EW YORK -- US-backed Iraqi political leader Ahmad Chalabi yesterday defended information his group gave Washington on weapons of mass destruction, amid growing questions about intelligence used to justify the war on Iraq.
Chalabi said he was aware of media reports suggesting that his Iraqi National Congress had given false information on Baghdad's alleged illegal biological, chemical, and nuclear weapons program, but said he remained convinced they would yet be found.
''We gave very accurate information, and we produced people who we handed over to the United States,'' Chalabi, on a brief visit to the United States, told the Council on Foreign Relations think tank. ''The only tangible things they've found are the mobile labs, which our defectors talked about.''
Chalabi, aided by Washington, was the first major exiled politician to reach the Iraqi capital after the invasion by US and British forces nearly three months ago removed Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, who is still missing. In April, Chalabi said he did not want a post in an interim government.
US and British officials have brushed aside their countries' failure to find evidence of Iraq's alleged weapons and said that time would prove them correct.
The bet is that the public will lose interest. In Washington, meanwhile, the Senate has voted to hold closed hearings on pre-war Iraqi intelligence. Wouldn't want to embarass anyone now.
