Global Security Newswire

Chief U.S. weapons inspector in Iraq Charles Duelfer has said that he received and then dismissed suggestions from the new head of the British MI6 intelligence agency about what to include in the final report of Duelfer’s Iraq Survey Group, the London Guardian reported today (see GSN, Aug. 2).

John Scarlett reportedly sent an e-mail to Duelfer in March with a list of possible claims to include in the final ISG report, including that prewar Iraq was working to weaponize smallpox and that it possessed mobile biological weapons facilities. 

“These so-called nuggets that the British had brought to my attention for my consideration were lifted out of previous ISG work. ... Whatever the British offered up it didn’t fit into what I was trying to do,” Duelfer told the Guardian.

Scarlett, who took over this week as MI6 chief, was the intelligence official who oversaw the British assessment of prewar Iraq’s WMD capabilities.

The Iraq Survey Group is set to release its final report on its search for evidence of Iraq’s alleged WMD efforts next month, Duelfer said. He said it would be “a big production” that would “no doubt leave some unanswered questions” (Julian Borger, London Guardian, Aug. 5).