Iraq inquiry: the transcript of the security blackout

Good morning from day 15 of the Iraq inquiry in a positively freezing London. Mercifully the press room is kept stocked with pretty decent coffee; otherwise we’d lose at least the first 15 minutes of live-Tweeting to finger-de-freezing.

Continuing from yesterday’s evidence we hear this morning from Lt Gen Sir Robert Fry – his biog reads Deputy Chief Defence Staff (Commitments) MoD 2003-06, Senior Military Representative in Iraq March-September 2006.

The session’s title is the view from London and Baghdad. The afternoon sees a trio of some of the most senior MoD, FCO and No 10 diplomats back at the time including a return by the (current) MI6 Chief John Sawers.

The transcripts of yesterday’s controversial Greenstock session – the one that saw the first use of the “kill button” to interrupt transmission – went up overnight at on the Iraq inquiry website. The relevant passage occurs down at page 68 and reads:

[Greenstock:] I reported these things back to London. [****************************************************************************************** REDACTED *****************************************] My telegrams would describe what was going on, and I later discovered that Secretary Powell was reading the UK telegrams from Baghdad because he wasn’t getting enough information from the Pentagon about what was really going on in Baghdad, as opposed to what Ambassador Bremer was reporting.

Let’s hope the button doesn’t see any further action in today’s session. Live-Tweets at twitter.com/iraqinquiryblog