WMD claims were lies says former envoy

Nigel Morris
London Independent
July 13, 2010

Britain was taken to war in Iraq on the basis of “lies”, scaremongering and deliberate exaggeration, a former UK diplomat told the Iraq inquiry.

• A d v e r t i s e m e n t

Carne Ross claimed that Britain and the United States privately did not believe that Iraq’s weapons programmes posed a “substantial threat” before launching the 2003 invasion.

Mr Ross, the former first secretary at the UK’s mission to the United Nations, told the Chilcot inquiry there was no “significant intelligence” to support claims that Saddam Hussein had amassed an arsenal of deadly weapons.

He argued that Saddam could have been contained through sanctions – and condemned the failure by the US or UK to close the Iraqi dictator’s bank accounts in Jordan.

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This article was posted: Tuesday, July 13, 2010 at 2:23 pm

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