- It was the Government's "duty" to "spin"
intelligence information on Iraq, a former minister has insisted.
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- Lewis Moonie, who lost his job at the Ministry of Defence
in the recent reshuffle, said ministers could not be "100 per cent"
sure the claims were right.
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- But once they placed their own faith in them it was right
that they went out to "sell" them to the public, he told the
BBC Radio 4 Today programme.
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- "You act on the information that you have and it
is our duty then, having decided on a course of action, to persuade people
that that is what we ought to be doing," Mr Moonie said. "People
seem to equate spin with lying. It is not.
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- "What we are talking about here is trying to put
the best gloss on your case to ensure people accept it.
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- "The danger is that it is impossible with intelligence,
except in hindsight, to be 100 per cent certain that something is accurate
or not."
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- Mr Moonie added: "When something is looked at, we
decide whether we believe it or not. Once we believe it, it is our duty
to sell it to people."
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