Archive for 'Issues' Category
A man of integrity
by Brian Jones
Baroness Manningham-Buller’s appearance at the Iraq Inquiry and her comments about briefing Home Office ministers, should remind us that John Denham, then Minister of State for Policing, resigned from the government when he learned it was finally determined to join the US led invasion and sought parliamentary backing.
His resignation speech, during the debate [...]
Chilcot: Ask for an inquest into Dr Kelly’s death
by Chris Ames
The Daily Mail reports that:
“The head of the Iraq war inquiry last night cleared the way for a full inquest into the death of weapons inspector Dr David Kelly.
“Sir John Chilcot said the Government scientist’s apparent suicide in July 2003 was ‘not a matter’ for his five-man panel to investigate.”
Well, that settles [...]
Chilcot: More of the same
by Chris Ames
I’ve just published this piece on Comment is Free:
Watching the Chilcot inquiry into the Iraq war is like watching a car crash in slow motion. Very, very slow motion.
It is supposed to be a “lessons learned” inquiry, but it has shown itself unable to admit to its own mistakes, let alone learn from [...]
Some news from the Inquiry
by Chris Ames
I said yesterday that I would ask the Inquiry to clarify which international lawyers it had written to soliciting submissions. It replied promptly, saying that “The invitation has been circulated to professional lawyers via the British Institute of International and Comparative Law and the Public International Discussion Group. It has not been sent [...]
What the French Ambassador said about Chirac
by Chris Ames
I’ve (very late) come across this story in the Guardian saying that “evidence given to the Chilcot inquiry by Labour ministers about the run-up to the invasion of Iraq was contradicted head-on by a top French government official” and this astonishingly inept rebuttal of the story by the Spectator’s David Blackburn.
According to [...]
So what did the Inquiry find out in the US?
by Chris Ames
The Inquiry’s list of who it saw on its recent trip to the US tells us a little bit – but not a lot – about the lines of inquiry it is following. But we know next to nothing about what it found out. And who the Inquiry didn’t see is pretty significant.
Quite [...]
We need answers, we need evidence
by Chris Ames
I’ve been having a bit of a debate with John Rentoul on the IndyMinds site.
Rentoul initially took issue with my post that asked Will the new government reveal the truth about Iraq?, suggesting that “The belief that there is some hidden truth about the war that has to be ‘revealed’ is a [...]
Are these (still) the right questions?
by Chris Ames
Before launching this site I produced a list of the main questions for the Inquiry, in collaboration with some early contributors. My intention was to try to cover as many of the issues as possible with some broad, open questions. Before assessing how far evidence put into the public domain by the Inquiry [...]
The Inquiry gets dragged into party politics
by Chris Ames
In spite of Sir John Chilcot’s plea, repeated again on Monday, to keep the Inquiry outside of party politics, at Prime Minister’s Questions today David Cameron seized upon criticism of at the weekend of Gordon Brown’s appearance, from former chiefs of the defence staff Lord Guthrie and Lord Boyce.
Perhaps Cameron could [...]
Defence funding (not) clarified
by Chris Ames
Today’s second witness was Sir Bill Jeffrey, Permanent Secretary at the Ministry of Defence since 2005. Jeffrey was said to have been unwell when he was first due to give evidence and his eventual appearance follows on from the row over the funding of the MOD.
According to the Telegraph:
Gordon Brown has not given the [...]