WILL CHILCOT BE DELAYED AGAIN?

He may push back report to include memo, hints former US ambassador

THE bombshell memo setting out Tony Blair’s assurances to the US over Iraq could further delay the release of the Chilcot Inquiry, it was claimed last night.

Sir John Chilcot is due to set out a timetable next week for publishing the findings of the six-year review into the disastrous 2003 war.

But Britain’s former ambassador to Washington last night said the leaked communique could now be a ‘factor for delay’ if – as thought – it has not yet been considered by the inquiry panel.

Ex- envoy Sir Christopher Meyer said: ‘Despite the delays, the key thing for Chilcot is to get it right.

‘Chilcot will have to judge what bearing, if any, it has on the conclusions he may be reaching. So, it could be a factor for delay.’

A spokesman for the inquiry yesterday refused to say whether Sir John and his team knew of the existence of the memo, which was written by former US Secretary of State Colin Powell to George W Bush in March 2002.

But the inquiry had little access to US Government files and it seems unlikely the claims were ever considered.

Iraq Inquiry chairman Sir John is expected to say next week that his controversial report will finally be published by next sum-

‘The key thing is to get it right’

mer – although one report yesterday suggested it could slip until 2017.

Ukip defence spokesman Mike Hookem last night said the inquiry should recall Mr Blair to explain the memo.

‘Blair knew Britain’s military was under strength, yet he still signed us up to a war without a UN mandate and without boosting the Armed Forces with numbers and the right kit,’ he said.

‘Secondly, he needs to be called back to answer questions about how open-minded he really was about signing us up to an illegal war, because these leaked memos read like a man who has made up his mind before any evidence was given either to MPs or the UN Security Council.’

Rose Gentle, whose 19- year- old son Gordon was killed by a roadside bomb in Basra in June 2004, said: ‘It will make a mockery of the Chilcot inquiry if he doesn’t have this memo in his report. I would be quite disgusted if it is not in there, and he still has time to put it in.

‘It makes me so angry to think he did not even have access to memos like these, which are now coming out by separate means. He should be using them to write his report.’

She added: ‘This Colin Powell memo is shocking but it is not surprising. It just confirms what we have always suspected – Blair lied to us from the start.

‘More and more people are now starting to realise that we’ve been lied to all along.’

Roger Bacon, whose officer son Matthew, 34, died in a roadside blast in Basra in 2005, said the chance emergence of the memo cast doubt on the value of the inquiry. ‘It makes a total farce of Chilcot that something as important as this can just pop out of the blue, coming from a third party and not as a result of anything to do with the inquiry investigation,’ he said. ‘It’s crucial information.

‘It makes you wonder what other extraordinary revelations are out there which Chilcot simply hasn’t seen. Surely Chilcot is now going to have to re-write his report to take account of this memo.

‘It throws a whole new light on things. Blair was up for this, right from the start.’ Meanwhile the former Labour attorney-general Lord Morris of Aberavon said it was time to ‘pull the plug’ on the inquiry, which has been beset with delays.

He said ministers should consider ‘discharging’ Sir John and publishing an interim report rather than accepting further prevarication.

Sir John, a 76-year-old retired civil servant, is facing mounting anger for allowing the inquiry – which has so far cost taxpayers £10million – to drag on indefinitely.

In August this year the Mail revealed that 29 f amilies had launched an unprecedented legal battle to force Sir John to deliver his report on the controversial 2003 war – which cost 179 British lives – by the end of the year.

The delays have also caused irritation i n Downing Street, which wanted the document published before the General Election last May. David Cameron has told Sir John to ‘get on with it’ while MPs have dubbed the inquiry chairman the ‘man with no conscience’.

The review, which began in 2009, finished taking evidence from witnesses in February 2011. Inquiry insiders say initial delays were caused by the intransigence of Cabinet Secretary Sir Jeremy Heywood over whether to allow the inquiry to publish details of letters exchanged between Mr Blair and President Bush in the run-up to the war.

In the end it was agreed to publish only the ‘gist’ of the letters.

For the last year the inquiry has been bogged down in the so-called ‘Maxwellisation’ process – a convention that allows those likely to be criticised, such as Mr Blair and his spin chief Alastair Campbell, to respond.