Former US minister denies Iraq comments

Former US deputy secretary of state Richard Armitage has denied saying that the United States asked the Netherlands for military support before the invasion of Iraq.

In an interview with Dutch public television news, he said he could not remember making the comments published in Dutch newspapers last week. Armitage said he was probably misunderstood.

In the interview he also denied that Dutch political support for the invasion of Iraq was not a precondition of the decision to appoint former Dutch foreign minister Jaap de Hoop Scheffer as secretary-general of Nato, but said that the Netherlands' stance did help.

The news agency GPD says it has the tape recording of the interview with Armitage to prove that he said the United States did ask the Netherlands for military support.