined or fired from the intelligence agencies since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks and the October 2002 National Intelligence Estimate report that said Iraq had weapons of mass destruction, Roberts said.

"We have found serious failures to share information before 9/11 and in the prewar work on Iraq's weapons of mass destruction. Where is the accountability?" Roberts said.

He said there was a need for "fresh thinking" in the intelligence agencies and in Congress.

- REUTERS

Herald Feature: Iraq