LONDON, 06 January 2022, (TON): In startling revelations, former British defence secretary Geoff Hoon has claimed that he was told to burn a memo from the attorney general that cast doubt on the legality of the Iraq war, boosting a campaign to strip former prime minister Tony Blair of his knighthood.

According to Daily Mail, Hoon said that he was ordered by Downing Street to burn a secret memo that said the 2003 invasion of Iraq could be "illegal".

Hoon, who was in charge of defence when the war started, said that his principal private secretary was told 'in no uncertain terms by Jonathan Powell, Tony's chief of staff, that after reading the document he must 'burn it'.

Hoon wrote in his memoir, See How They Run, that he had been under pressure from Mike Boyce, the chief of defence staff, to provide him with clear legal direction that his forces could take action in Iraq, in lieu of a UN resolution authorising force, Daily Mail reported.

Hoon said “the advice was not an easy read and concluded that the Iraq invasion would be lawful only if the prime minister believed that it was in the UK’s national interest to do so.”

He wrote “it was not exactly the ringing endorsement that the chief of the defence staff was looking for, and in any event, I was not strictly allowed to show it to him or even discuss it with him.”

“Moreover, when my principal private secretary, Peter Watkins, called Jonathan Powell in Downing St and asked what he should now do with the document, he was told in no uncertain terms that he should ‘burn it’.”

An online petition asking that Blair’s newly announced knighthood be rescinded has also been signed by more than 700,000 people as of Wednesday.

The petition was created by Angus Scott at change.org as soon as the New Year Honours were announced last night.