David Kelly, Missing UK War Advisor and Former UN Weapons Inspector, Found Dead

[Phaedrus]

Adding mystery to the controversy over pre-war intelligence gathering, British police said a body found Friday matches the description of a missing British Ministry of Defense adviser. The adviser had been suspected of being a source for a news report that Britain doctored information on Iraq’s weapons programs in order to bolster the case for war.

Full story here.

Phaedrus

 

[DENIRO]

i always get confused was this part in godfather part 1 or 2?

 

[Phaedrus]

Body officially identified and cuase of death named -- suicide via slashed wrist.

Story here.

Phaedrus

 

[Oceans11]

Iraq weapons expert Dr David Kelly reportedly warned of "many dark actors playing games" in an e-mail sent hours before he bled to death from a slashed wrist.
The message, sent to a journalist, appeared to refer to officials within the Ministry of Defence and British intelligence agencies with whom he had sparred over interpretations of weapons reports, according to the New York Times.

Dr Kelly disappeared two days after being questioned by the Commons foreign affairs select committee.

But his e-mail gave no indication he was depressed and said he was waiting "until the end of the week" before judging how his appearance before the committee had gone, the newspaper said.

The 59-year-old had told MPs he had spoken to BBC reporter Andrew Gilligan but denied he was the main source for his report that Downing Street communications director Alastair Campbell "sexed up" a dossier setting out the case for war in Iraq.

His body was found at 0920 BST on Friday in a wooded area at Harrowdown Hill, near Faringdon.

'Stress'

On Thursday, before leaving his Oxfordshire home for the last time, Dr Kelly had worked on a report he said he owed the Foreign Office and sent some e-mails to friends, his wife, Janice, told the New York Times.

The newspaper said a second e-mail, sent by Dr Kelly to an associate, was "combative".

In it, the Ministry of Defence adviser said he was determined to overcome the scandal surrounding him and was enthusiastic about the possibility of returning to Iraq.

Mrs Kelly told the paper her husband had been under enormous stress "as we all had been", but she had no indication he was contemplating suicide.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/3080795.stm


===========================================


The Sunday Times says Dr Kelly had initially been told his name would not be made public after he told MoD officials he believed he was the source for the BBC's story that Downing Street had "sexed up" a dossier on Iraq's weapons capabilities.

Dr Kelly told the newspaper - in an interview it believes to be the last he gave before he died - that he was shocked his name would be made public and that he felt profoundly let down by the ministry.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/3080939.stm

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The Gov/BBC relationship is at an all time low at the moment.

There could be a lot of collateral damage from this one, since it ultimately ties back to the WMD farce.

 

[BallRash]

suicide my ass

 

[kayaman+]

Why would a doctor decide to bleed to death as a means of suicide? Doesn't make much sense. I have a feeling there's more than meets the eye here.

 

[sphincter]

the damage was done....why close the barn door after the horse runs out?.....unless maybe you didn`t tell the truth....and might be disgraced...

the british vince foster...

 

[JackDee]

alright it was a suicide.

Anyone know who suicided him though?

nothing to do with the war, and the forged documents.

shit happens.

 

[JackDee]

^

 

[Jointpleasure]

Blood letting was common medical practice in order to "clean ones body of toxins". Why would anyone be surprised, this was common practice. Hell, leech therapy is once again gaining popularity amongst the MD's worldwide.

"Physician heal thyself"

 

[JackDee]

.

 

[Phaedrus]

This story just gets better and better. Lots of little revelations have come out in the interim month, including Kelley's precognition of being "found dead in the woods" if the war with Iraq happened, and the exposure of feeble attempts by the good folks at No.10 Downing Street to discredit Kelley.

Now Blair has returned home and will be facing some very tought questions, as the below article from The Guardian explains. Wish we could get some of this sort of action going against the dipshits at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

Phaedrus

Blair returns to face tough questions

Press Association
Friday August 22, 2003

Tony Blair arrived back in Britain today from his three-week family holiday in the Caribbean, facing tough questioning from Hutton inquiry into David Kelly's death.
The prime minister touched down at London's Gatwick airport with his wife, Cherie, and their four children. He will spend the weekend at Chequers, preparing for his unprecedented appearance before Lord Hutton next Thursday.

Mr Blair's return from Barbados came hours after the Hutton inquiry took an extraordinary and chilling twist when it emerged that Dr Kelly had predicted his own death six months ago.

The weapons scientist at the centre of Downing Street's row with the BBC told British diplomat David Broucher in February that he would probably be "found dead in the woods" if Iraq was invaded.

The revelation sheds light on Dr Kelly's state of mind five months before he took his own life in woodland near his Oxfordshire home.

