Inquiry Unlikely to Report Finding Iraq Arms

Wed September 24, 2003 03:06 PM ET

By Carol Giacomo and Tabassum Zakaria
UNITED NATIONS/WASHINGTON (Reuters) - An eagerly awaited U.S. inquiry is expected to report finding "documentary evidence" that Iraq had chemical and biological weapons programs but no proof of actual arms, a senior U.S. official said on Wednesday.

The expected finding in a report by David Kay, who served as a U.N. nuclear inspector in Iraq in 1991, would be a blow to President Bush who, before ordering the invasion of Iraq last March, argued Saddam Hussein's weapons of mass destruction posed an imminent threat that justified war.

The failure to turn up any such weapons has eroded U.S. credibility as Bush now seeks greater help from the international community to stabilize and rebuild Iraq.

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