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The key backroom players
Evening Standard Last updated at 00:00am on 25.06.03Paul Hamill
Who? He was a member of the Coalition Information Centre (CIC), a special propaganda outfit set up by Alastair Campbell to promote the Government's case for war with Iraq.
But days before Tony Blair promised to help with two parliamentary inquiries into the dossiers, he was posted to Baghdad to act as a press officer for the reconstruction effort. At the time the dossier was produced he was on secondment from the Foreign Office, described as "director of story development".
The title implies his job was to take an idea and generate killer facts and selected material to add muscle to it.
Why was he named? The name "phamill" appears all over the electronic version of the dodgy dossier. A version was auto-saved repeatedly on his computer hard disc, indicating he spent such a long time working on it that the machine automatically made several back-ups to protect his work in case of a computer crash.
His likely involvement? Mr Hamill seems to have played a major role in producing and/or editing the dossier. He may, indeed, be the primary author. The question is, who gave him his orders and what was he told to produce? If other officials were feeding text to him he may not have known that huge sections of the dossier were copied from a 13-year-old thesis on the internet.
John Pratt
Who? He is a gofer in the Strategic Communications Unit, part of Campbell's empire run by Peter Hyman, a key Labour Party moderniser who worked in Mr Blair's private office long before Labour won power.
Both Downing Street and the Foreign Office seem reluctant to claim Mr Hamill as a member of their staff. A No10 spokesman said he was a junior member of the CIC team and, as an FO secondee, not a Downing Street staffer. This is significant because when the scandal first broke, sources denied that senior Downing Street officials were in any way to blame. Jack Straw, meanwhile, has insisted the dossier was nothing to do with FO officials.
Why was he named? He was sent the document by Mr Hamill and saved a version on floppy disc.
His likely involvement? "He had nothing to do with writing it," says an official. His role would be significant if it pointed to the involvement of Mr Hyman. In a little-noticed document, the FO revealed a special adviser at No 10 - a description fitting both Mr Campbell and Mr Hyman - made "editorial changes" to the dossier.
Alison Blackshaw
Who? She is Mr Campbell's personal assistant.
Why was she named? She received the master copy from John Pratt and saved it on her computer. She then saved it twice to floppy disc, presumably after changes were made.
Her likely involvement? She would have printed the document for Mr Campbell, who does not have a computer or printer. "Ali does not trust computers - rightly as it turned out," said one insider. If he marked changes in pen, she would have typed them for him. Her computer is the nearest the electronic trail comes to Mr Campbell personally.
Murtza Khan
Who? "News editor for the Downing Street website". Insiders say he is a designer, not a writer.
Why was he named? He took the floppy disc from Ms Blackshaw and saved it on his computer. He then made a fresh copy, named Iraq.doc, which was prepared for posting on No 10's website.
His likely involvement? His role, say insiders, was purely technical - and the last link in the chain to publication.
