NEW YORK, Sept 16: A classified National Intelligence Estimate prepared for President Bush in late July spelt out a dark assessment of prospects for Iraq, said the New York Times on Thursday.

"The estimate outlines three possibilities for Iraq through the end of 2005, with the worst case being developments that could lead to civil war, the officials said. The most favourable outcome described is an Iraq whose stability would remain tenuous in political, economic and security terms," the Times said.

Senator John Kerry, Democratic Party's nominee for the President, severely criticized the Bush administration's optimistic public position on Iraq on Wednesday and questioned whether it would be possible to hold elections there in January.

"I think it is very difficult to see today how you're going to distribute ballots in places like Falluja and Ramadi and Najaf and other parts of the country without having established the security," Mr Kerry said in a Radio interview.

"I know that the people who are supposed to run that election believe that they need a longer period of time and greater security before they can even begin to do it, and they just can't do it at this point in time. So I'm not sure the president is being honest with the American people about that situation either at this point."

One government official who read the paper told the Times "there's a significant amount of pessimism". The paper said that the intelligence estimate, the first on Iraq since October 2002, was prepared by the National Intelligence Council and was approved by the National Foreign Intelligence Board under John E. McLaughlin, the acting director of central intelligence.

Such estimates can be requested by the White House or Congress, but this one was initiated by the intelligence council under George J. Tenet, who stepped down as director of central intelligence on July 9, the government officials said.

President Bush, who was briefed on the new intelligence estimate, has not significantly changed the tenor of his public remarks on the war's course over the summer, consistently emphasizing progress while acknowledging the difficulties, the paper noted.