Official Suspended After Files on Al Qaeda Found on Suburban Train

By TORCUIL CRICHTON CHIEF UK POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT

SECRET security documents on the strength of the al Qaeda operation in Pakistan and the situation in Iraq were left on a train in suburban London and then handed in to the BBC, the government admitted last night.

The Cabinet Office said later that an official at the centre of the scandal had been suspended from his job.

The senior civil servant – who has not been identified – was questioned in an internal inquiry after sensitive files relating to al Qaida and Iraq were left on a commuter train.

He remained at work in Whitehall yesterday after the loss was discovered on Tuesday, but a decision was later taken that he should be suspended from work while inquiries continue.

It is understood the Cabinet Secretary Sir Gus O’Donnell’s decision was taken after the issue was brought to the attention of Prime Minister Gordon Brown. A spokesman for the Cabinet Office said: “The official at the centre of this investigation into the loss of documents has been suspended tonight from his duties.”

A police investigation was launched after two documents – both marked “secret” – were left behind by a senior intelligence officer. The documents were eventually handed to the BBC’s security correspondent Frank Gardner, who reported details of the security breach.

A spokesman for the Cabinet Office said: “Two documents which are marked as ‘secret’ were left on a train and have subsequently been handed to the BBC. There has been a security breach, the Metropolitan Police are carrying out an investigation.” The spokesman declined to discuss the contents of the documents, but the BBC reported they were left on the train by a senior intelligence officer.

The Cabinet Office spokesman said the papers had been in the possession of a senior intelligence officer based in the Cabinet Office. Asked how many people would have had access to the papers, he said: “Secret is a high classification so they would have had limited circulation.”

Opposition parties called for an immediate statement to parliament. Liberal Democrat home affairs spokesman Chris Huhne described the incident as an appalling breach of security. “It beggars belief that the government could have scored such a devastating own goal on the very day that it was pushing draconian counterterrorism laws through parliament, ” he said.

Mr Gardner said the documents were left in an orange cardboard envelope on a train from London Waterloo to Surrey by a “very senior intelligence official” working in the Cabinet Office.

A full-scale police search was launched when it was realised they were missing, as officials were concerned at the possibility of such sensitive papers finding their way into the wrong hands, he said.

The incident is the latest in a series of embarrassing losses of government information, including the disappearance of personal details of millions of child benefit recipients last November.

The security documents were picked up by a fellow passenger, who looked inside and found a seven-page document setting out the latest government assessment on the Islamist terror network al Qaeda, along with a “top secret and in some cases damning” assessment of Iraq’s security forces, said Mr Gardner.

The al Qaeda document, commissioned jointly by the Foreign Office and Home Office, was classified “UK top secret”, he said. It was so sensitive that each page was numbered and marked “For UK, US, Canadian and Australian eyes only”.

The second document, on Iraq, was commissioned by the Ministry of Defence. Mr Gardner said: “This was a clear breach of government rules. They should be sealed in a briefcase if they are taken out.”

Originally published by Newsquest Media Group.

(c) 2008 Herald, The; Glasgow (UK). Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning. All rights Reserved.