Prime suspect in Fletcher murder ‘let back into UK as state asset’
Claims emerge of deal to give visas to Libyan ‘agent of influence’ thought to be involved in 1984 shooting
THE prime suspect in the murder of WPC Yvonne Fletcher was recruited as a state asset more than a decade after the shooting, it was claimed last night.
Saleh Ibrahim Mabrouk was arrested on conspiracy to murder the police officer, who was shot dead outside the Libyan embassy in London in 1984, but no charges were ever brought on grounds of national security.
Mabrouk was expelled from the UK in the aftermath of the shooting but was allowed to come and go after Col Muammar Gaddafi agreed to give up Libya’s weapons of mass destruction.
Two years before Gaddafi’s overthrow in 2011, Mabrouk settled permanently in the UK, buying a house in Reading with £385,000 cash.
Multiple sources have now claimed he was allowed to return to the UK because he was a state “asset”.
One source has claimed that Mabrouk was involved in negotiations, or at least in influencing Gaddafi when Libya was brought in from the cold and agreed to relinquish its WMDS.
The Foreign Office, it is alleged, gave Mabrouk some form of “comfort” letter in about 2002 which prevented police stopping and questioning him on arrival each time he flew into the UK.
An explosive High Court case, due to start at the beginning of November, will hear evidence of Mabrouk’s alleged role in the conspiracy to murder WPC Fletcher. A criminal investigation into Mabrouk was dropped in 2017 but he now faces trial in a civil case being brought by John Murray, a retired police officer, who cradled WPC Fletcher as she lay dying. The case is likely to raise the issue of Mabrouk’s possible status as a state asset.
One former government source described Mabrouk as an “agent of influence”, described as an asset working within a government of a target country – in this case Libya – to influence national policy.
In an interview with The Daily Telegraph, Matthew Jury, Mr Murray’s lawyer of Mccue Jury & Partners LLP, said: “Perhaps the Government still deems there to be too much use in the old dog yet to allow a public inquiry into such a trifle as the unsolved murder of a British police officer? Or perhaps it’s just scared of what it or he may reveal about their past dealings. Either way, Yvonne’s life was worth more. Moreover, unless brought to heel, how long until the old dog bites us again?”
Fifteen years after the murder, Mabrouk, a senior aide to Gaddafi, despite being a suspect, was given “several” visas to enter Britain over a 10-year period between 1999 and 2011, prior to the collapse of the Gaddafi regime.
The source said: “Mabrouk was well known as an agent of influence. Mabrouk had high level contacts. Some deal was done whereby Mabrouk was allowed to resettle here as part of the reconciliation with Libya.”
A separate police source said he believed Mabrouk was able to circumvent money-laundering regulations when buying a house in the UK because of his usefulness to our government.
A former senior Met Police detective, who worked in the National Terrorism Financial Investigation Unit, said it would not have been possible for a member of Gaddafi’s regime, wanted for a terrorist offence, to be able to come to the UK and buy a house – unless he was already an asset of the British Government. The senior officer said: “My understanding of it is that Yvonne Fletcher’s killer was on the Government’s books. We started recruiting people in Libya and at least one of the people they are going after is implicated in the murder of a police officer.
“I remember hearing at the time that Mabrouk was on our books and that was the problem with pursuing the criminal investigation. But they will never admit this but there is no way somebody like that can bring into the country all that money without bringing something to the table. There is no way Mabrouk can come in from Libya with a suitcase full of cash unless somebody in authority is helping you.”
Sir Richard Dearlove, who was the chief of MI6 between 1999 and 2004, when asked whether Mabrouk had been an asset, said: “I don’t think I can comment on that.” He then added: “It doesn’t really mean anything to me. I cannot recall that.”
Mr Murray, who launched the legal action against Mabrouk, and which is now being funded by the Police Federation, said: “We have been told he is a state asset. We have been told that is part of the withheld evidence. That is why the Foreign Office and the Home Office refused to hand over the evidence to the Crown Prosecution Service.
I think the evidence to support that is part of that package. They are not handing over the evidence in order to protect their asset.
“The guy gets deported [after the murder] and kicked out of the country and then is allowed to settle back here and allowed to remain in the country and be looked after. There is something wrong there. The idea we have used Yvonne Fletcher’s conspirator in her murder as an asset is shocking.”
Sir Mike Penning, the former policing minister between 2014 and 2016, is calling for an inquiry into the handling of Mabrouk. Sir Mike said: “We need to find out why this man has not been prosecuted. The police have said they have more than enough evidence. He was accused of money-laundering and he was involved in Yvonne’s murder yet he appears to have been able to come in and out of the UK. Mabrouk was very close to Saif Gaddafi.”
He added: “I have heard accusations that Mabrouk was an asset. Surely we need to find that out. This is the murder of Yvonne Fletcher that we are talking about. There is something very odd that a man with this background was allowed to settle in this country.”
Sir Richard Dalton, UK ambassador to Libya between 1999 and 2002, said he did not believe Mabrouk was close enough to Gaddafi to have been a useful asset. “People have built Mabrouk up to be much more than he actually was. He was on the periphery of the regime,” said Sir Richard. “I never got the impression he was one of the ‘people of the tent’. That was a term used for people who had access.”
Mabrouk was expelled from the UK in the immediate aftermath of the murder and, having returned to Tripoli, was put in charge of the graduates institute, training the future cadre of leaders.
But Sir Richard said: “I have no knowledge [that he was an asset] and doubt it. I think it unlikely for the reasons I have given. He was not a big fish.”
In July 2018, Mabrouk returned to Libya and is not thought to have set foot in the UK again.
He has repeatedly denied having any role in WPC Fletcher’s death.