Uproar as UK government classifies details of weapon expert’s death

Dr. David Kelly

By JOSEPH FITSANAKIS | intelNews.org |
Public speculation over the alleged suicide of UK biological weapons expert Dr. David Kelly is bound to increase, after a senior state official secretly ordered that details of his death be kept secret for 70 years. Dr. Kelly, a British Ministry of Defense scientist, who had been employed by the United Nations as a weapons inspector, caused a major stir by becoming one of the sources of a 2003 BBC report disputing the British government’s claim that Iraq could deploy chemical or biological weapons at 45 minutes’ notice. He was later called to appear before a Parliamentary committee investigating the government’s claims about Iraq’s purported ‘weapons of mass destruction’. But on July 18, 2003, four days after appearing before the committee, Dr. Kelly’s was found dead at a wooded area near his home. An official government inquiry, chaired by Lord Hutton, ruled that the scientist had committed suicide, prompting waves of protests by Dr. Kelly’s family, colleagues, medical experts, and members of the public. It now appears that Lord Hutton has issued a secret order barring for 70 years the release into the public domain of all records on Dr. Kelly’s death, including photographic evidence, as well as most-mortem and other medical reports. The move, which British newspaper The Daily Mail described as “draconian” and “highly unusual”, surprised observers who say they cannot find any mention of it in the public record.