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U.K. assures help to U.N. team

By Hasan Suroor

LONDON DEC. 23. Britain has assured the U.N. weapons inspectors that they would get all the help they need to unearth Iraq's weapons of mass destruction. This followed a stinging rebuke by the chief of weapons inspectors, Hans Blix, that Britain, and the U.S. were not sharing with him fully the intelligence they claimed to have about the Iraqi President, Saddam Hussein's alleged arsenal.

But even as the Foreign Office promised full assistance to Mr. Blix and his team, doubts emerged whether Britain and the U.S. had any clinching evidence at all to back their claims.

``The British Government officials have privately admitted that they do not have any `killer evidence' about weapons of mass destruction. If they had, they would have already passed it to the inspectors,'' The Guardian said today.

Mr. Blix said last week that if the U.K. and the U.S. were `convinced' that they had enough evidence against Mr. Hussein "then one would expect they would be able to tell us where is this stuff.''

Reports suggested that some `sensitive' intelligence was being held back from weapons inspectors because of fears that it might get leaked. According to The Sunday Telegraph, Washington and London were "waiting for his (Mr. Blix's) team to establish a reliable track record before entrusting them with all the information they have.'' Meanwhile, Britain's leading clergymen, including the Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, have joined MPs and peace activists to warn against a war in Iraq. Using their traditional Christmas messages, some of the Britain's senior Bishops have questioned the legitimacy of a war which is seen to lack international backing.

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