U.S. Senate to release detailed critique of Bush's prewar claims

WASHINGTON, March 10 (Xinhua) -- After four years of investigation, the U.S. Senate Intelligence Committee will soon release a detailed report that criticizes the Bush administration's claims in the buildup to the war in Iraq.

The long-delayed document catalogs dozens of prewar assertions by President George W. Bush and other administration officials that proved to be wildly inaccurate about Iraq's alleged stockpiles of banned weapons and pursuit of nuclear arms, the Los Angeles Times reported Monday.

But the report reaches a mixed verdict on the key question of whether the White House misused intelligence to make the case for war.

The document criticizes White House officials for making assertions that failed to reflect disagreements or uncertainties in the underlying intelligence on Iraq, officials said.

However, the report acknowledges that many claims were consistent with intelligence assessments in circulation at the time.

Because of the nuanced nature of the conclusions, one congressional official familiar with the document said, "Nobody is going to be happy."

The report helps culminate a series of investigations that the committee has carried out in connection with the war in Iraq.

But the report itself was stalled repeatedly, partly due to the complexity of the task and partisan disagreements among senators.