Bush defends Iraq war decision

US PRESIDETN George W Bush said yesterday that a report by a US team hunting for Iraqi weapons of mass destruction found evidence of weapons’ programmes and defended his decision to go to war.

“This administration will deal with gathering dangers where we find them,” Mr Bush said, adding he was not worried about a CBS News-New York Times poll that said 53% of Americans doubted whether the Iraq war was worth the cost.

The poll also showed a sharp fall in public confidence in President Bush’s ability to handle foreign and economic policy issues.

In Vienna, an expert close to the UN nuclear watchdog yesterday cast doubt on US claims that Saddam Hussein had been planning to revive Iraq’s atomic weapons’ programme until the US invasion in March.

The expert close to the International Atomic Energy Agency said that David Kay’s report was largely based on “statements and opinions by scientists and officials with no apparent supporting evidence”.

Mr Kay, head of the US-led team which has been searching for evidence of Saddam’s chemical, biological and

nuclear weapons in postwar Iraq, said his team had found no stocks of such arms. But he said there was “evidence of Saddam’s continued ambition to acquire nuclear weapons”.

“The testimony we have obtained from Iraqi scientists and senior government officials should clear up any doubts about whether Saddam still wanted to obtain nuclear weapons,” Mr Kay said of the interim report his team supplied to the US Congress.

“They said Saddam Hussein remained firmly committed to acquiring nuclear weapons,” he said.

The allegation that Saddam Hussein had revived his nuclear, chemical and biological weapons’ programmes after UN inspectors left Iraq in December 1998 was the main justification for the US-led war to disarm Iraq.