- AFP) -- "Devastating" testimony by the widow
of weapons expert David Kelly to an inquiry into her husband's death could
be enough to seal the fate of Britain's embattled Defence Secretary Geoff
Hoon, London's newspapers said.
-
- "How can Hoon survive this?" read a headline
in the Daily Mail tabloid, a day after Kelly's widow said she felt betrayed
by the defence ministry for exposing her husband as the source of a disputed
BBC report alleging the government exaggerated the threat of Saddam Hussein's
Iraq ahead of the US-led war.
-
- Kelly's body was found on July 18 with a slit wrist in
woods close to his home near London, a week after the Ministry of Defence
(MoD) said he was the likely source of the BBC report.
-
- Kelly's widow, Janice, testified Monday before judge
Lord Hutton, as the inquiry entered a fourth week of hearing evidence.
-
- The Daily Mail, a fierce opponent of the Labour government,
described her testimony as "devastating", as did The Guardian
broadsheet.
-
- The Mail added that her evidence revealed "a string
of (government) lies" and a "cold betrayal of a decent man".
-
- "Had he a shred of honour, the wretched Geoff Hoon
would now resign from an MoD that has so disgraced itself while he is nominally
in charge," the Mail said in its editorial.
-
- "Yet let nobody imagine that his departure will
clear the air. The man from his own evidence to the Hutton Inquiry is a
mere puppet. Others pull the strings."
-
- In evidence to the inquiry last week, Hoon denied being
responsible for outing Kelly, preferring to blame Prime Minister Tony Blair's
office and juniors in his own department for leaking his name.
-
- The Times said evidence given by Janice Kelly was "potentially
devastating for Geoff Hoon" while the Financial Times said it "may
seal the fate" of the cabinet minister.
-
- A commentator in The Independent wrote that Hoon's "assertions
that his employee was well treated (by his bosses at the MoD) will never
stand up again".
-
- The Daily Telegraph, however, was uncertain whether Janice
Kelly's testimony was politically damaging, arguing that it was becoming
increasingly clear that Kelly's death "was not so much a public scandal
as a private tragedy, for which his widow and family deserve the greatest
sympathy".
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