The Iraq Inquiry: what they say and what they mean
Let us read between the lines of the way the Iraq inquiry is to be conducted…
[Iraq Inquiry chairman, Sir John] Chilcot repeated his insistence that evidence would be heard in public, and perhaps live on television, “wherever possible”.
But he said some sessions would remain behind closed doors, “consistent with the need to protect national security, sometimes to ensure complete candour and openness from witnesses”.
‘To ensure complete candour and openness from witnesses’. To be fair, it doesn’t take a genius to translate this. What Chilcot is saying, in other words, is some prominent members of the British Establishment cannot be trusted or expected to tell the truth in public. How marvellous.
Posted on July 30th, 2009 at 7:22pm under Iraq, UK politics
It also means that discussion of some subjects in the public eye will be just too embarrassing. Talking about the level of the UK’s commitment to international law, or the real meaning of the special relationship, could open a pandora’s box of difficult questions that no politician wants to think about.