The British Foreign Office has made a last-ditch attempt to stop one of its former senior diplomats from publishing a book claiming that the government knew that Iraq did not represent a significant threat to the West in the run-up to the Iraq war.
On Saturday evening Carne Ross, who was a member of the British mission to the UN, declined to comment on a letter asking him to "reconsider" his decision to publish his book, Independent Diplomat, other than to describe it as "unpleasant."
A spokesman said: "The Foreign and Commonwealth Office [FCO] disagrees fundamentally with much of the book and is disappointed that Mr Ross has chosen to misrepresent the FCO. In doing so, he risks damaging the credibility and morale of the FCO and the relationship of confidence and trust within government."
Ross's book is likely to make uncomfortable reading for ministers as it raises questions about why the government continued to support the Iraq invasion if it did not believe that Saddam Hussein was a genuine threat.
A diplomat for 15 years, Ross resigned in 2004 after giving secret testimony to the Butler inquiry on the war.
It included the allegation that between 1998 and mid-2002 -- when Ross worked at the UN -- Britain and the US assessed that Iraq was not a threat.
Ross says that the book, to be published next month, is a serious critique of the government's foreign policy rather than a "kiss and tell."
Ross, who described himself as a "rottweiler" at the UN in his ferocious defense of British foreign policy, came to question his beliefs when he took time off from the Foreign Office.
Ther UN envoy said many people in the Foreign Office who had vetted the book sympathized with his arguments, which focus on the idea that foreign policy is concentrated in the hands of too few people and that those it affects are not involved in its formation.
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