06/06/04 "ICH" -- Ms Montague interviewed David Kay on the BBC Today programme yesterday.

He served as IAEA/UNSCOM Chief Nuclear Weapons Inspector in Iraq following the Gulf War. From June 2003 he was appointed by President Bush to head the 1,400 man Iraq Survey Group. He resigned that position in January 2004 having concluded that there had been no stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq at the time of the war. He is now Senior Research Fellow at the Potomac Institute of Policy Studies - a major body in the constellation of Washington 'think-tanks'. He is concentrating on counter-terrorism and weapons proliferation in a section which is also working on the enhancement of 'blast weapons'. He has appeared before three senate committees dealing with intelligence failures etc.

Ms M was quizzing him about the resignation of CIA head George Tenet and his deputy. Kay said that the intelligence services had under performed since the end of the cold war and he could see the logic of Bush clearing the decks before the election. And what of the hunt in Iraq for WMD - was it a waste of time? It was not of the highest priority and likely to be any bit of use said Kay. Ms M said that Blair still speaks of unmasking WMDs in Iraq. This is delusional said Kay, 'there is nothing there' but 'there were programmes'.

The German word for suicide is more direct than the English: Selbstmord - self-murder.

Did Dr David Kelly - husband, father of three daughters and a leading world expert in chemical and germ warfare - murder himself, or was he murdered by others?

When his violent death was first reported I felt he was likely a victim of a wicked system that had used him and spat him out. I was very sceptical that he could have bled to death from one cut wrist.

At first, the media spoke of 'alleged suicide', but by last November I became aware that reporters were speaking of Dr Kelly's 'suicide' without qualification. Objecting to this, on 15 December I wrote a letter to the Morning Star - key extracts follow:

Of Human Wreckage and Zionists Dreams
Withdrawal from Gaza?
 

The sea was warm. A kingfisher perched momentarily atop a rusting reinforcing rod with a tiny fish in its bill. Its iridescent beauty was a glistening tear drop on the face of this weeping land. Strings of boats were streaming out of the harbour with the powerful mother ship towing the tiddlers astern. The Prophet in action. Later they would become the long skein of lights lying 5 kilometres from shore all night. They strayed no further mind you because the sea is also occupied in addition to the land and the air.

I am here to advance the work of the charity I founded with the voyage of the Dove and the Dolphin in February last year. The second object of this charity is ‘to relieve poverty, distress and hardship among the Palestinian people and to promote the welfare of Palestinian children’. I was also here to be a witness and to stand with my Palestinian brothers and sisters. I wanted to see this part of Palestine again 2004 years since the birth of the Christ 80 miles away and in the 56th year of the nakba (catastrophe – literally the story of the falling down).