Iraq War Inquiry To Be Held 'In Private'

[hibsbollah]

:bitchy:http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/8100432.stm (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/8100432.stm)


Absolutely scandalous. Nick Clegg is right, Brown is trying to cover up what led us to war.


An independent inquiry into the Iraq war will be held in private, Prime Minister Gordon Brown has told MPs.
Opposition parties - and many Labour MPs - have been calling for the probe since shortly after the 2003 invasion.

The inquiry will cover July 2001 to July 2009 and be chaired by Sir John Chilcot, Mr Brown told MPs.
It will begin work next month and take at least a year, Mr Brown said. Its aim will be to identify "lessons learned" and not to "apportion blame", he said.

The government had been urged to hold the inquiry in public, but Mr Brown said he must take into account national security, and avoid damaging Britain's military capability.

The prime minister added that it would hear evidence in private so witnesses can be "as candid as possible".

Mr Brown said the final report would reveal "all but the most secret of information" and the "unprecedented" process would be "fully independent of government".

But the prime minister was jeered by Conservative MPs when he announced that the inquiry would take a year to report - beyond the date of the next general election.

Tory leader David Cameron said that, because of this, there was a danger the public would believe the process had been "fixed".

Sir John Chilcot, 70, is a former permanent under-secretary of state at the Northern Ireland Office and has been chairman since 2001 of the Police Federation and sat on the Butler Inquiry into the intelligence on Iraq's weapons of mass destruction.

[Phil D. Rolls]

Can't see any problem with this myself, it's hardly like they have anything to hide. :rolleyes:

[Betty Boop]

:bitchy:http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/8100432.stm (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/8100432.stm)


Absolutely scandalous. Nick Clegg is right, Brown is trying to cover up what led us to war.


An independent inquiry into the Iraq war will be held in private, Prime Minister Gordon Brown has told MPs.
Opposition parties - and many Labour MPs - have been calling for the probe since shortly after the 2003 invasion.

The inquiry will cover July 2001 to July 2009 and be chaired by Sir John Chilcot, Mr Brown told MPs.
It will begin work next month and take at least a year, Mr Brown said. Its aim will be to identify "lessons learned" and not to "apportion blame", he said.

The government had been urged to hold the inquiry in public, but Mr Brown said he must take into account national security, and avoid damaging Britain's military capability.

The prime minister added that it would hear evidence in private so witnesses can be "as candid as possible".

Mr Brown said the final report would reveal "all but the most secret of information" and the "unprecedented" process would be "fully independent of government".

But the prime minister was jeered by Conservative MPs when he announced that the inquiry would take a year to report - beyond the date of the next general election.

Tory leader David Cameron said that, because of this, there was a danger the public would believe the process had been "fixed".

Sir John Chilcot, 70, is a former permanent under-secretary of state at the Northern Ireland Office and has been chairman since 2001 of the Police Federation and sat on the Butler Inquiry into the intelligence on Iraq's weapons of mass destruction.
Another whitewash! :grr:

[steakbake]

More like a "Brown-wash".

Whoopdee *** do.

I suppose I'll have to wait until I'm 60 odds and the 30 year Freedom of Information rule comes in to play find out why our troops were sent in to invade a country without a UN mandate.

By that point, most of those culpable will be dead, or sitting in the House of Lords and many of our compatriots will not case less, or at least, less that they already do.

[Betty Boop]

Two bodies, thought to be of British hostages kidnapped in 2007, have been returned to British authorities. I had forgotten all about them.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2009/jun/20/british-hostages-bodies-iraq

[Betty Boop]

.June 22, 2009 "The Observer" -- - A confidential record of a meeting between President Bush and Tony Blair before the invasion of Iraq, outlining their intention to go to war without a second United Nations resolution, will be an explosive issue for the official inquiry into the UK's role in toppling Saddam Hussein.
The memo, written on 31 January 2003, almost two months before the invasion and seen by the Observer, confirms that as the two men became increasingly aware UN inspectors would fail to find weapons of mass destruction (WMD) they had to contemplate alternative scenarios that might trigger a second resolution legitimising military action.

Bush told Blair the US had drawn up a provocative plan "to fly U2 reconnaissance aircraft painted in UN colours over Iraq with fighter cover"
Bush said that if Saddam fired at the planes this would put the Iraqi leader in breach of UN resolutions.

The president expressed hopes that an Iraqi defector would be "brought out" to give a public presentation on Saddam's WMD or that someone might assassinate the Iraqi leader. However, Bush confirmed even without a second resolution, the US was prepared for military action. The memo said Blair told Bush he was "solidly with the president".

