[A-List] Bring 'em on: Equivocation & Lies

["bon moun" <sherrynstan@xxxxxxx>]

General Richard Myers, the chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff,
said Sunday that despite the string of deadly attacks on coalition
forces, the resistance in Iraq was far from "monolithic" or nationwide,
instead appearing fragmented and limited to a small triangular area from
Baghdad to the north and west.
http://www.iht.com/articles/101916.html

Britain 'knew uranium claims were false'
Suzanne Goldenberg in Washington
Monday July 7, 2003
The Guardian

British officials knew there had been no secret trade in uranium from
Africa to Iraq seven months before such claims were raised in the
September dossier released by Downing Street, the retired US ambassador
who investigated the supposed sales for the CIA said yesterday.

In his first public appearance, Joseph Wilson provided a detailed
account of the investigations which debunked intelligence reports about
sales of uranium from Niger to Iraq. He said it was almost certain
British and US leaders knew they were recirculating false reports.

In February 2002, Mr Wilson, a career diplomat who served on the
national security council, was asked by the CIA to travel to Niger to
investigate reports on the sale of uranium yellow cake from Niger to
Iraq during the late 1990s.

He was told vice-president Dick Cheney's office had raised questions
about the report.

After an eight-day investigation, Mr Wilson concluded there had been no
such sales to Iraq, and shared his findings with embassy staff in Niger,
the State Department's Africa affairs desk in Washington, and the CIA,
which then reported back to Mr Cheney's office.

He thought the matter settled until last autumn when the US and Britain
revived the allegation, both in the Blair government's dossier last
September and in President George Bush's state of the union address last
January, which cited the British claims.

"That information was erroneous and they knew about it well ahead both
of the publication of the white paper and the president's state of the
union address," Mr Wilson told NBC's Meet the Press yesterday.

In other interviews yesterday, he said it was almost certain British
officials knew the reports on uranium sales had been proved false, well
before they appeared in the dossier.

"Given the fact that we were in close cooperation, were close allies,
were building the case for our respective populations, it was
unfathomable to me that this information would not have been shared," he
told the Washington Post.


Guardian Unlimited C Guardian Newspapers Limited 2003