The Report
of the Iraq Inquiry
640.
Lord Goldsmith
had agreed but “stressed that he wished to ensure that his
advice
was clearly
on the record”. Mr Straw had “assured” Lord Goldsmith that
Mr Blair was
fully aware
of Lord Goldsmith’s views.
641.
Finally, Ms
Adams recorded that Lord Goldsmith:
“… hoped
that, if there were any further meetings … at which decisions on
the use
of force
were to be made, the Foreign Secretary would make clear that the
Attorney
ought to be
present. The Foreign Secretary agreed.”
642.
The note of
the conversation produced by Mr Straw’s Private Office records
that
Lord
Goldsmith told Mr Straw that the latest draft of the
resolution “did not provide legal
authorisation
for the use of force”.207
In a
discussion of the tactics necessary to persuade
the US to
take the UN route, Lord Goldsmith said he was:
“…
comfortable with what had been said publicly so far. He noted the
Prime
Minister’s
assurance to Bush that we would participate in military action
should
the
Security Council route fail, but he took the Foreign Secretary’s
point that to
maintain
influence over the American approach, we had to demonstrate that
we
stood
shoulder to shoulder. The Foreign Secretary reassured the Attorney
that both
he and the
Prime Minister had explained our legal position to Powell and Bush
who
understood
the constraints.”
643.
Lord Goldsmith
and Mr Straw agreed that discussions within Government
“should
take full
account of the legal issues”. Mr Straw “accepted” that “unless
circumstances
changed …
we would need a second resolution to authorise the use of force”
but
“tactically,
we should not commit ourselves to this externally yet”.
Mr Straw also pointed
out that he
“could envisage circumstances in which it might be possible to take
action
without
specific Security Council authority”, but “obviously the Government
would need
the
Attorney’s advice”. Lord Goldsmith would be seeing Mr Blair
the following week and
he and
Mr Straw would keep in touch.
644.
The FCO record
of Lord Goldsmith’s conversation with Mr Straw was sent
to
Mr Ricketts.
It was also sent to the Private Secretaries of Mr Straw and
Sir Michael Jay,
FCO
Permanent Under Secretary (PUS), Mr Wood, Mr Stephen
Pattison, Head of FCO
United
Nations Department and other senior officials.
645.
No record of
the conversation between Lord Goldsmith and Mr Straw
appears
to have
been sent to UKMIS New York.
646.
In his
statement to the Inquiry, Lord Goldsmith wrote that he had not had
the
opportunity
to consider the draft resolution in detail before his telephone
call to Mr Straw,
but his
view was that the draft was not sufficient to authorise the use of
force.208
207
Minute
Sedwill to Ricketts, 18 October 2002, ‘Iraq: Foreign Secretary’s
Conversation with the
Attorney‑General,
18 October’.
208
Statement,
4 January 2011, paragraph 2.2.
314