Solicitor Matthew Jury, who is part of the team representing the families, said: “They describe it to me as a black cloud hanging over their heads and the only way to disperse that cloud, for them to get some degree of closure, is for this report to be published and for them to finally know the truth”.
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He has said publication of his report has been delayed to allow those who have been criticised to respond.
A group of at least 29 families warned inquiry chairman Sir John Chilcot of their intentions in a legal letter, according to The Daily Mail.
The Chilcot inquiry has already taken six years and has included long interviews with the key figures involved in the UK and US led invasion of Iraq in 2003 – including then Prime Minister Tony Blair.
Sir Jeremy Heywood, head of the civil service, said the inquiry has repeatedly declined offers of additional assistance to help speed up the process.
Sir John insisted last month that his inquiry – launched in 2009 – was making “significant progress”, although he could not set a date for the publication of his findings.
“What Sir John doesn’t understand is the strength of feeling amongst the bereaved”.
“The only way for me to move on from this now is to consign Iraq to history and part of doing so is to get this inquiry published”. The inquiry covers the period from summer 2001 to the end of July 2009, encompassing the run-up and aftermath of the conflict as well as the war itself.
A spokesman for the inquiry said Sir John was considering a large number of replies from those included in the report “with care”. In January, hopes that the report would be published before May’s general election were dashed, with David Cameron and Nick Clegg calling the delays “extremely frustrating” and “incomprehensible”.
“I think that should be borne in mind, we are engaged in a process that is going to produce an inquiry into an immensely important historic event and the Maxwellisation process gives us the best chance of getting it right”.
Delays are thought to have been caused because of a bid from some to stop the publication of conversations between Mr Blair and the US president at the time, George W Bush.
It drew an angry response from the Prime Minister, who said he was “disappointed” that the inquiry was unable to provide a timetable for completion and warned Sir John: “We are fast losing patience”.
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Lawyers for the families say this process is a convention, rather than a legal requirement, and should not have led to “interminable” delays. Instead, it endures whilst the inquiry is ongoing.
