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Iraq: U.S. Forces Take “Chemical Ali” Into Custody U.S. forces have taken custody of Ali Hassan al-Majid, known as “Chemical Ali” for ordering chemical weapons attacks on Kurdish rebels in Northern Iraq in 1998, a senior defense official said today (see GSN, June 6). Officials have not released details on al-Majid’s capture, according to the Associated Press. Al-Majid, ranked No. 5 on the U.S. most-wanted list, had previously been thought to have been killed during an airstrike in April (Robert Burns, Associated Press/Yahoo!News, Aug. 21). British Dossier Meanwhile, British documents released yesterday suggest that senior British officials attempted to stop weapons expert David Kelly from discussing his doubts over a September 2002 dossier on Iraqi weapons of mass destruction, according to Reuters (see GSN, Aug. 20). The documents were presented during an inquiry into Kelly’s apparent suicide. He had been previously identified as the source for a BBC report accusing the British government of exaggerating Iraqi-related intelligence. According to one of the documents presented at the inquiry, a senior British Defense Ministry official said that during a meeting in British Prime Minister Tony Blair’s office a week before Kelly was set to testify before two parliamentary committees, it was discussed that some of Kelly’s views on the dossier could be damaging to the government’s claims, according to Reuters. For example, Kelly’s testimony could have discredited a claim that the Iraqi military had the ability to deploy biological and chemical weapons within 45 minutes of receiving an order to do so, the official said (Reuters/Los Angeles Times, Aug. 21).
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