LONDON, May 15: Former British prime minister Tony Blair’s wife defended herself on Thursday after the family of David Kelly, the official who committed suicide in a row over Iraq, slammed her for writing about it.

Cherie Blair said it would have been impossible to write her memoirs without discussing the Kelly affair, which was at the centre of a major dispute between the government and the BBC in the wake of the 2003 invasion of Iraq.

“David Kelly’s death was a huge tragedy for the Kelly family first and foremost but... to tell the story about being in Number 10 (Downing Street) and not to mention David Kelly I think would be actually really impossible,” she told BBC radio.

Her comments came after Derek Vawdrey, the brother of Kelly’s widow Janice, said that Downing Street was responsible for his death and that Blair’s wife was using his suicide to bolster her husband’s image.—AFP