SENIOR intelligence officials told yesterday of their grave doubts about key claims in the Government’s dossier on the threat from Iraq.

In evidence that dealt a blow to Downing Street’s insistence that it made no attempt to “sex up” the document, one leading expert on chemical weapons said he believed that it had been “overegged” and another felt that “spin merchants” had interfered with the dossier in pursuit of political objectives. He hoped the document would soon be “tomorrow’s chip wrappers”.

Their main concern was over the controversial “45-minute” claim, which was described as “nebulous”, “second-hand” and which, some officials feared, may have been a piece of Iraqi disinformation.

Moreover, Lord Hutton’s inquiry into the death of David Kelly heard that some analysts at the Defence Intelligence Staff — the intelligence wing of the Ministry of Defence — had made it clear that they were unhappy with “all the detail” in the controversial dossier, but that the “shutters had come down” before their concerns could be addressed.

The inquiry also learnt that the final dossier was apparently not signed off by a full meeting of the Joint Intelligence Committee (JIC).

Tony Blair told the inquiry last week that the dossier “all had to be produced and done through the process of the JIC”, but yesterday a top intelligence analyst said he could recall no JIC meeting between the final draft of the dossier and its publication.

On a day of evidence that went to the heart of the feud between the Government and the BBC, the two intelligence figures disclosed that they and their colleagues were concerned by the compilation of the dossier published last September to build a case against Saddam Hussein.

They also disclosed that Dr Kelly had known of concerns within the intelligence community over the 45-minute claim that ignited the dispute. Brian Jones, the recently retired head of the team providing technical analysis of biological, chemical and nuclear weapons at the Defence Intelligence Staff, said that key complaints were about the language used in the dossier.

“They were really about a tendency in certain areas . . . to, shall we say, overegg certain assessments in relation particularly to chemical agents and weapons,” he said. His leading chemical weapons expert was concerned that he could not point to any solid evidence of production.

Dr Jones, who described himself as “probably the most experienced intelligence official working on WMD”, added that some of his staff had said they were unhappy and felt that their reservations were not properly considered. “The shutters were coming down on that particular paper,” he said. “the discussion and argument had been concluded”.

The second official, a chemical weapons expert referred to as Mr A, said that DIS staff thought that “political objectives” were behind repeated changes to the dossier. In an e-mail to Dr Kelly after publication, he wrote of “our view you and I should have been more involved in this than the spin-merchants of our administration. Let’s hope it turns into tomorrow’s chip wrappers.”

Mr A told the inquiry: “The perception was that the dossier had been round the houses several times to find a form of words that would strengthen certain political objectives.”

John Scarlett, the JIC chairman, has told the inquiry that he was not aware of any disquiet among intelligence officials about the dossier.

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