4.1 | Iraq WMD assessments, pre-July 2002

sub-source who reported only once and whom the Secret Intelligence Service (SIS) was

not able to contact after the conflict.

52. The need for a revised set of controls for Iraq’s WMD and military programmes

was agreed by No.10 in March 2001.

53. An FCO initiative seeking more information publicly to explain policy on Iraq

seems not to have been pursued.

54. Sir John Sawers, Mr Blair’s Private Secretary for Foreign Affairs from 1999 to 2001,

told the Inquiry that, during the first meeting of Mr Blair and President Bush at Camp David

on 23 February 2001 (see Section 1.2), Mr Colin Powell, US Secretary of State, had:

“… made clear that he was most concerned about Iraqi activities on chemical and

biological weapons. There was a range of dual use goods here that should be

properly controlled and should be subject to sanctions but the wider range of trade

sanctions should be removed.”23

55. The record of the Camp David meeting stated that the US and UK agreed on the

need for a policy which was more widely supported in the Middle East region.24 As a

result of the policy of the previous 10 years, Iraq was not as large a threat as it could

have been (including to Kuwait); but Saddam was still pursuing WMD (he had done little

on the nuclear side).

56. The revised policy framework for Iraq, issued by No.10 on 7 March 2001, began:

“A revised set of controls [on Iraq] would be introduced as soon as possible, focused

on Iraq’s WMD and military programmes.”25

57. Mr Tim Dowse, Head of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO)

Non‑Proliferation Department from January 2001 to November 2003, told the Inquiry

that the FCO Board expressed an interest in early 2001 in drawing on intelligence and

unclassified material to put more into the public domain to explain policy on Iraq.26

58. The UK Government has been unable to identify any documents relating to

this issue.27

23 Public hearing, 10 December 2009, pages 15-16.

24 Letter Sawers to Cowper-Coles, 24 February 2001, ‘Prime Minister’s Talks with President Bush,

Camp David, 23 February 2001’.

25 Letter Sawers to Cowper-Coles, 7 March 2001, ‘Iraq: New Policy Framework’.

26 Public hearing, 25 November 2009, page 67.

27 Letter Cabinet Office [junior official] to Aldred, 16 September 2015, ‘Iraq Inquiry Request for

Documents’.

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