The PM and his embattled defence secretary, Geoff Hoon, who will appear before the inquiry next week, face questions on whether the government's dossier was "sexed-up" and on their roles in the identification of Dr Kelly.

Mr Blair also returns to a deepening security crisis in Iraq after the bombing of the UN headquarters in Baghdad on Tuesday which left 23 dead, including British UN official Fiona Watson.

Amid calls for more troops to be sent to the country, the foreign secretary, Jack Straw, was meeting UN secretary general Kofi Annan in New York today to discuss widening the role of the UN in Iraq.

During Mr Blair's three weeks away, Downing Street has been hit by a series of revelations thrown up by the inquiry, as well as the embarrassment of remarks made by his official spokesman, Tom Kelly, that Dr Kelly was a "Walter Mitty" fantasist.

As pictures of a tanned Mr Blair swimming in the Caribbean appeared on newspaper front pages back home, No 10 came under fire over the spokesman's comments, made in an off-the-record briefing to a journalist before the Hutton inquiry had even begun.

Once the inquiry got under way, the paper trail of evidence relating to Dr Kelly's death reached Mr Blair himself.

It emerged that his chief of staff and close aide, Jonathan Powell, had warned on September 17 that it would be wrong for Mr Blair to claim in the government's dossier that Iraq posed an "imminent threat" to the world.

A week later Mr Blair, presenting the dossier to the Commons, said that Iraq's weapons of mass destruction programme was "up and running now".

Hundreds of people are expected to queue outside the royal courts of justice to catch a glimpse of the prime minister taking the witness stand to face examination by counsel for the inquiry James Dingemans QC and Lord Hutton.

The intense scrutiny will be a far cry from the privacy of Cliff Richard's £3m villa, where Mr Blair and his family spent their holiday.

According to passengers on the Blairs' British Airways flight, which touched down this morning, the family travelled economy class, although their front row seats in the cabin ensured they had more leg room than their fellow travellers.

Livingstone and Janet Prescott, who travelled to the island and back with their children on the same flights as the Blairs, said the family had mainly "kept themselves to themselves" with only one or two other passengers attempting to talk to them.

Mr Prescott, a 51-year-old builder from Forest Gate, east London, said: "It should happen that they travel with everyone else."

Jokingly, he added: "I was going to harass him on the way back but in the end I thought I'd better let them have some time to themselves. He was on holiday and everybody deserves a break from work."

 

[Phaedrus]

Some updates on the issues surrounding the Kelly story ...

Scarlett: dossier not 'sexed up'

Intelligence chief John Scarlett today told the Hutton inquiry into Dr Kelly's death he had known immediately that Andrew Gilligan's BBC report alleging the dossier on Iraq weapons had been "sexed up" by Downing Street was "completely untrue".
Mr Scarlett, the chairman of the joint intelligence committee, said he had been sitting at his desk on the morning of May 29 when the Radio 4 Today programme broadcast the claim that the deployment of weapons within 45 minutes had been inserted by Downing Street.

He said he had been alerted to the allegations by a No 10 press officer and had been "a bit surprised to hear of them".

"I knew immediately that it was completely untrue. Nobody was in a better position than I was to know that and I said so," he said of Gilligan's claim about the 45-minute detail.

However, Mr Scarlett admitted the claim had come from a single source and had been delivered to British intelligence at a late stage in the preparation of the dossier on Iraq weapons, which was published on September 24 last year.

Full story here.

The 45-minute claim

The inquiry also heard that the origin of the disputed 45-minute claim on Iraqi weapons came from a secret intelligence report dated August 30.

The claim that Iraq could deploy "chemical and biological munitions" within 45 minutes was made in a classified email issued by a member of the joint intelligence committee (JIC) -but with both sender and recipient blacked out for security reasons.

It was distributed to Downing Street and Whitehall staff six days later on September 5 as new drafts of the September 24 dossier were being prepared.

The email stated that "forward deployed storage sites of chemical and biological munitions could be with military units and ready for firing within 45 minutes".

That revelation, presented by the chairman of the JIC on the ninth day of the inquiry, appears to blow out of the water the original suggestion by BBC reporter Andrew Gilligan that the claim was made up.

Mr Scarlett also denied that it was inserted at the behest of No 10.

Asked if he had sensed any "attitude of pressure" to include specific information in his drafting of the September dossier, Mr Scarlett replied: "That is not a fair analysis."

Full story here.

Kelly 'led on'

It also emerged today that David Kelly suggested he had been "led on" by the BBC reporter Andrew Gilligan at an interview with his Ministry of Defence bosses.

Mr Scarlett told the Hutton inquiry into Dr Kelly's death that an MoD official telephoned him to report back on the interview.

According to the official Dr Kelly maintained he could not be the source for Gilligan's report for the Today programme.

