January 09, 2007	Tuesday	Zilhaj 18, 1427

LONDON, Jan 8: The Indictment of Anthony Charles Lynton Blair for the Crime of Aggression Against Iraq -- A Hearing. That is the title of a play to be staged here soon in which Tony Blair faces indictment for a crime of aggression against Iraq before departing as prime minister.

Real lawyers and testimony from MPs, diplomats and other experts are expected to be used in the play.

The ambitious project is from London's Tricycle theatre, which has staged edited verbatim accounts of events such as the Stephen Lawrence inquiry, the Bloody Sunday hearings and the Hutton inquiry.

According to the Guardian’s Monday edition the theatre will create the event itself and then use actors to stage a condensed version. Whether there is a case for indictment will be up to the audience. Barristers on both sides are colleagues of Mr.Blair’s wife, Cherie Booth, from Matrix Chambers.

Julian Knowles will be defending Mr Blair. “I’m starting several paces behind the prosecution. Obviously the events of the last week have been pretty grisly and the audience at the Tricycle will probably be anti-war, but it is my role to show there is not a case in law,” he said.

Against him will be Philippe Sands QC, professor of international law at University College London.

Witnesses so far include MPs Clare Short, who was in the cabinet in the run up to the war, and Bob Marshall-Andrews; Sir Michael Quinlan, former permanent under-secretary at the ministry of defence; and Scott Ritter, former United Nations weapons inspector. They will testify this month, with the results edited into an April stage version by the Tricycle’s regular collaborator, the Guardian journalist Richard Norton-Taylor.