PM bows to pressure, calls for Iraq WMD probe

British PM Tony Blair buckled under growing pressure on Tuesday, calling an inquiry into the quality of British intelligence about banned Ir...

British PM Tony Blair buckled under growing pressure on Tuesday, calling an inquiry into the quality of British intelligence about banned Iraqi weapons after Washington set up its own probe into the reasons given for war. 8216;8216;I think it is right8230;that we have a look at the intelligence that we received and whether it was accurate or not,8217;8217; Blair told a senior Parliamentary committee. Until now, he has firmly resisted calls for an inquiry although no banned weapons have been found, months after Saddam Hussein was toppled.

A move by US President George W. Bush to appoint a commission on US Intelligence 8212; confirmed on Monday 8212; turned up the heat on Britain to do the same. Foreign Secretary Jack Straw will make a statement to Parliament at 1230 GMT, spelling out details of the inquiry. The official government line that evidence of weapons could yet be found has been increasingly hard to sustain since Chief US weapons hunter David Kay quit his post last month and blew a hole in the Anglo-American argument.

Kay said he believed Iraq had no stockpiles of illicit weapons and that 8216;8216;we were almost all wrong8217;8217; in assuming it did. Blair insisted that the lack of banned weapons did not undermine the legal or moral case for war, although it was the express reason he gave for military action. Saddam, he said, was flouting UN resolutions anyway.

8216;8216;Had we failed to act on the intelligence we received I think it would have been a gross dereliction of duty,8217;8217; he said.

8216;8216;Whatever is discovered as a result of that inquiry, I do not accept that it was wrong to remove Saddam Hussein or that the world is not a safer or better place for that.8217;8217; Argument has raged over whether the inquiry will examine the political decisions taken to wage war, rather than focus exclusively on problems with the intelligence received.

The minority Liberal Democrats are insisting on the former, Blair has refused. Their dispute delayed a formal announcement of the cross-party probe which had been expected late on Monday. 8216;8216;We are still hoping to get the agreement of the Liberal Democrats,8217;8217; Blair said. 8216;8216;We do not in my view need an inquiry into the political decision to go to war.8217;8217; It would, he said, look at the way intelligence was gathered, then evaluated and used by government.

Meanwhile, Australian Prime Minister John Howard acknowledged on Tuesday that US and British intelligence on WMDs, upon which his government relied to join the war against Iraq, may have been wrong. 8216;8216;In the fullness of time it might be demonstrated that the advice was inaccurate,8217;8217; Howard said. 8216;8216;We can8217;t be absolutely certain that the intelligence was wrong. Obviously the evidence is not pointing strongly in the other direction.8217;8217; Howard8217;s latest comments come amid mounting pressure at home for an inquiry into Australia8217;s intelligence on Iraq. 8212; Reuters