UK doubt grows about WMD

2003-07-10 08:16

London - Senior British government officials no longer believe actual physical weapons of mass destruction will be uncovered in Iraq, the BBC has reported.

The BBC's Andrew Marr said: "Senior government sources are telling me they no longer believe physical weapons of mass destruction are going to be found in Iraq.

"They don't think there were weapons programmes. They believe that interviews with Iraqi scientists, perhaps documentation will be uncovered which will reveal the extent of programmes that were then in the past," said Marr.

"But, when it comes to physical evidence I have to say the belief that this will be found and can be paraded in front of the cameras seems to be trickling into the sand," said Marr.

Downing Street said Prime Minister Tony Blair was standing by his comments to MPs at a parliamentary committee on Tuesday that he was convinced evidence of Iraq's weapons programmes will be found.

'Genuinly bemused'

"One theory is that Saddam Hussein did have it, but dismantled his weapons of mass destruction before the war started.

"This was perhaps because he had made promises to countries like France and Russia and he hoped those countries would help him," Marr said.

"The people I am talking to were not cynics, they are not people who made the evidence up or who believed it wasn't there in first place, they are genuinely bemused," he said.

The BBC is already embroiled in a row with Downing Street about an assertion that Blair's office beefed up information from intelligence services to persuade a sceptical public of the case for war.

- AFX