But, Mr Scarlett said, the official told him that Dr Kelly "had seemed less sure than before". In particular, Dr Kelly had begun to make comments to the effect that maybe Mr Gilligan had "led him on".

Mr Scarlett said he believed the MoD interview was necessary after Dr Kelly admitted meeting Gilligan.

Full story here.

MP attacks Gilligan interference

Labour MP Andrew MacKinlay has attacked BBC reporter Andrew Gilligan for emailing his colleagues on the foreign affairs select committee to suggest lines of questioning to take with David Kelly.

Appearing before the Hutton inquiry as it entered its third week, Mr MacKinlay, who suggested Dr Kelly was a "fall guy" who had been "set up" by the government when he appeared before the committee on July 15, criticised Gilligan for trying to influence the committee.

"I think it is highly inappropriate... I think it is an affront that I was going to be fed this by someone so central to all the debate and discussion. It's absolutely outrageous," he told Lord Hutton.

It has emerged during the inquiry that Gilligan sent emails to two MPs on the committee, one Liberal Democrat and one Conservative, and the court has also been shown a draft of a similar mail that Gilligan intended to send to Mr MacKinlay.

But the Labour MP said he had never received the email. "I delete so much. If it is not obvious who the person is, it is out," he said.

"If I had received it, I would have told Donald [Anderson, committee chairman] and the clerk and brought it to the attention of the whole committee. I have never seen this. I haven't received one like this," he added.

Full story here.


Phaedrus

 

[Phaedrus]

More developments:

Blair Accepts Responsibility for Naming Kelley

Blair Says 'Sexed Up' Dossier Claims, if True, Merit His Resignation

Official Hutton Inquiry Website


Phaedrus

 

[Phaedrus]

Just keeping the thread updated ...


Dossier 'too strong', says MoD man

A senior intelligence official today dealt a blow to Tony Blair's claims that the dossier on Iraq had not been "sexed up" when he said the language used in the foreword, which was personally signed off by the prime minister, was "too strong".
Brian Jones, a retired branch head of the defence intelligence analysis staff, told the Hutton inquiry his staff had concerns about the dossier at the centre of No 10's row with the BBC, parts of which he described as "over-egged".

But he said they had been particular concerned about the infamous 45-minute claim, which sparked the war of words between Downing Street and the BBC.

Dr Jones said the use of the word "indicated" to express the strength of the intelligence on the 45-minute claim in the main body of the dossier was "a little bit strong but I felt I could live with that".

But when it came to the executive summary and foreword he said: "I thought they were too strong."

Dr Jones told Lord Hutton that Dr Kelly, who had regular contact with his department and had the security clearance to come and go as he liked, was certainly aware of concerns among staff about the use of intelligence in the dossier.

Dr Jones told the inquiry his department had been concerned about "the tendency ... to, shall we say, over-egg certain assessments, particularly in relation to the production of chemical weapons".

Full story here.

Reports of shredded paperwork denied

No documents relating to Dr Kelly were destroyed or shredded, the chief of security for the Ministry of Defence insisted today at the Hutton inquiry.

Stephen McDonald told the inquiry into the MoD scientist's death that one document with Dr Kelly's name written in hand on it had been found in a "burn bag" in the MoD building on Sunday July 20.

But he denied media reports that any documents had been shredded or removed from the building.

He said there was "never any suggestion of officials - senior or otherwise - shredding documents relating to David Kelly or being destroyed".

That is despite stories in the Daily Telegraph and Mail on Sunday alleging such papers had been "hastily shredded" and "removed by a mysterious blonde" respectively.

But Mr McDonald admitted that one piece of paper, seen by a security guard, did include the name "David Kelly" in a bag of documents set to be burnt, and this had provoked a special security operation.

In excess of normal procedure the MoD police were notified and the room in which the burn bag was found was sealed.

The document, shown to the inquiry, was a minute by the secretary to the ISCG (Information and Security Co-ordinating Group) on Iraq suggesting media briefings for the following week.

Under a heading marked "negative measures to play down or ignore", an anonymous member of staff had added Dr Kelly's name in ink to a list including "US/UK differences", "Ba'ath revival" and "discontent speed/constitutional reform".

Mr McDonald said that the unnamed official had added the name retrospectively to the printed minute and it was then "pointed out to him that David Kelly's name was a domestic matter and not for consideration by the ISCG".

The document had been produced in the wake of Dr Kelly's death but such an insistence has so far only Mr McDonald's word to support it.

Full story [urlhttp://politics.guardian.co.uk/kelly/story/0,13747,1034844,00.html]here[/url]

Police 'confident' it was suicide

Earlier the assistant chief constable of Thames Valley police, Michael Page, told the inquiry that he "remained confident that he [Dr Kelly] met his death at his own hand".

