Justice At Last?

Just when ex-Prime Minister Tony Blair thought it was safe to stick his head above the parapet!

It is reported today that there are fresh calls for a formal inquest to be held into the death of Government scientist Dr David Kelly.

If you remember, Dr Kelly's body was found six years ago in woods near his Oxfordshire home after he was exposed as the source of a BBC report on the grounds for going to war in Iraq.

Instead of a coroner's inquest, Tony Blair asked Lord Hutton to conduct an inquiry.

The results of that inquiry concluded that Dr Kelly died from blood loss as a result of cutting his wrist with a blunt gardening knife.

A group of campaigning doctors have now produced a report arguing that the Hutton Inquiry's finding of suicide was flawed and have handed it to lawyers preparing a legal challenge.

According to the team of 13 medical specialists, a cut to the ulnar artery was "highly unlikely" to have caused enough bleeding to kill Dr Kelly.
Post mortem reports should be provided to enable their questions to be answered, the doctors added.

One of the authors of the report, retired consultant in orthopaedic and trauma surgery David Halpin, said previous examinations into Dr Kelly's death were "flawed".

Lord Hutton was charged with inquiring into the circumstances surrounding the death and not the cause itself and his inquiry did not have the same legal standards as a coroner's inquest, he said.

"Due process has been subverted," he said. "The group that I am part of is not prepared to let that go. There is evidence of a cover-up."

He said: "He (Dr Kelly) was a very prominent germ and chemical warfare expert. That is relevant because of his knowledge of the biology of death. He had spent ten years at Porton Down (Defence Science and Technology Laboratory) and he knew everything about killing things.
So to take what was said to be a blunt knife and what was alleged to be his wife's co-proxamol tablets to try to kill himself is extraordinary. I think it's highly likely he was assassinated."

The report by the group of doctors setting out their rejection of the theory that Dr Kelly died of a haemorrhage will also be sent to Sir John Chilcot's forthcoming inquiry into the Iraq conflict.

Hopefully the Chilcot Inquiry will find that this was an unlawful war, ultimately leading to the indictment of Tony Blair and George W Bush as war criminals.

Ah well! I can dream, can’t I?