The five-page document, written by Blair's foreign policy adviser, Sir David Manning, and copied to Sir Jeremy Greenstock, the UK ambassador to the UN, Jonathan Powell, Blair's chief of staff, the chief of the defence staff, Admiral Lord Boyce, and the UK's ambassador to Washington, Sir Christopher Meyer, outlines how Bush told Blair he had decided on a start date for the war.

Paraphrasing Bush's comments at the meeting, Manning, noted: "The start date for the military campaign was now pencilled in for 10 March. This was when the bombing would begin."

Last night an expert on international law who is familar with the memo's contents said it provided vital evidence into the two men's frames of mind as they considered the invasion and its aftermath and must be presented to the Chilcott inquiry established by Gordon Brown to examine the causes, conduct and consequences of the Iraq war.

Philippe Sands, QC, a professor of law at University College London who is expected to give evidence to the inquiry, said confidential material such as the memo was of national importance, making it vital that the inquiry is not held in private, as Brown originally envisioned.

In today's Observer, Sands writes: "Documents like this raise issues of national embarrassment, not national security. The restoration of public confidence requires this new inquiry to be transparent. Contentious matters should not be kept out of the public domain, even in the run-up to an election."

The memo notes there had been a shift in the two men's thinking on Iraq by late January 2003 and that preparing for war was now their priority. "Our diplomatic strategy had to be arranged around the military planning," Manning writes. This was despite the fact Blair that had yet to receive advice on the legality of the war from the Attorney General, Lord Goldsmith, which did not arrive until 7 March 2003 - 13 days before the bombing campaign started.

In his article today, Sands says the memo raises questions about the selection of the chair of the inquiry. Sir John Chilcott sat on the 2004 Butler inquiry, which examined the reliability of intelligence in the run-up to the Iraq war, and would have been privy to the document's contents - and the doubts about WMD running to the highest levels of the US and UK governments.

Many senior legal experts have expressed dismay that Chilcott has been selected to chair the inquiry as he is considered to be close to the security services after his time spent as a civil servant in Northern Ireland.

Brown had believed that allowing the Chilcott inquiry to hold private hearings would allow witnesses to be candid. But after bereaved families and antiwar campaigners expressed outrage, the prime minister wrote to Chilcott to say that if the panel can show witnesses and national security issues will not be compromised by public hearings, he will change his stance.

Lord Guthrie, a former chief of the defence staff under Blair, described the memo as "quite shocking". He said that it underscored why the Chilcott inquiry must be seen to be a robust investigation: "It's important that the inquiry is not a whitewash as these inquiries often are."

This year, the Dutch government launched its own inquiry into its support for the war. Significantly, the inquiry will see all the intelligence shared with the Dutch intelligence services by MI5 and MI6. The inquiry intends to publish its report in November - suggesting that confidential information about the role played by the UK and the US could become public before Chilcott's inquiry reports next year.

[da-robster]

:bitchy:http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/8100432.stm (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/8100432.stm)


Absolutely scandalous. Nick Clegg is right, Brown is trying to cover up what led us to war.


An independent inquiry into the Iraq war will be held in private, Prime Minister Gordon Brown has told MPs.
Opposition parties - and many Labour MPs - have been calling for the probe since shortly after the 2003 invasion.

The inquiry will cover July 2001 to July 2009 and be chaired by Sir John Chilcot, Mr Brown told MPs.
It will begin work next month and take at least a year, Mr Brown said. Its aim will be to identify "lessons learned" and not to "apportion blame", he said.

The government had been urged to hold the inquiry in public, but Mr Brown said he must take into account national security, and avoid damaging Britain's military capability.

The prime minister added that it would hear evidence in private so witnesses can be "as candid as possible".

Mr Brown said the final report would reveal "all but the most secret of information" and the "unprecedented" process would be "fully independent of government".

But the prime minister was jeered by Conservative MPs when he announced that the inquiry would take a year to report - beyond the date of the next general election.

Tory leader David Cameron said that, because of this, there was a danger the public would believe the process had been "fixed".

Sir John Chilcot, 70, is a former permanent under-secretary of state at the Northern Ireland Office and has been chairman since 2001 of the Police Federation and sat on the Butler Inquiry into the intelligence on Iraq's weapons of mass destruction.

Well Nick Clegg's right because if the report was truly independent and showed us what most already know then he and Blair would be crucified,it would be expenses mark II.

[JimBHibees]

Well Nick Clegg's right because if the report was truly independent and showed us what most already know then he and Blair would be crucified,it would be expenses mark II.

Blair would be on war crimes. They dont want us to know. Jack Straw stopped a FOI request of the cabinet minutes around the time of the decision to bend over for the US. This will be the same, a few criticisms and a promise to do better next time.