London, Sept 01: Weapons adviser David Kelly felt betrayed by the Ministry of Defence for confirming that he might be the source of a broadcast report questioning the British government's case for war in Iraq, his widow testified today. "He said several times over coffee, over lunch, over afternoon tea that he felt totally let down and betrayed," Janice Kelly testified via a video link to a judicial inquiry examining the circumstances of his apparent suicide.
Kelly, 59, was found dead near his rural home days after he was identified as a possible source for a British Broadcasting Corp. claim that the government "sexed up" an intelligence dossier about Iraq's weapons programs. Mrs. Kelly said she learned of his involvement on July 8 as the couple watched the television news.
"The main story was that a source had identified itself and then immediately David said to me 'it's me’," she told the inquiry, headed by senior appeals judge Lord Hutton.
"My reaction was total dismay, my heart sank and I was terribly worried because the fact that he said that to me ... I knew that he was aware that his name would be in the public domain quite soon," said Mrs Kelly. Kelly seemed "desperately unhappy about it, really really unhappy, totally dismayed," she said.
Kelly was called to testify before a House of Commons committee on July 15. He was reported missing two days later, and his body was found on July 18.
Mrs. Kelly said her husband had become "very much more taciturn, more difficult to talk to, more tense, more withdrawn" after he had written to his superiors at the ministry of defense saying he might have been the source for the BBC report. Bureau Report