Veteran inspector named new weapons hunter

The CIA named a new inspector to lead the search for Iraqi weapons of mass destruction, choosing a veteran investigator who has expressed scepticism that Saddam Hussein possessed banned weapons that posed an immediate threat.

Charles Duelfer, the No 2 UN weapons inspector in Iraq for much of the 1990s, is taking over the task of sorting out Saddam’s weapons programme. He said yesterday that CIA Director George Tenet assured him he wanted one thing: “That is the truth, wherever that lay.”