The Report
of the Iraq Inquiry
•
“The
Humanitarian Abuses paper needs some further work, principally to
insert
boxes and
photographs …”217
498.
Mr McKane
stated that the papers would need to be shown to the
US
Administration
“at some point”, and asked for Sir David’s views on the timing for
that. He
also asked
for Mr Blair’s views on whether they “should be launched under
the name of
the Foreign
Secretary or a group of Ministers, who might include the Prime
Minister, the
Defence
Secretary and the International Development Secretary (or any
combination)”
before DFID
was consulted.
499.
There were
only three material changes to the previous draft:
•
References
to UNSCOM being unable to account for all imported missiles
and
that Iraq
could have built more missiles using components it had retained
and
hidden were
added as “evidence” to the summary of Iraq’s ballistic
missile
capability.
•
The Human
Rights Watch estimate of casualties from Saddam Hussein’s
attack
on Kurds in
Northern Iraq in 1988 was added to the text.
•
The revised
estimates of chemical agent and precursor chemicals produced
by
the DIS
replaced broad brush figures.
500.
A further
Cabinet Office meeting was held on 21 May, to discuss progress
on
the draft
FCO documents on weapons inspections and human rights abuses,
which
were to be
finalised for discussion, with the WMD paper, on 29
May.218
Officials
were
generally
content with the drafts, subject to a number of detailed, mainly
presentational,
amendments.
501.
Mr Patrick
Lamb, a member of the FCO Non-Proliferation Department, sent
the
Cabinet
Office “a copy of the latest version of the Inspections Paper” on
27 May.219
502.
Mr McKane
sent the three draft papers, which he described as “virtually in
final
form,
although the CIC is still making presentational changes”, to the
MOD, the FCO and
the
Department for Trade and Industry (DTI) on 30 May.220
503.
Mr McKane
added that he envisaged submitting the drafts to No.10 in the
second
half of
June.
217
Minute
McKane to Manning, 26 April 2002, ‘Iraq’.
218
Minute Dodd
to Lamb, 22 May 2002, ‘Iraq’.
219
Letter Lamb
to Dodd, 27 May 2002, ‘Iraq Inspections Paper’.
220
Letter
McKane to Bowen, 30 May 2002, ‘Iraq: Public Documents’ attaching
Papers, [undated], ‘Iraqi
WMD
Programmes’; ‘Iraqi Regime Crimes and Human Rights Abuses’; ‘UN
Weapons Inspections in Iraq’.
102