Further supplementary memorandum from
the Foreign and Commonwealth Office
1. The FAC asked whether the JIC was represented
in the CIC. No JIC Assessments staff worked in the CIC. As Alastair
Campbell has noted in his supplementary memorandum to the Committee,
the JIC chairman did attend some meetings of the Iraq Communication
Group.
2. The Committee also requested comments
on the question raised by Dr Tom Inch as to whether there was
any evidence that the attempts at procurement (of dual use chemicals
and materials) were successful. We have no evidence of whether
Iraqi attempts at procurement were successful.
Foreign and Commonwealth Office
1 July 2003
Further supplementary memorandum from
the Foreign and Commonwealth Office
ADDITIONAL MATERIAL FOR THE FAC
1. You asked for additional information
on Dr Glen Rangwala's memorandum.
2. The Foreign Secretary and Alastair Campbell
both dealt with several of the issues raised by Dr Glen Rangwala
during their oral evidence sessions.
3. In addition, Alastair Campbell's memorandum
(Tuesday 24 June 2003) has explained how a mistake was made in
the preparation of the February 2003 briefing paper entitled,
"Iraq—Its infrastructure of concealment deception and
intimidation". The Government has acknowledged and apologised
for that mistake.
4. In relation to the specifics on changes
to the text of Dr AI-Marashi's work, we have made it clear that
those officials submitting changes to the briefing paper were
not aware that they were commenting on material which included
parts of Dr AI-Marashi's work. They had assumed it was government-sourced
material.
5. Some changes were made to reflect current
intelligence material. Alastair Campbell has already submitted
additional information to the Committee on intelligence material
contained in the February briefing paper.
6. The Foreign Secretary and Alastair Campbell
responded to the Committee's questions on the change made in the
dossier from aiding opposition groups in hostile regimes"
to "supporting terrorist organisations in hostile regimes
This reflected information at the time that the Iraqi regime was
supporting terrorist organisations including the MEK, Hamas and
Islamic Jihad.
7. Other changes were made to the briefing
paper because the officials believed that they rendered the account
more accurate. For example, numerical changes were made to the
membership of the various organisations in section 2 of the briefing
paper. This was on the basis of work prepared in the FCO and submitted
to the CIC during the preparation of the February briefing paper.
8. This led to several occasions where the
numbers were reduced. For example, the Directorate of General
Intelligence (AI-Mukhabarat) in Dr AI-Marashi's article said it
had 8,000 members whereas the February briefing paper said it
had 4,000. The Special Security Organisation (AI-Amn al-Khas)
similarly went down from 5,000 to 2,000.
9. Dr Al-Marashi's own evidence to the Committee
addressed the currency and accuracy of his own work. Dr AI-Marashi
said: "It was as accurate as I could possibly make it as
of September 2002 using open source materials". Dr Al-Marashi
also confirmed to the Chairman that his work was updated from
beyond 1991 to 2002.
Foreign and Commonwealth Office
July 2003
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