"Consistent with the conclusions reached elsewhere in this report, we conclude that ministers did not mislead Parliament."
But then you look at the detail. For example, on the Niger uranium ("crude forgeries"):
"It is very odd indeed that the government asserts that it was not relying on the evidence which has since been shown to have been forged, but that eight months later it is still reviewing the other evidence. The assertion 'that Iraq sought the supply of significant amounts of uranium from Africa' should have been qualified to reflect the uncertainty."
"Very odd indeed." Oh, those Brits! And about imminent threats:
"The 45 minutes claim (that Iraq could deploy chemical or biological weapons within 45 minutes of Saddam Hussein's giving the order) did not warrant the prominence given to it in the dossier, because it was based on intelligence from a single, uncorroborated source."
Move along people. No story here.
UPDATE: Thanks to alert reader Tresy, this from Toronto's Globe and Mail:
A British parliamentary committee on Monday sharply criticized the government's handling of intelligence on Iraqi weapons but narrowly cleared Prime Minister Tony Blair's communications chief of "improper influence" in drafting a controversial intelligence dossier.
The cross-party committee also said Mr. Blair misrepresented to lawmakers the status of the second dossier, published in January, which included material copied from a graduate thesis posted on the Internet.
The committee said that it was "wholly unacceptable" for the government to plagiarize work without attribution, as happened with the January dossier.
By telling lawmakers that the document represented "further intelligence," Mr. Blair "misrepresented its status," the committee's report said, although it acknowledged the Prime Minister learned of its provenance only later.
The Foreign Affairs Committee, which questioned Mr. Campbell, said the powerful communications chief "did not exert or seek to exert improper influence" in including the 45-minute claim in the September document.
That verdict was reached only after the committee chairman, Labour Party lawmaker Donald Anderson, used his tiebreaking power as chairman to exonerate Mr. Campbell.
The report said it was wrong for Mr. Campbell — an unelected special adviser hired outside the civil service system — to have presided over a meeting on intelligence matters, and said the practice should cease.
Meanwhile, one of those loony Tories, MP John Stanley, makes the following point:
No evidence has been found in Iraq to substantiate four key assertions in the September document:
- That Iraq has a major chemical-biological weapons program with an "active, ongoing production capability."
- That Iraq had up to 20 longer-range missiles capable of hitting British bases in Cyprus.
- That Iraq was seeking uranium in Africa as part of an effort to restart a nuclear weapons program.
- That Iraq had some chemical and biological weapons ready for deployment within 45 minutes of an order.
Oh well... Never mind.