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Sat 15 Oct, 2005 08:27 am
Richard Norton-Taylor
Saturday October 15, 2005
The Guardian
George Bush told Tony Blair shortly before the invasion of Iraq that he intended to target other countries, including Saudi Arabia, which, he implied, planned to acquire weapons of mass destruction.
Mr Bush said he "wanted to go beyond Iraq in dealing with WMD proliferation, mentioning in particular Saudi Arabia, Iran, North Korea, and Pakistan," according to a note of a telephone conversation between the two men on January 30 2003.
The note is quoted in the US edition, published next week, of Lawless World, America and the Making and Breaking of Global Rules, by the British international lawyer Philippe Sands. The memo was drawn up by one of the prime minister's foreign policy advisers in Downing Street and passed to the Foreign Office, according to Mr Sands.
It is not surprising that Mr Bush referred to Iran and North Korea, or even Pakistan - at the time suspected of spreading nuclear know-how, but now one of America's closest allies in the "war on terror". What is significant is the mention of Saudi Arabia.
In Washington, the neo-cons in particular were hostile to the Saudi royal family and did not think they were doing enough to quell Islamist extremists - 15 of the 19 September 11 attackers were Saudis. But the Bush administration did not in public express concern about any Saudi nuclear ambitions.
In September 2003, the Guardian reported that Saudi Arabia had embarked on a strategic review that included acquiring nuclear weapons. Until then, the assumption in Washington was that Saudi Arabia was content to remain under the US nuclear umbrella despite the worsening relationship between Riyadh and Washington.
It is not clear how Mr Blair responded to Mr Bush's remarks during the telephone conversation, which took place on the eve of a trip to Washington for talks with the US president.
In his book, Blair's Wars, John Kampfner says that at the meeting the two leaders "agreed to concentrate not just on Iraq ... but also the Middle East". But that was taken to be a reference to Palestine. Mr Blair wanted Mr Bush to express concern about the plight of the Palestinians to appease the Labour party.
Mr Blair at the time was careful to avoid any suggestion that the Bush administration intended to target other countries after the invasion of Iraq. However, for the first time he suggested there were links between Saddam Hussein and al-Qaida.
After the invasion, Washington adopted a calmer approach towards Iran, leaving it to Britain, France, and Germany to pursue a diplomatic course.
Despite hard evidence that Pakistan was deeply involved in exporting nuclear technology, the Bush administration embraced President Pervez Musharraf as an ally against al-Qaida. Washington's relations with Saudi Arabia remain cool. Mr Sands does not shed further light on the issue.
Government could be forced to publish secrets of Iraq memo
Freedom Of Information: Government could be forced to publish secrets of Iraq memo. What did Tony Blair tell George Bush when they discussed Iraq?
Robert Verkaik, Law Editor, considers how the Freedom of Information Act might provide the answer
Published: 11 May 2007
Independent UK
A civil servant and an MP's researcher were yesterday sentenced by an Old Bailey judge for being involved in the disclosure of the contents of a top-secret Iraq memo which recorded conversations between Tony Blair and George Bush during a 2004 meeting in Washington. The same memo has been the subject of an 18-month inquiry under the Freedom of Information Act.
A request made to the Government for the memo's formal disclosure under the right-to-know legislation is now with the Information Commissioner, Richard Thomas, who has the power to order release of the four-page document. Such a move would be extremely embarrassing for the Government and undermine the decision to prosecute the two men under the Official Secrets Act of 1989.
The trial judge has already imposed a court order preventing any further reference to the contents of the memo on the grounds that such publication would be a threat to national security. In such circumstances it seems very unlikely that Mr Thomas would be able to find an argument in favour of disclosure.
But a careful reading of the Downing Street response letter to the Liverpool academic who first made the request in December 2005 shows that national security is not one of the exemptions that its FOI team relied on to deny access to the document. Instead the Government said that the information would damage international relations between Britain and America. It reads: "The effective conduct of international relations depends on maintaining trust and confidence between governments."
This is not the same as national security, which government lawyers in the Old Bailey trial had argued would be damaged if the memo was published. They even said that disclosure could threaten the lives of British troops serving in Iraq.
The precise detail of the information being sought is now covered by the terms of the Old Bailey gagging order. But it is clear from the correspondence between the Cabinet Office and the FOI requestor that both sides knew what was at stake.
Part of the argument raised by the academic in favour of disclosure is that the possible content of the memo has already been alluded to in the media and therefore the information is already in the public domain. The content of the memo has been confirmed by a respected source, a Member of Parliament, Peter Kilfolye.
The requestor also reminds the Cabinet Office of guidance from the Department for Constitutional Affairs (now the Ministry of Justice) on the application of the exemption for possible harm to international relations:
Individual requests for information must be considered on their merits but you should take account of what is already in the public domain when assessing prejudice to international relations. The fact that similar or related information is already in the public domain may reduce or negate any potential prejudice.
The Liverpool academic made the same request for disclosure of the memo to the US State Department under the American Freedom of Information Act. It was seven months before he got an answer. And when he did, it was even more disappointing than the one he received from the British government. It read simply: "No records responsive to your request were located."
A quite astonishing result given that a civil servant was jailed for six months yesterday because a jury found that he had leaked this memo to a researcher working for an anti-war MP. If the memo didn't exist, then he must be innocent.
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