Blair prepares way for Iraq WMD inquiry

Britain's Tony Blair prepared the way yesterday for an inquiry into apparent intelligence failings over Iraq after Washington bowed to calls for an independent probe into the justification given for war.

The prime minister's spokesman said the government would soon announce how it planned to address the "valid question" of the whereabouts of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction (WMD) - the main Anglo-American motive for the conflict.

"It's true we have yet to find WMD weapons in Iraq, we recognise this is a valid question. We are close to announcing how we are going to address these questions but we want first to announce that to parliament," the spokesman said.

"The issue is the valid question being asked about 'where are the WMD and how that compares to the intelligence,'" he said.

Pressure has been mounting on Mr Blair to explain apparent flaws in intelligence that led him to state, prior to the war, that Iraq was a "serious and current" threat and that it had continued to produce chemical and biological weapons.

Mr Blair's spokesman said the government had been talking to the United States "consistently" about the issue.

The announcement comes one day before Mr Blair faces a grilling by a powerful parliamentary committee and as the opposition Conservative Party prepares to file a parliamentary motion urging an inquiry into Iraq intelligence.

Donald Anderson, chairman of parliament's Foreign Affairs Committee, has said he will ask Mr Blair today if he still believes the intelligence he received about Iraq's weapons.

Questions over intelligence on Iraq will frustrate Mr Blair's attempts to draw a line under what has been the most torrid period of his six-and-a-half-year tenure.

A British judge last week exonerated Mr Blair of blame over the suicide of government scientist David Kelly, who killed himself after being named as the source of a BBC report that Mr Blair had "sexed up" the threat from Iraq.

The judge also concluded that Mr Blair had not exaggerated evidence of Iraq's weapons, raising even more questions about the quality of the intelligence, given the failure to unearth any deadly armament in Iraq despite months of searching.

Mr Blair's spokesman said Lord Hutton's conclusion had opened the way for the government to address the weapons issue.

The failure to find weapons of mass destruction in Iraq has dealt a major blow to Mr Blair's credibility, sending his public trust ratings plummeting in the wake of the US-led invasion.