- News>
- World
US received forged Niger papers 3 months before Bush`s speech
Washington, July 18: Three months before President George W Bush`s State of the Union address in January, during which he charged that Saddam Hussein sought nuclear material from Africa, the US State Department received documents which suggested the link and later turned out to be forged.
Washington, July 18: Three months before President George W Bush's State of the Union address in January, during which he charged that Saddam Hussein sought nuclear material from Africa, the US State Department received documents which suggested the link and later turned out to be forged.
"We acquired the documents in October 2002, and they were shared widely within the US government, with all the appropriate agencies in various ways," State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said yesterday.
Administration officials, who wished to remain anonymous, said the documents appeared to be of "dubious authenticity" but were distributed to the CIA and other agencies within days, reported a top US daily today.
The documents first came into the US government's hands when a journalist turned them over to US Embassy officials in Rome, Italy. An earlier report had suggested that they may have been forged by a Niger diplomat who wanted to make some quick money. But the US government waited four months to turn them over to UN weapons inspectors who had been demanding to see evidence of US and British claims that Iraq attempted purchase of uranium oxide from Niger in violation of UN resolutions. In March, the International Atomic Energy Agency declared the documents as forgeries.
The newspaper noted that the Bush administration had till now maintained that it did not have the documents before the January 28 State of the Union address.
The alleged purchase was among the reasons given by Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair for going to war against Iraq without explicit UN sanction. In October, the CIA warned the administration not to use the Niger claim in public, it said. CIA director George Tenet personally persuaded deputy national security adviser Stephen Hadley to omit it from Bush's October 7 speech in Cincinnati about the threat posed by Hussein.
But on the eve of Bush's January 28 address, Robert Joseph, an assistant to the President in charge of nonproliferation at the National Security Council, proposed in a telephone conversation with senior CIA official Alan Foley, that the presidential address include the allegation that Iraq sought to purchase 500 pounds of uranium from Niger. Bureau Report
Administration officials, who wished to remain anonymous, said the documents appeared to be of "dubious authenticity" but were distributed to the CIA and other agencies within days, reported a top US daily today.
The documents first came into the US government's hands when a journalist turned them over to US Embassy officials in Rome, Italy. An earlier report had suggested that they may have been forged by a Niger diplomat who wanted to make some quick money. But the US government waited four months to turn them over to UN weapons inspectors who had been demanding to see evidence of US and British claims that Iraq attempted purchase of uranium oxide from Niger in violation of UN resolutions. In March, the International Atomic Energy Agency declared the documents as forgeries.
The newspaper noted that the Bush administration had till now maintained that it did not have the documents before the January 28 State of the Union address.
The alleged purchase was among the reasons given by Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair for going to war against Iraq without explicit UN sanction. In October, the CIA warned the administration not to use the Niger claim in public, it said. CIA director George Tenet personally persuaded deputy national security adviser Stephen Hadley to omit it from Bush's October 7 speech in Cincinnati about the threat posed by Hussein.
But on the eve of Bush's January 28 address, Robert Joseph, an assistant to the President in charge of nonproliferation at the National Security Council, proposed in a telephone conversation with senior CIA official Alan Foley, that the presidential address include the allegation that Iraq sought to purchase 500 pounds of uranium from Niger. Bureau Report