WASHINGTON, April 7: The White House on Friday chose not to challenge a prosecutor’s disclosure that President George Bush authorised top official Lewis ‘Scooter’ Libby to disclose intelligence on Iraq in 2003, as Mr Libby alleges.

Spokesman Scott McClellan noted that the White House released declassified portions of an intelligence report around the same time, July 2003.

That was part of an already known public release of information in the face of criticism of Mr Bush’s grounds for invading Iraq from former ambassador Joe Wilson.

According to court papers filed on Tuesday, Mr Libby, Vice President Dick Cheney’s former chief of staff, told a federal grand jury that Mr Cheney had told him that the president had authorised him to disclose information from a secret National Intelligence Estimate to then-New York Times reporter Judith Miller.

The disclosure arose out of a long-running investigation into the leak of CIA’s operative Valerie Plame’s identity. Plame is Wilson’s wife and the former diplomat has accused the White House of revealing her identity to get back at him.

Mr Libby resigned from the administration in October when he was charged with perjury by special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald, who is investigating the leaking of Ms Plame’s name. His trial is set to begin next January.—Reuters