Bush refuses to release Iraq dossier

REFUSING to bow to pressure from the Democrats, the White House yesterday said it would not release the rest of a secret intelligence assessment that depicts a growing terrorist threat caused by the war in Iraq.

The move is seen as an attempt by as the Bush administration to quell criticism that its anti-terror policies are seriously flawed.

Tony Snow, the White House press secretary, said releasing the full report, key points of which George Bush, the president, unexpectedly declassified on Tuesday after parts were leaked to the media last weekend, would jeopardise the lives of agents who gathered the information.

It would also risk the nation's ability to work with foreign governments and to keep secret its intelligence-gathering methods, Mr Snow said, and "compromise the independence of people doing intelligence analysis."

The bleak National Intelligence Estimate (NIE), compiled by 16 US intelligence agencies staffed by the government's top analysts, concluded that Iraq has become a cause clbre for jihadists, who are growing in number and geographic reach.

Peppered with questions yesterday, Mr Snow said the NIE report was "not designed to draw judgments about success or failure; it's an intelligence document, it's a snapshot".

Mr Snow said the report confirmed the importance of the war in Iraq as a bulwark against terrorists. "Iraq has become, for them, the battleground," he said. "If they lose, they lose their bragging rights. They lose their ability to recruit."

The document has given both political parties new ammunition in the lead up to November's mid-term elections. For Republicans, as Mr Snow stressed, it provides more evidence that Iraq is central to the war on terrorism and cannot be abandoned without giving jihadists a crucial victory.

For Democrats, it furthers their argument that the 2003 Iraq invasion has inflamed anti-US sentiments in the Muslim world and left the US, and the world, less safe.

"The American people deserve the full story, not those parts of it that the Bush administration selects," said Edward Kennedy, a senior Democrat senator.

Donald Rumsfeld, the defence secretary, in Albania meeting defence ministers, said Mr Bush had declassified the report's key judgments, after parts of it were leaked, so that "the American people and the world will be able to see the truth and precisely what that document says".

But Senator Joe Biden, the senior Democrat on the Senate foreign relations committee, said Mr Bush has allowed Iraq to fester as a training ground for terrorists, and US voters are worried about it.

"On election day if there's still the carnage in the streets of Iraq, then it will be clear that they have concluded that this administration's policy has failed and there will be a political price for it," Mr Biden predicted.