'DOUBT ON IRAQ WMD INTELLIGENCE'

John Prescott, Britain’s deputy Prime Minister at the time of the 2003 invasion of Iraq said he had doubts about intelligence that Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction, describing some of it as “tittle tattle.” Prescott, who was deputy to Tony Blair during his entire tenure in power, said he thought the intelligence on WMD prior to the war was not “very substantial.” Prescott also told an inquiry in London into Britain’s role in the conflict that the government’s top lawyer had come under great pressure to say whether military action was legal and had not been “a happy bunny.” Prescott was the last person due to give public evidence to the inquiry which has already heard testimony from Blair, his successor Gordon Brown, and other senior ministers, civil servants and military officers. The decision to go to war was the most controversial episode of Blair’s 10-year premiership, provoking huge protests, divisions within his Labour Party and accusations he had deceived about the reasons for invasion.