Members of the US Congress were this afternoon hearing evidence about two secret Downing St memos written before the invasion of Iraq which seem to imply that President Bush systematically misled the American people.

The first of the two memos were leaked to the Sunday Times in May, but the potential scandal was ignored by the mainstream US media.

The memos were however forced onto the political agenda by bloggers, who have refused to let the scandal die down. Today their efforts were due to bear fruit, when anti-war Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee will hold an informal meeting to hear evidence on the top secret minutes as part of a hearing on intelligence issues before the Iraq war.

After the hearing, Congressman John Conyers Jr was due personally to deliver a letter to President Bush asking for answer about America's path to war. The petition has been signed by over 100 members of Congress and half a million ordinary US citizens.

The letter is due to be followed by a public rally by anti-war campaigners in front of the White House.

"It's the first time that the memo has been addressed in such a way on Capitol Hill," said Roland Watson, Times Washington correspondent.

"It's a further sign that the issue of the memo is finally picking up some momentum in Washington."

The first memo is a transcript of a meeting head in Downing St in July 2002. In it, C, the head of MI6, says that based on meetings in Washington there had been a shift in attitude and that "military action was now seen as inevitable". President Bush wanted to remove Saddam Hussein, and would do so "justified by the conjunction of terrorism and WMD", it states.

The next line is the one that has excited opponents of the war. The memo continues: "But the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy."

SInce the memo was first published in the Sunday Times and on Times Online in May, it has remained among the most frequently read articles every day. A website for the memo has been set up by campaigners at www.downingstreetmemo.com.

The second memo, referred to as DSMII, was published this week, saying that British ministers were told that they had no choice but to find a way to make the war in Iraq legal. The publication of the second document provoked the sceptical US press to take notice, and the story appeared on the front page of the respected Washington Post.

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