What a night! This Niger story and its many threads of lies and cover-ups is unraveling so fast I can't put the stories up fast enough. The Sunday morning news programs are going to have a field day over this! The dam has broken and there's a $#!^storm coming. Man, I don't know what will happen first. Bush falls off the wagon or Cheney has a heart attack. I wonder what the religious right is going to make of all this. How do they explain God's wrath when it's directed at their own false prophet?


Blair ignored CIA weapons warning
Intelligence breakdown after Britain dismissed US doubts over Iraq nuclear link to Niger

Kamal Ahmed, political editor
The Observer/Sunday July 13, 2003

Britain and America suffered a complete breakdown in relations over vital evidence against Saddam Hussein and weapons of mass destruction, refusing to share information and keeping each other in the dark over key elements of the case against the Iraqi dictator.

In a remarkable letter released last night, the Foreign Secretary, Jack Straw, reveals a catalogue of disputes between the two countries, lending more ammunition to critics of the war and exerting fresh pressure on the Prime Minister.

The letter to the Foreign Affairs Committee, which investigated the case for war against Iraq, reveals that Britain ignored a request from the CIA to remove claims that Saddam was trying to buy nuclear material from Niger, despite concerns that the allegations were bogus. It also details a government decision to block information going to the CIA because it was too sensitive.

As diplomatic relations between America and Britain become increasingly strained over Iraq's WMD, Straw said that the Government had separate evidence of the Niger link, which it has not shared with the US.

The revelations come just four days before Tony Blair travels to America for his toughest visit there since he came to power in 1997. As well as WMD, the Prime Minister will also raise Britain's 'serious concerns' over the treatment of British citizens held at Guantanamo Bay.

Straw's letter reveals:

· That evidence given to the CIA by the former US ambassador to Gabon, Joseph Wilson - that Niger officials had denied any link - was never shared with the British.

· That Foreign Office officials were left to read reports of Wilson's findings in the press only days before they were raised as part of the committee's inquiry into the war.

· That when the CIA, having seen a draft of the September dossier on Iraq's WMD, demanded that the Niger claim be removed, it was ignored because the agency did not back it up with 'any explanation'.

Although publicly the two governments are trying to maintain a united front, the admission two days ago by the head of the CIA, George Tenet, that President Bush should never have made the claim about the Niger connection to Iraq, has left British officials exposed...




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