Date set for UK public inquiry into Iraq war
Public hearings in the Iraq war inquiry will begin in the UK next month, it was announced today.
Organisers also laid out guidelines for witnesses which stress that figures including ministers and senior military officers will be expected to give live evidence.
The first public hearings will take place on November 24 at the QEII conference centre near the British Houses of Parliament.
Although the witnesses have not yet been officially named, Inquiry chairman John Chilcot said they could only give evidence in private for "genuine" reasons.
He said: "Ministers, senior military officers, members of the senior civil service and their equivalents, and former holders of those posts, should all expect to give evidence in public. Only if there are genuine issues of national or personal security would such senior witnesses be justified in seeking to give some of their evidence in private."
The Iraq inquiry began three months ago and will examine the period from 2001 up to July 2009 including the run up to war, the conflict itself and the aftermath.
