News Search Search this site or the web powered by FreeFind Site search Web search Story archive		14-8-2003 Scotsman THe Hutton Inquiry: Kelly Blamed No 10 over dossier By Gethin Chamberlain Defence Correspondent THE weapons expert Dr David Kelly confirmed that the intelligence community had serious concerns about the government dossier on Iraqi weapons and personally blamed the Downing Street press office for inserting the controversial "45 minute claim" into the document, the inquiry into his death heard yesterday. In an extraordinary tape of a conversation with Susan Watts, the science correspondent for BBC Newsnight, Dr Kelly confirmed large parts of the story by the BBC's Andrew Gilligan. Mr Gilligan, who had spoken to Dr Kelly, accused No 10 and specifically Alastair Campbell of "sexing up" the document. However, the BBC also came out of the day badly, as Ms Watts attacked its "misguided" attempts to defend its claim that Downing Street altered the dossier. She accused her own bosses of placing her under intense pressure to back up the story by Mr Gilligan, its defence and diplomatic correspondent. The BBC had mounted a spirited defence of Mr Gilligan's reporting on the flagship Radio 4 Today programme, which included the assertion that Downing Street inserted a claim that Iraq could be ready to launch weapons of mass destruction at 45 minutes notice, despite knowing this was wrong. Mr Gilligan says he ran the story after speaking to Dr Kelly, who committed suicide after he was identified as the source. But on the third day of Lord Hutton's inquiry into the events surrounding his death, the BBC's case was dealt a crushing blow as Ms Watts contradicted parts of Mr Gilligan's story. "He (Dr Kelly) did not say to me that the dossier was transformed in the last week and he certainly did not say that the 45 minute claim was inserted either by Alastair Campbell or by anyone else in government," she said. "In fact, he denied specifically that Alastair Campbell was involved." She added that she felt under "considerable pressure from the BBC" to reveal the identity of her source. She said: "I felt that the purpose was to corroborate the Andrew Gilligan allegations and not for any proper news purposes." And she accused the BBC of trying to use her story to add authenticity to Mr Gilligan's version. But even if she did not believe Dr Kelly was blaming Mr Campbell, a tape of her conversation with the weapons expert, which was played to the inquiry, raised fresh questions about how the government presented its dossier. On the 45 minute claim Dr Kelly told Ms Watts: "They were desperate for information ... they were pushing hard for information which could be released that was one that popped up and it was seized on and it was unfortunate that it was." Pressed further on whether he could confirm that it was Mr Campbell who had inserted the 45 minutes claim, Dr Kelly said: "No, I can't All I can say is the No 10 press office. I've never met Alastair Campbell so I can't, but I think Alastair Campbell is synonymous with that press office because he's responsible for it." But he also insisted: "I don't think they're being willfully dishonest. I think they just think that that's the way the public will appreciate it best." The BBC's director of news, Richard Sambrook, defended his decision to ask Ms Watts the identity of her source. He said he had been struck by the similarities between what her source and Mr Gilligan's source were saying and - amid the bitter row between the BBC and the government - he wanted to find out if they were the same person. "I believed it would have been irresponsible for me not to find out whether that was the case and what else they said," he said. The inquiry also heard details of the increasingly bitter relationship between the BBC and Mr Campbell. One of numerous letters of complaint about the corporation's broadcasting sent by Mr Campbell was headed "Catalogue of Lies", and James Dingemans QC, the counsel to the inquiry, read out an acerbic internal BBC e-mail from Kevin Marsh, the Today programme editor, about Mr Campbell's complaints. In one he said: "I started to look at this point by point but it is drivel. It would be easy to get as confused as Campbell is.
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