Iraq Inquiry: Business as usual

Iraq Inquiry: Business as usual

Gordon Brown is facing demands to change the rules of the Iraq inquiry this weekend amid fears that the most explosive documents explaining why Britain went to war will not be made public.

As the inquiry enters its second week, the prime minister is under pressure to make key evidence relating to secret government discussions public, including minutes showing how the then attorney general, Lord Goldsmith, changed his mind about the legality of the war.

The demands are made in a letter to Brown from the Liberal Democrat leader, Nick Clegg, who insists that unless the lid is lifted on secrecy, the Chilcot inquiry will fail to satisfy the public's demands for honesty.

...Clegg writes that such powers are draconian for a government that has pledged to allow the truth about Iraq to emerge. "The restrictions on information released by the inquiry are greater than those which apply under current freedom of information rules," he writes.

Gordon Brown urged to lift Iraq inquiry secrecy (The Guardian, 29 November 2009)

See also: Iraq: The inquiry cover-up that will keep us in the dark (The Independent, 25 November 2009)