More proof of Iraq's weapons on the way, says White House

THE White House did not hype intelligence on the threat from Iraq's suspected banned weapons to justify the war to oust Saddam Hussein, Bush administration officials said yesterday.

They said Iraq possessed such weapons before the war and that more proof is forthcoming.

Iraqis "have had weapons throughout their history. They have used chemical weapons. They have acknowledged they had biological weapons.

"And they never accounted for all that they had or what they might or might not have done with it," Secretary of State Colin Powell said on "Fox News Sunday."

Powell told reporters the paper trail and interviews with Iraqis involved in the weapons programs would lead to the discovery of evidence.

"I think all the documents that are now coming forward and people who are being interviewed will tell us more about what they have hidden and where they have hidden it," Powell said.

Powell said the media, not the American people, were calling the prewar intelligence bogus.

"How can it be bogus when I can show you pictures of people that were gassed by Saddam Hussein?

"I can show you reports from UN inspectors all through the 1990s that demonstrated the Iraqis had weapons of mass destruction.

"I can show you reports where the Iraqis were caught lying about their weapons of mass destruction."

Powell dismissed allegations that Vice President Dick Cheney, during visits to the Central Intelligence Agency, applied political pressure to get intelligence officials to exaggerate reports.

"False," Powell told "Fox News SunCondoleezza Rice, the president's national security adviser was yesterday asked where the weapons were:

"This is a program that was built for concealment. We've always known that. We've always known that it would take some time to put together a full picture of his weapons of mass destruction programs," she replied.

Meanwhile, Britain's intelligence services have been given a dramatic, if not unprecedented, assurance that the Government will take much greater care in future in preparing their intelligence assessments for publication.

This commitment follows the allegations that intelligence briefings on weapons of mass destruction in Iraq had been deliberately hyped up by the Government to justify going to war.

The heads of the British intelligence services, incensed that a published dossier on the weapons, was a mixture of their work and a student's thesis.

They were outraged when Number 10 exaggerated a report that Saddam Hussein had a capability to fire deadly weapons within 45 minutes, and have now been told by the government's Chief of Communications Alister Campbell of the new approach.

The rift between the Government and the intelligence heads had also been fuelled by the leader of the House of Commons, John Reid, who claimed there were 'rogue elements' in the intelligence groups, seeking to undermine the Government.

This further twist to the controversy, has led to renewed calls from the Conservative leader Iain Duncan-Smith, who had supported the war, for a full public inquiry into the matter.

He dismisses a parliamentary inquiry offered by Mr Blair as unacceptable.

In calling for the inquiry, Mr Duncan-Smith said his concern about the matter was that it was twisted, fiddled and spun by people like Alister Campbell and was dangerous to the reputation and the integrity of the Government and the intelligence services.

When asked if he believed he was duped by Tony Blair, he replied: "I don't want to believe that he knowingly said anything to me or presented to me anything he knew to be wrong.

"My belief is that, by and large, I got the right intelligence."