Hutton report blames BBC

The British Broadcasting Company (BBC) is primarily at fault in the controversy leading up to the suicide of David Kelly, the microbiologist and Iraqi bioweapons expert, according to a long-awaited judge's inquiry report.Prime Minister Tony Blair and his government, which a BBC reporter had accused last May of exaggerating the threat from Iraqi weapons of mass destruction in order to build the case for war, are innocent of that charge and mostly blameless in the dispute, the report concludes.Furthermore, Brian Hutton, head of the inquiry and author of the report, said in a public announcement Wednesday (January 28) that no one else was involved in Kelly's July death. “I am satisfied that Dr. David Kelly took his own life by cutting his left wrist,” Hutton said, “hastened by his taking [painkillers].”Hutton said the central charge in BBC Reporter Andrew Gilligan's May 29 bombshell story was “unfounded.” Gilligan claimed then that the Blair government knew or at least suspected that the allegation in its Iraq dossier that Iraq could launch weapons of mass destruction in 45 minutes was false. Gilligan's story blamed Blair's aides for “sexing up” the dossier only in its final draft last September. But Hutton's report states that the claim was only added on September 5 because the Secret Intelligence Service did not receive it from an Iraqi source until August 29.Prime Minister Blair met the report with a call for the BBC to withdraw Gilligan's allegation. “I simply ask… now withdraw it fully, openly, and clearly,” he said Wednesday (January 28).Kelly's family called on the government to take action to ensure that such a tragedy never occurs again. Their lawyer, Peter Jacobsen, said, “No other person should have to suffer the pressure he experienced.”Kelly, who had also been a United Nations weapons inspector in Iraq, killed himself only days after the government “confirmed” that he was the source of Gilligan's story. But he was not, the report states. “I am satisfied Dr. Kelly did not say the government probably knew or suspected the 45-minute claim was wrong before the claim was inserted in the dossier,” Hutton writes. Gilligan's notes of his conversation with Kelly are suspect because he lost them and had to reconstruct them from memory later, according to the report. Kelly steadfastly maintained that he was not the source. But after he told his superiors at the Ministry of Defence that he had spoken to Gilligan, Blair's chief press officer “confirmed” to reporters that Kelly was indeed the source. Hutton's written conclusion faulted the ministry for not telling Kelly his name might come out and for not notifying him immediately when it did. However, he also said Blair's government was not trying to “out” Kelly. Rather, he said, Blair government officials thought Kelly was so obviously the logical person to have been the source for such a claim that it wouldn't be possible to keep his identity secret.Hutton faulted BBC's editors for letting Gilligan broadcast his accusation without first asking the Ministry of Defence for comment. He assailed BBC managers for not even asking to see Gilligan's notes during their own inquiry into the matter, which found no evidence of wrongdoing by the reporter.A psychiatrist determined that Kelly took his life because he had been “publicly disgraced,” according to the report. But in his public announcement, Hutton said, “I am satisfied that no one realized or should have realized that those pressures and strains [resulting from the government's inaccurate outing of him as the source] might drive him to take his own life.” The report also says there is no evidence to suggest that Kelly was suffering from mental illness prior to his suicide.

Hutton report blames BBC

Probe into David Kelly's suicide finds UK government did not exaggerate Iraqi threat

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