Galloway changes his tune on Iraqi memos
By Philip Johnston, Home Affairs Editor
(Filed: 25/04/2003)
George Galloway revised his view yesterday that the documents found by The Daily Telegraph in Baghdad linking him to payments from the regime of Saddam Hussein were forgeries.
But he still maintained that their contents were untrue and libellous.
Earlier this week, Mr Galloway, Labour MP for Glasgow Kelvin, appeared to suggest that the documents had been fabricated.
But he told Radio 4's Today programme: "I am not saying they are forgeries. I am saying they could be forgeries and that their provenance is extremely suspicious."
In The Guardian yesterday, he was quoted as saying: "Irrespective of the provenance of the documents the material in them is false."
Mr Galloway also told Radio Scotland that he could not rule out the possibility that he had been misrepresented by others who had taken money from Iraq.
"I can't answer for anything that anyone else has done - that anyone else has, as it were, traded on my name," he said. "But of course the possibility exists.
"Personally, the only thing that matters to me in terms of my libel action is these allegations that I myself took sums of money from the government then ruling Iraq are not only untrue but lies on a fantastic scale and ones which are being answered in the libel courts."
While Mr Galloway continues to protest that he did not take money from Saddam as indicated by the documents found in Iraq, his explanation has changed subtly over the past week.
When he was first asked about the initial document produced on Monday he said: "Maybe it's the product of the same forgers who forged so many other things in this whole Iraq picture. Maybe The Daily Telegraph forged it."
However, Mr Galloway denied changing his story. In answers to questions posed by The Daily Telegraph yesterday he said: "I never said they were definitely forgeries. They could be forgeries."
Several experts, including a former Iraqi government aide, have since claimed that the documents are genuine and Mr Galloway yesterday was unable or unwilling to say who may have forged them if they were not.
"People can make their own minds up about that. Forgery and deception have been a hallmark of this Iraq affair from the start," he said on the Today programme.
Because he was at his villa in Portugal, he was not in a position to comment directly upon the documents other than to question their provenance. But what mattered most to him was not where the documents came from but that the contents were false.
"This is a lie of fantastic proportions which only the most credulous would believe. I am one of the most scrutinised and observed figures in Britain, and Iraq, one of the most scrutinised, besieged and observed countries in the world. The idea that the Iraqi regime was channelling to me personally hundreds of thousands of pounds is simply absurd.
"The Telegraph has not advanced a scintilla of evidence that I have ever traded in oil or food or received any money from Iraq. All they have done is publish a document which they miraculously came by in a burning, looted, destroyed building which, miraculously when they put their hand in it, came out with my name on it and information relating to me.
"Most people think that that's a set-up."
In this week's Tribune magazine, he said the allegations were a "helpful diversion from the invasion, destruction and occupation of Iraq.
"For the record, I have never personally benefited from my work on Iraq. On the contrary, I have given my political life's blood to my fight for the people of Iraq."
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24 April 2003: This is genuine, says Saddam's ex-aide |
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22 April 2003: Letter asking for money 'is a forgery' |
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Related reports |
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Inquiry into Galloway fund |
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Gone to press |
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External links |
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Fantastic lies of the Daily Telegraph [25 Apr '03] - Tribune |