The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) said on Friday that its reporter Andrew Gilliganhas resigned after being criticized in the Hutton report on the suicide of the British government weapons adviser David Kelly.

The reporter became BBC's latest victim over the Kelly affair, as both the broadcaster's director general Greg Dyke and chairman Gavyn Davies resigned after the Hutton report was published on Wednesday.

Gilligan was at the center of a bitter row between the British government and the BBC, after he reported last May that the government "sexed up" the capabilities of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction to justify the war against Iraq.

But the Hutton report cleared the British government of any wrongdoing while piling blame on the BBC for their "unfounded" report and "defective" editorial processes.

Gilligan apologized for the mistakes in his report in a statement issued on Friday but described the BBC collectively as "the victim of a grave injustice."

"My departure is at my own initiative," he said. "I am resigning because I want to protect it (BBC).

"I accept my part in the crisis which has befallen the organization. But a greater part has been played by the unbalanced judgments of (senior judge) Lord Hutton."
 
(Xinhua News Agency January 31, 2004)