WASHINGTON, July 8: The White House has admitted for the first time that its claim that former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein had tried to buy uranium from Niger was false.

In a surprising statement that has stunned the US capital, White House spokesman Ari Fleischer said on Monday that President George W. Bush made a mistake when he said in his state of the union address in January that Iraq had tried to buy uranium from the African nation.

The president’s statement, he said, was based on forged documents from Niger. “The president’s statement was based on the predicate of the yellow cake uranium from Niger,” Mr Fleischer told reporters. “So given the fact that the report on the yellow cake did not turn out to be accurate, that is reflective of the president’s broader statement.”

United Nations inspectors had already dismissed as forgeries documents backing the claim released during the run-up to the Iraq war.

A former US ambassador who investigated the allegations in 2002 also reported to the Central Intelligence Agency that it was false.

President Bush, nonetheless, repeated the allegations in his 2003 state of the union address.

Meanwhile, British Prime Minister Tony Blair has appeared before a parliamentary committee.

An inquiry on Monday cleared Mr Blair of manipulating intelligence on Iraq’s alleged weapons of mass destruction, but said undue emphasis was given to questionable evidence.

Mr Blair told members of parliament that he still believed illegal weapons would be found in Iraq.

Observers here say the White House’s admission will add fuel to the controversy raging in the US and Britain over charges that the two governments manipulated intelligence reports to make the case for war against Iraq.

On Sunday, former US ambassador Joseph Wilson told the NBC News that he had travelled to Africa in 2002 to investigate the report.

Mr Wilson, Washington’s envoy to Gabon from 1992 to 1995, said he had reported back to the CIA that it was highly doubtful that any such transaction had ever taken place.

Leaders of the Democratic Party are demanding a bipartisan inquiry into the Bush administration’s claims about Iraq.

On June 22, Senator Pat Roberts, who heads the Senate select committee on intelligence, said the committee had started hearings into the reports that President Bush used for justifying his invasion of Iraq.