Asked by Lord Hutton whether any third party may have been involved in the death, Mr Page replied that he "can't conceive a way a third party could be involved without leaving any presence, and I have been unable to find any trace of any presence whatsoever".

Earlier the inquiry heard from forensic toxicologist Richard Allan who said that Dr Kelly had taken "quite a large overdose" of coproxamol but that the government scientist probably died of blood loss before all the paracetamol had been absorbed.

Investigation similar to murder case

Thames Valley police launched a "murder standard investigation" following the discovery of Dr Kelly's body because of the high-profile circumstances surrounding his death.

Assistant chief constable Page today told the Hutton inquiry that the force scrambled together a top-level team to search for Dr Kelly in the early hours of the morning of the day after he went missing.

"We determined from the outset because of the attending circumstances that we would apply the highest standard of investigation as was possible. I wouldn't say I launched a murder investigation but the investigation was of that standard.

The police search was extensive with 30 officers drawn in from other areas to supplement the 10 already on duty. Mounted police and an underwater search unit were also sent out along with voluntary dog searchers.

As soon as the dog searchers who found Dr Kelly's body rang in with the information to Abingdon police station it was passed to Assistant Chief Constable Page.

He decided to send a Home Office pathologist and forensic biologists to the scene, something that is not routine procedure in such cases.

Full story here.

 

[Phaedrus]

Blair must go if Hutton blames him, say voters


Tory ultimatum on PM backed by majority of electorate

by Michael White
The Guardian

Downing Street's hope that Lord Hutton's verdict on the death of David Kelly will acquit Tony Blair of serious blame was thrown into stark relief last night after the Conservatives and the electorate served notice that they expect him to resign if his optimism proves false.

Within hours of another brutal exchange with the Tory leader, Michael Howard, across the Commons dispatch box, Mr Blair learned from a Channel 4 News poll that 57% of voters expect him to walk if Lord Hutton decides he authorised the leaking of Dr Kelly's name shortly before the weapons expert killed himself.

Mr Blair's hunch, reinforced by close advisers, is that voters are keen to see the issue resolved and to "move on" to the domestic agenda, notably public sector reform.

Despite getting a similar claim wrong in 2001, the Sun reported yesterday that the general election will be held on May 5 2005, and that Mr Blair will hand the party leadership to Gordon Brown after 10 years in office in 2007.

Grossly premature, such confident talk tempts fate and provokes MPs and voters. Like the prime minister, No 10 officials categorically refuse to speculate about the contents of Lord Hutton's delayed report, due to be published in the next few weeks.

Drawing on hints implicit in the way Lord Hutton handled the inquiry, those close to Mr Blair are picking up clear signals that the prime minister and his kitchen cabinet believe he will be cleared of doctoring the "dodgy dossier" on Iraq's weapons and of complicity in the Kelly "naming" strategy.

Mr Howard is expending much of his hard-won political capital trying to prove that Mr Blair is guilty before the report is published. Yesterday he used most of his six weekly questions to ask for a "yes or no to whether the prime minister had authorised the naming of David Kelly?"

Mr Blair described the charge as "completely untrue," when it was first raised on July 22, a formula he has repeated, adding that his replies must be seen in their "totality". Yesterday he again urged Conservative MPs not to pre-judge the report, but wait until Lord Hutton gives his verdict.

Mr Howard was goaded into claiming that the "whole country has seen just how desperately dodgy this prime minister is".

For the first time since he succeeded Iain Duncan Smith, Mr Howard was jeered by MPs - Liberal Democrat as well as Labour - who felt he had lost the plot.

But Mr Blair's reply won the day's biggest cheer from Labour MPs. "I hope that, since you have raised issues of my integrity, effectively accused me of telling lies, if this report does not find those charges proven, you will have the decency to apologise."

If Mr Blair's hunch is right, Mr Howard is trying to make mud stick before it is hosed down by Lord Hutton, a tactic that sometimes works. The ambiguity inherent in Mr Blair's pre-Hutton position is clearly obvious to the 2,300 people who voted online for Channel 4 News with YouGov.

In addition to the 57% who said they thought he should resign if blamed for the outing of Dr Kelly, 70% of voters (55% of traditional Labour voters) think he is out of touch.

Some 61% think he "sometimes" tell lies (23% prefer "often"), though 51% believe he is "about as honest" as the average politician. Voters want him to be more honest, more inclined to listen and more concerned with domestic issues. The Hutton inquiry has harmed him. Half of the electorate thinks he is running out of steam.

Yet the message is far from dreadful. More people support the Iraq war now than oppose it (48% to 42%). Some 63% believe Mr Blair is decisive, against 24% who do not, and more consider him competent, likeable and caring than do not. For a mid-parliament, second-term prime minister, these are qualities that should win a third term.