Details from Blair's Iraq calls were deleted

[cal04]

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/details-from-blairs-iraq-calls-were-deleted-2189275.html

The questions facing Tony Blair at tomorrow's Iraq inquiry hearing are piling up. It emerged last night that parts of Mr Blair's conversations with the United States President George Bush in the build-up to war were expunged from Whitehall records.

Sir John Chilcot's team also heard yesterday from a senior civil servant that Downing Street ignored Foreign Office warnings over publishing the infamously exaggerated dossiers on the threat from Saddam Hussein's supposed weapons arsenal.

Mr Blair's private secretary at No 10 routinely deleted any mention of his correspondence with Mr Bush from the Government minutes, the inquiry has found out. The disclosure will fuel anger over the failure to release the memos between the two leaders in the run-up to war, which could fill in gaps for when Mr Blair took key decisions over the war. David Cameron, challenged over the refusal to publish the memos, said that he was powerless to order their release.

Mr Blair's then private secretary, Matthew Rycroft, has recalled that Mr Bush often began telephones calls or video conferences in 2002 and 2003 by thanking the former prime minister for his letters.


Whitehall chief blocks release of Blair's notes to Bush on Iraq
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2011/jan/18/iraq-war-inquiry-tonyblair

[Lint Head]

1. So, Bush's puppy dog obeyed his master.

[bhikkhu]

2. Where is wikileaks when we need them?

Oh yeah - practically shut down and bankrupted by the US state dept...