Hoon: 'I approved plan to confirm Kelly's name'
UK Defence Secretary Geoff Hoon admitted today that he had approved the plan to confirm the name of Government weapons expert David Kelly to journalists.
At his second appearance before the Hutton Inquiry, he denied that it was part of a deliberate “strategy” to leak the scientist’s identity to the press.
And he strongly defended the British Ministry of Defence’s handling of Dr Kelly after he came forward to say that he had an unauthorised meeting with BBC journalist Andrew Gilligan.
The inquiry is investigating how Dr Kelly apparently came to take his own life after being identified as the source of Mr Gilligan’s story claiming that the Government “sexed up” its Iraqi weapons dossier.
Mr Hoon told the inquiry that the permanent secretary at the UK MoD, Sir Kevin Tebbit, had informed him that the press office had been instructed to confirm Dr Kelly’s identity to journalists who came up with the right name.
He said Sir Kevin had “put his head round the door” of his office on the morning of July 9 – the day after the MoD had issued a statement saying an unnamed official had admitted meeting Mr Gilligan – to tell him of the plan.
“What Sir Kevin was doing that morning was just checking essentially that I approved that approach,” he said.
Asked if he had approved that approach, he replied: “Yes, I did.”
He added: “It was his view, it was my view, that this was the best and most straightforward way of dealing with journalists who had identified correctly the name of the person who had come forward.”
