George Galloway will fly to Washington next week to give evidence to the Senate committee which accused him of profiting from the sale of Iraqi oil.

The independent MP has denied all claims he made money through Saddam Hussein's Oil-for-Food scheme.

Galloway says the committee failed to respond to his emails and letters asking for an opportunity to rebut the allegations.

But a committee spokesman insisted on Thursday that Galloway had never contacted them by any means "including but not limited to telephone, fax, email, letter, Morse code or carrier pigeon".

And the spokesman added: "Our investigators used appropriate diplomatic channels to inform Mr Galloway of all the allegations contained in the report. That included the US state department and the British embassy."

From his home in Portugal Galloway told the Guardian: "I did not write to Mr Coleman personally ... I did not know who he was but I did write to vice-president Dick Cheney in his capacity of chairman of the senate."

The chairman of the committee, Norm Coleman, has said he would be pleased to have Galloway appear at the next hearing on Tuesday.

The hearing's title will be Oil For Influence: How Saddam used oil to reward politicians and terrorist entities under the United Nations Oil-for-food.