London, Aug 21: The chairman of a Parliamentary Committee which publicly grilled an arms expert days before his presumed suicide was today to appear before an inquiry into his death that has fuelled a British government crisis over the Iraq war. Donald Anderson, a Member of Parliament (MP) for British Prime Minister Tony Blair's Labour Party, chaired a foreign affairs select committee that questioned arms expert David Kelly after he was linked to an allegation that Britain "sexed up" its case for the US-led war. Kelly's death in July came after the Defence Ministry named him as the likely source of a BBC report that alleged Blair's office embellished intelligence over Iraq's weapons potential. The government has denied the allegation while its row with the BBC and Kelly's mysterious death have left Blair, who is faring badly in opinion polls, facing his gravest crisis since assuming power six years ago. Anderson chaired a joint-party committee which grilled Kelly on July 15, three days before his body was found with a slit wrist in the countryside near his home west of London.

Blair ordered an independent judicial inquiry into Kelly's death within hours of his body being found.

Attention was likely to focus Thursday on the committee's televised session with Kelly, where the government scientist said he believed he was not the main source of the BBC's allegation.

Bureau Report