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Cia warned whitehouse false iraqi nuclear claim { July 9 2003 } Original Source Link: (May no longer be active)    http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/3056626.stm http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/3056626.stm Last Updated: Wednesday, 9 July, 2003, 06:31 GMT 07:31 UK White House 'warned over Iraq claim' The CIA warned the US Government that claims about Iraq's nuclear ambitions were not true months before President Bush used them to make his case for war, the BBC has learned. Doubts about a claim that Iraq had tried to buy uranium from the African state of Niger were aired 10 months before Mr Bush included the allegation in his key State of the Union address this year, a CIA official has told the BBC. On Tuesday, the White House for the first time officially acknowledged that the Niger claim was wrong and suggested it should not have been used in the president's State of the Union speech in January. Given the fact that the report on the yellow cake did not turn out to be accurate, that is reflective of the president's broader statement White House spokesman Ari Fleischer But the CIA official has said that a former US diplomat had already established the claim was false in March 2002 - and that the information had been passed on to government departments, including the White House, well before Mr Bush mentioned it in the speech. Both President Bush and UK Prime Minister Tony Blair mentioned the claim, based on British intelligence, that Iraq was trying to get uranium from Niger as part of its attempt to build a nuclear weapons programme. Mr Blair is under fire from British MPs about the credibility of a dossier of evidence, which set out his case for war. And in the US, increasing doubts are being raised about the American use of intelligence. Forged documents In his keynote speech to Congress in January, the President said: "The British Government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa." But the documents alleging a transaction were found to have been forged. White House spokesman Ari Fleischer appeared to concede on Tuesday that the uranium claim in the State of the Union address was based on inaccurate information. "The president's statement was based on the predicate of the yellow cake [uranium] from Niger," Mr Fleischer said. "So given the fact that the report on the yellow cake did not turn out to be accurate, that is reflective of the president's broader statement." The British Government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa. President George W Bush But a former US diplomat, Ambassador Joseph Wilson, went on the record at the weekend to say that he had travelled to Africa to investigate the uranium claims and found no evidence to support them. Now the CIA official has told the BBC that Mr Wilson's findings had been passed onto the White House as early as March 2002. That means that the administration would have known nearly a year before the State of the Union address that the information was likely false. In response, a US Government official told the BBC that the White House received hundreds of intelligence reports every day. The official said there was no evidence that this specific cable about uranium had been passed on to the president. But in Congress, Democrats are demanding a full investigation into the intelligence that underpinned the case for war. They have demanded to know if President Bush used evidence that he knew to be weak or wrong. British undeterred The British Government has stood by its assertion, saying the forged documents were not the only evidence used to reach its conclusion that Saddam Hussein tried to buy uranium from Africa. On Tuesday Mr Blair defended the assessment, telling a committee of MPs that it was not a "fantasy" and that the intelligence services themselves stood by the allegation. "The evidence that we had that the Iraqi Government had gone back to try to purchase further amounts of uranium from Niger did not come from these so-called 'forged' documents, they came from separate intelligence," Mr Blair said. However, Mr Blair did not specify what that separate intelligence was. Story from BBC NEWS: http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/americas/3056626.stm Published: 2003/07/09 06:31:26 GMT © BBC MMIII

Administration endorse forgery nuclear program Blix accuses uk and us of spin { September 18 2003 } Bush chastised rice fleischer { July 19 2003 } Bush declares his faith tenet cia { July 13 2003 } Bush defends cia intel darn good { July 14 2003 } Bush scapegoats cia for iraq error { July 12 2003 } Bush warned by cia before speech { July 23 2003 } Cia did not share doubt iraq data { June 12 2003 } Cia said cheney was wrong Cia studying err threat assessment { May 22 2003 } Cia warned whitehouse false iraqi nuclear claim { July 9 2003 } Colin powell plagiarised { February 6 2003 } Doubts grow over smoking gun { May 2 2003 } Evidence called fake { March 8 2003 } Evidence distorted for war Far from having nukes Germans warned iraq intelligence was bad { November 20 2005 } Insiders say intelligence skewed { May 30 2003 } Iraq intelligence hoax { May 31 2003 } Iraq weapons dossier rewritten { May 29 2003 } Kerry calls on bush truth about iraq Mobile labs balloon truck { June 8 2003 } More doubt of iraq weapons { May 30 2003 } Most think truth was stretched to justify war { February 13 2004 } No chemicals found No wmd smoking gun { March 30 2003 } Now bush claims weapons program only { June 9 2003 } Powell calls case bull shit Powell doubts over cia intelligence { June 2 2003 } Row over pre war intelligence Rumsfeld denies false pretext { May 29 2003 } Senator knew of bad intelligence kept quiet { April 27 2007 } Tenet says he corrected cheney privately { March 10 2004 } Tenet takes responsibility for false intelligence { July 11 2003 } Us modified report { December 19 2002 } Us questions prewar intelligence Weapons dossier sent back six times { June 6 2003 } White house used gossip to build case for war { November 21 2005 } Whitehouse didnt gain cia nod for claim { July 20 2003 } Woodward book powell misgivings about iraq { April 19 2004 } Woodward book says bush doubted iraq case { April 17 2004 } Files Listed: 41

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