Washington, March 31. (PTI): The new chief US weapons inspector has presented a new theory, which reflects the current Administration's justification for the Iraq invasion that even if Saddam Hussein had no weapons of mass destruction, the ousted dictator "may have been" developing a capacity to develop them at short notice.

Charles A Duelfer, in his first appearance since replacing David Kay in January, told two Senate committees meeting in closed session yesterday that he had refocused the work of the Iraq Survey Group (ISG) to determine Hussein's "intentions."

Duelfer said this had included trying to discover what Saddam Hussein had ordered, whether weapons were hidden and whether there was a plan "for a break out production capacity" according to an unclassified statement Duelfer released to reporters.

Making that task more difficult was that "some of these decisions may not have been recorded in traditional ways" and that they "may have been orally transmitted or conveyed to only a select group, a trusted inner circle."

While interrogation of top Hussein aides continues, he said, "obtaining clear, truthful information from the senior Iraqi leadership has been problematic even at this point in time."