Portal:Current events/2004 February 2
February 2, 2004 (Monday)
- U.S. President George W. Bush announces the formation of the Iraq Intelligence Commission, an independent, bipartisan inquiry presidential commission to probe into prewar intelligence regarding weapons of mass destruction leading up to the decision to invade Iraq. Former Iraq Survey Group chief David Kay, who searched for weapons in Iraq, meets with Bush at the White House and maintains that Bush was right to go to war in Iraq and characterizes the Saddam Hussein regime as "far more dangerous than even we anticipated" when it was thought he had WMDs ready to deploy. (See rationale for the Iraq War and Senate Report on Pre-war Intelligence on Iraq)
- Traces of ricin are found in the mailroom of a Dirksen Senate Office Building.
- Prime Minister of Israel Ariel Sharon announces to the Ha'aretz newspaper that he plans to dismantle 17 Israeli settlements in the Gaza Strip and says that he foresees a time when there are no Jews in Gaza at all.
- Pakistani nuclear scientist Abdul Qadeer Khan confesses to smuggling nuclear hardware on chartered planes, sharing secret designs for the centrifuges that produce the enriched uranium necessary to develop a nuclear weapon, and giving personal briefings to nuclear scientists from Iran, North Korea and Libya, believing that nuclear proliferation would "ease Western attention on Pakistan" and "help the Muslim cause"
- The leader of Conservative Party of Norway (Høyre), Jan Petersen, announces his resignation as party leader after 10 years at the helm. He continues as Foreign Minister in the coalition government.
- Roger Federer becomes the ATP number-one ranked player.