3.5 |
Development of UK strategy and options, September to November 2002
–
the
negotiation of resolution 1441
“It is
impossible to say what difference this would have made but the text
did change
after my
meeting with the Prime Minister [on 22 October 2002] and my advice
on it
was not
sought. Some of those changes were in my view significant and
featured in
995.
Lord Goldsmith
added that it would not be “impossible for an Attorney
General
in London
to give advice throughout the process of negotiations”, but that
would have
required
him to have “been given much more information and to have been
included
to a far
greater extent”.367
996.
Asked whether
Lord Goldsmith should have been more closely involved in
the
negotiation
of resolution 1441, Mr Blair stated:
“… in
retrospect it would have been sensible to have had him absolutely
in touch
with the
negotiating machinery all the way through …”368
997.
Sir Michael
Wood identified the “main consequence” of the fact that Lord
Goldsmith
did not
give advice at the later stages of the negotiation was that “there
was inevitably
some
uncertainty about his views on the meaning of the resolution, which
made it
difficult
for FCO Legal Advisers to advise Ministers”. But it was “far from
clear that having
his further
views during the negotiation would have made a significant
difference to the
course of
the negotiations or to the terms of the eventual
resolution”.369
998.
Lord
Goldsmith decided to convey his views orally rather than in
writing
on a number
of occasions, including in response to the three explicit
requests,
of 24 September,
18 October and 4 November 2002, from FCO Legal
Advisers
for his
advice.
999.
Lord
Goldsmith bears some responsibility for not seeking more
assertively
to ensure
that his views were known and understood by those negotiating
the
resolution
and those responsible for its implementation.
1000.
Mr Wood
and Mr Macleod did not have full visibility of the
discussions
between
Mr Blair and Mr Straw and their counterparts which led to
some of the
key
provisions in resolution 1441.
1001.
Nor did
they see all the records of discussions in which Lord
Goldsmith
set out
his concerns.
1002.
The
accounts given to the Inquiry by Sir Michael Wood, Sir
Jeremy
Greenstock
and Mr Macleod, about the UK Permanent Mission to the
UN
366
Statement,
4 January 2011, paragraphs 1.5‑1.6.
367
Statement,
4 January 2011, paragraph 1.14.
368
Public
hearing, 21 January 2011, page 53.
369
Statement,
15 March 2011, page 12.
375