Clinton Claimed Last Year Saddam Had WMD

Former U.S. president Bill Clinton said in October during a visit to Portugal that he was convinced Iraq had weapons of mass destruction up until the fall of Saddam Hussein, Portuguese Prime Minister Jose Manuel Durao Barroso said.

"When Clinton was here recently he told me he was absolutely convinced, given his years in the White House and the access to privileged information which he had, that Iraq possessed weapons of mass destruction until the end of the Saddam regime," the prime minister said in an interview with Portuguese cable news channel SIC Noticias.

Clinton, a Democrat who left office in 2001, met with Durao Barroso on Oct. 21, when he traveled to Lisbon to give a speech on globalization.

The U.S. justified going to war against Iraq last year citing the threat posed by Baghdad's weapons of mass destruction.

An influential Washington think tank said the Bush administration "systematically" inflated the threat from Iraq's weapons programs in a bid to strengthen its push for military action against Iraq last year.

In its report, the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace also said it was unlikely that Iraq could have destroyed, hidden or moved out of the country hundreds of weapons of mass destruction without Washington detecting some sign of activity.

Editor's note:
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