Bush, Cheney quizzed on 9/11

President George W. Bush said he and Vice President Dick Cheney answered every question yesterday from the panel investigating the September 11 attacks and denied the joint appearance was aimed at keeping their story straight.

In comments afterward in the White House Rose Garden, Mr Bush declared the extraordinary, more than three-hour session a success that he hoped would lead to recommendations about how to guard against future attacks, which he left open as a possibility.

He dismissed criticism from Democrats that he wanted to appear together with Mr Cheney so they would not contradict each other and did not mention he had only met with the commission under pressure from victims' families.

"Look, if we had something to hide we wouldn't have met with them in the first place. We answered all their questions. As I say, I came away good about the session because I wanted them to know how I set strategy, how we run the White House, how we deal with threats," Mr Bush said.

A key area of questioning for Mr Bush was his response to an August 6, 2001, presidential intelligence memo entitled "Bin Ladin Determined to Strike In US."

It said al Qaeda members were in the United States before the September 11, 2001, commercial airliner attacks and that the FBI had detected suspicious patterns of activity "consistent with preparations for hijackings or other types of attacks."

Mr Bush has said the memo's usefulness was limited because it did not point to a specific target. He did not appear to give any ground on that position.

Former counterterrorism chief Richard Clarke has said Mr Bush did not heed his warnings that al Qaeda was an urgent threat.