British government weapons adviser David Kelly was a superb scientist whose work helped uncover Saddam Hussein’s secret germ warfare program, a former colleague said on Monday as he testified at a judicial inquiry into Kelly’s suicide.
Terence Taylor of the International Institute of Strategic Studies in Washington said Kelly had been greatly respected by experts in both Britain and the United States.
”His work in Iraq was remarkably successful,” said Taylor of the former United Nations weapons inspector, who was caught up in a row over the government’s use of intelligence in the build-up to the war in Iraq. ”He was very determined.”
Taylor added that Kelly had been awarded the Cross of St Michael and St George by Queen Elizabeth II for his ”superb” work.
That honor came in 1996 on the recommendation of the former Conservative government of John Major.
The inquiry, headed by senior appeals Judge Lord Hutton, will probe the circumstances behind Kelly’s suicide in July and the government’s use of intelligence on Iraqi weapons.
The judge has said he intends to call Prime Minister Tony Blair and Defence Secretary Geoff Hoon to testify.
Kelly was found dead in the woods near his home in Abingdon, southern England, on July 18. He had slashed his left wrist.
Kelly, an adviser to Britain’s defense ministry, was identified as the source of a BBC report that raised questions about Blair’s case for war in Iraq.
The report, broadcast on May 29, quoted an unidentified source as saying Blair’s office had ”sexed up” an intelligence dossier on Iraqi weapons to bolster the case for war.
Specifically, the report claimed Blair’s office had, against the wishes of intelligence chiefs, included a claim that Saddam could deploy chemical and biological weapons at 45 minutes’ notice.
The report, vehemently denied by the government, sparked a bitter row with the broadcaster and prompted two parliamentary probes into the government’s use of intelligence.
Kelly’s name leaked out after weeks of public squabbling between the government and the broadcaster. He killed himself three days after facing tough questioning by lawmakers conducting one of the parliamentary probes.
The uproar over Kelly’s suicide has become the severest test for Blair since he took office six years ago.
One aspect of Hutton’s inquiry is the role played by the government in naming Kelly as the source of the BBC story.
Taylor said that between 1991 and 1998 Kelly was involved in about 35 weapons inspections in Iraq.
”He was able to absorb large amounts of information and process and analyze it in a way that was very impressive,” he told the inquiry.
He said he spoke with the scientist about four days before his death and the conversation had centred on Kelly joining the Iraq Survey Group — a body appointed by the US-led coalition to find evidence of weapons of mass destruction in the country.
”He was clearly thinking and was focused on that during this particular conversation,” said Taylor, adding that Kelly had not mentioned the row between the government and the BBC in which he was embroiled.
Julian Miller, who works in the intelligence and security secretariat of the Cabinet Office, Martin Howard, deputy chief of defence intelligence at the Ministry of Defence and Patrick Lamb, deputy head of the counter-proliferation department at the Foreign Office, were scheduled to give evidence on Monday.
BBC defence correspondent Andrew Gilligan, who reported the May 29 story, and the broadcaster’s head of news, Richard Sambrook, are due to testify on Tuesday. — Sapa-AP