UK government rebuked for lack of cooperation in Iraq war inquiry
IRNA - Islamic Republic News Agency
London, Mar. 18, IRNA -- The Foreign Affairs Committee Thursday criticised the lack of cooperation by British ministers in giving evidence to its inquiry into the decision to go to war in Iraq. "We are a committee of Parliament, our job is to scrutinise the executive and we believe that we have been denied the tools to do our job effectively," the chairman of the all-party group, Labour MP Donald Anderson said. In a special report, the committee called for more powers to carry out investigations and said it should have the authority to summon the Prime Minister and access official documents. It pointed out that Tony Blair gave evidence to the joint parliamentary intelligence and security committee report on the Iraq war and Lord Hutton`s inquiry into the death of arms inspector David Kelly but not its own inquiry. "It is a plea from members of our committee, eager to perform their tasks and to do their duty, yet frustrated at the lack of adequate co-operation from the government," Anderson said. "In our judgment, it is time for Parliament to stand up for its rights," he said. The report said that what powers parliamentary committee have "are in practice unenforceable." The Foreign Affairs Committee, in its report on the case for the Iraq war last year, said that the "jury was still out on the accuracy" of the government`s dossier on Saddam Hussein`s arms threat. It said it would have been "high desirable" to have obtained a fresh UN resolution before taking military action and also concluded that invading Iraq had done little to reduce the terrorist threat to Britain. During its inquiry, the committee controversially interviewed Kelly before his death, after he was exposed as the likely source of a BBC report in May 2003 that the government exaggerated Iraq`s arms threat. HC/212 End
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