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| (National Security Archive) |
On February 5, 2003 Secretary of State Colin Powell made his
famous presentation
to the United Nations Security Council laying out the U.S. case against Iraq.
Powell had been the main advocate
within the Bush administration to go to the international body to build up
support for the United States’ Iraq strategy.
One section of Powell’s speech focused upon Abu Musab
al-Zarqawi and his cooperation with the Kurdish Salafi group Ansar al-Islam.
Powell claimed that Zarqawi was working with Ansar at a camp in Iraq’s
Kurdistan to develop poison. Powell showed a satellite picture of the base in
Khurmal. The problem
was that Ansar didn’t run that camp. It was under a group called Komaleh
Islami, which had ties with the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK). While it
would take months to discredit Powell’s presentation after the invasion of
Iraq, this part of his claims was questioned the day he appeared at the U.N. It
foreshadowed the faulty intelligence that so much of the American case against
Saddam was based upon.
SOURCES
Chivers, C.J. “Kurds
Puzzled by Report of Terror Camp,” New York Times, 2/6/03
International Crisis Group, “Radical Islam In Iraqi
Kurdistan: The Mouse That Roared,” 2/7/03
McGeary, Johanna,
“Dissecting The Case,” Time, 2/10/03
Powell, Colin, “A Policy of Evasion and Deception,” United
Nations, 2/5/03
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