Chilcot Iraq War Inquiry Report Will Be Published After EU Referendum, Says David Cameron

Chilcot Iraq War Inquiry Report Will Be Published After EU Referendum, Says David Cameron

David Cameron has said he expects the Chilcot Inquiry into the Iraq War will finally be published soon after the June 23 EU referendum.

Set up by Gordon Brown in 2009, a date has yet to be set for publication of the report into the 2003 invasion.

The prime minister was today pressed at PMQs by Tory MP David Amess to ensure it would be released before his 100-year-old mother Maude had set a record for long life.

Amess has previously asked Cameron whether his mother would live long enough to see the EU referendum take place.

Cameron told Amess today he hoped his mother would be able to vote in the referendum this summer.

He added: "I am sure the Chilcot report will come not too much longer after that."

The Chilcot Inquiry report will contain over a million words and include details of over 200 cabinet meetings.

In April, families of those who died in the Iraq War demanded the report be released before the referendum.

Reg Keys, the father of a British solider who was killed in 2003, told the Daily Telegraph: "There have been so many false dawns. … It is delay after delay. We just feel like we are political pawns, the families of the fallen and wounded. To hold it back until after the referendum is just putting Iraq on the backburner again."

Conservative MP David Davis has warned people have “probably” died as a result of the ongoing delays in publishing the report.

He told the Commons last month: "The longer we leave it the less useful these lessons will be and the more likely it is that we will make the same mistakes.

"A decision such as those that were made in Libya, Syria and Iraq are made without the knowledge or facts, mistakes are made, and sometimes people die as a result."

The former Tory leadership candidate who is campaigning for Brexit addedit it would be “outrageous” if the report was delayed until after the June 23 referendum. 

 

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