Democratic presidential candidate Sen. John Kerry said Sunday the Bush administration, including Vice President Dick Cheney, should be "held accountable" for claims Iraq had weapons of mass destruction.

Kerry, riding a tide of support since a surprising win Monday in the first of the US presidential nominating contests, said US lawmakers should hold hearings on Capitol Hill.

David Kay, appointed by the Bush administration to hunt for Iraq's weapons of mass destruction told Reuters on Friday he had concluded Iraq had no stockpiles of biological and chemical weapons, as asserted in official US intelligence estimates in the lead-up to the US-led invasion.

"They ought to be held accountable for using the weapons of mass destruction argument," Kerry of Massachusetts said on CBS' "Face the Nation" program. "Dick Cheney and others in the administration misled the American people with respect to the true status of the weapons of mass destruction in Iraq."

Kerry was joined in his call for an investigation by other Democrats on the campaign trail who are vying for the chance to beat President Bush in November. With his victory in Iowa last week, the Vietnam veteran has forged to the front of the Democratic pack, leading rivals by 7 percentage points in the latest Reuters/MSNBC/Zogby tracking poll in advance of Tuesday's New Hampshire primary.

Asked if the administration claims were the result of bad intelligence or intentional deception, Kerry told "Fox News Sunday," "I don't know the answer to that, but we ought to know the answer to that in America."

Kerry said he would not suggest President Bush was at fault "without adequate evidence." But, he added: "I know the vice president either misspoke or misled the American people."

In Rome on Sunday, Cheney ignored a question about Iraqi weapons as he entered Galleria Borghese art museum.