Straw wanted 'killer paragraph' on WMD

Foreign Secretary Jack Straw has admitted he wanted a "killer paragraph" inserted into the Government's dossier on Iraq's weapons of mass destruction.

Mr Straw requested that part of the document be "strengthened" to highlight the "centrality of WMD to Saddam Hussein's role", according to an e-mail presented to the Hutton inquiry.

Details of how the Foreign Secretary, who has so far avoided the spotlight in the affair surrounding Dr Kelly's suicide, wanted the dossier hardened emerged alongside the revelation that Foreign Office officials agreed to the scientist's name being made public.

According to e-mails released by the inquiry, Peter Ricketts, former political director of the Foreign Office and now Britain's ambassador to Nato, and Mr Straw's press secretary John Williams, both agreed that Dr Kelly should be named.

The Foreign Secretary attempted to play down the importance of their contents, highlighted by The Independent newspaper, saying they had been on the inquiry website "for weeks".

Asked whether he had requested, through his private secretary Mark Sedwill, that a "killer paragraph" be inserted into the September 2002 dossier, Mr Straw said: "This is an accurate reference to an e-mail that was sent on my behalf by a private secretary, and what I wanted was to raise the prominence of Saddam Hussein's defiance of the United Nations over 12 years. I still do."

Mr Straw has not been called to give evidence to Lord Hutton's inquiry, but the senior law lord may want the Foreign Secretary to testify when he begins his second phase next week.

The Foreign Secretary told BBC Radio 4's Today programme: "As to any role I had in the dossier, of course I had a role in the dossier. That's well-known and well-advertised on the website.

"Whether Lord Hutton wishes to talk to me is a matter entirely for Lord Hutton. I am not going to get into the detail because there are questions about the comments which I made.

"I am very, very happy to answer those questions if Lord Hutton wishes me to do so."

Most watched News videos