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Speaking in a Channel 4 News interview last night, Hoon said he had "evidence" relating to the truck in which the photos, allegedly showing abuse of Iraqi prisoners, were shot was almost certainly not used in Iraq.

"Certainly that is the evidence that we have, that this particular truck was not in Iraq. It is now really a matter for the Daily Mirror to indicate whether they are willing to cooperate, as they said they would do, in now investigating what looks increasingly like a hoax."

Hoon called on the Daily Mirror to explain why it had perpetrated this "hoax", which is said to have helped escalate violence towards British troops.

When he was asked directly whether he thought the pictures were fakes, Hoon said: "Well, it appears to be the case, yes." The interview followed his Commons statement where he first told MPs that there were "strong indications" that the vehicle in the Daily Mirror photos had never been in Iraq.

Hoon's comments came as a growing body of evidence pointed to the pictures being a hoax. This morning, the Daily Telegraph reported Army souces as saying that the pictures were shot at a Territorial Army barracks in Preston, Lancashire and were mocked up on a four-ton Bedford MK lorry of a type that did not go to Iraq.

The barracks is home to the Lancastrian and Cumbrian volunteers, of which around 100 served in Iraq with the Queen's Lancashire Regiment, which is at the centre of the charges.

BBC News was also this morning reporting that military sources had positively identified the "actual" truck and said it had never been sent to Iraq.

In response to the defence minister's questions, the Queen's Lancashire Regiment said it was delighted with what Hoon had said.

An officer of the regiment told BBC News that Hoon's statement "vindicates our case" and called for the paper to issue an apology.

"Additional lines of inquiry are being pursued to corroborate this," he said.

But Daily Mirror editor Piers Morgan was clinging to the fact that the Royal Military Police investigation had not been able to categorically prove the pictures fake and is refusing to back down.

"The Daily Mirror does not accept that the MoD has proved these photographs are faked. Nor will we accept that they are not genuine images until incontrovertible evidence is produced to the contrary," Morgan said.

The paper yesterday switched tactics as part of a bid to divert attention, arguing the real case was the much bigger story of the abuse it had exposed.

Additionally the paper countered that it had evidence from soldiers A and B that the type of van in the picture was used in Iraq.

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