Kelly 'given just two days notice he would be outed'

GOVERNMENT weapons expert David Kelly was given just two days warning that his name was likely to appear in the press, the inquiry into his death was told yesterday.

In a dramatic change of evidence, a key Ministry of Defence witness admitted that no mention was made of the likelihood that his name would be made public when he was first interviewed about his contacts with BBC journalist Andrew Gilligan.

Bryan Wells, Dr Kelly's line manager, told the Hutton Inquiry that the prospect of the scientist's name "emerging" had only been raised at a second interview three days later on July 7.

However, the inquiry has already heard that, by that stage, senior Government figures, from Tony Blair and Defence Secretary Geoff Hoon down, had concluded that it was "inevitable" that he would have to be named at some point.

The inquiry was set up to investigate how Dr Kelly apparently came to take his own life after being publicly identified as the source of Mr Gilligan's story claiming the Government "sexed up" its Iraq weapons dossier.

In his original evidence last month, Dr Wells said that Dr Kelly had "acknowledged" at his first interview with MoD managers on July 4 that his name could come out.

However, under re-examination by counsel to the inquiry James Dingemans QC, he admitted that the question of Dr Kelly's name "emerging" was only raised at the second interview.