MI5 won’t say if spies have murdered in UK

MI5 refused to say yesterday whether its spies had committed murder in the UK, as it admitted it had authorised crimes necessary to protect the public.

The Security Service has been accused of unlawfully allowing agents to commit crimes under a secret policy which, it is claimed, could be used to authorise offences as serious as killing. A challenge over the guidance’s legality was launched at the High Court yesterday by human rights groups.

MI5 has refused to say which crimes are permitted under the policy – the existence of which became known last year – as it could “frustrate” operations.

Lawyers for organisations including Reprieve and Privacy International claim the policy may be used to allow “serious criminal offences” and that it risks the “most grave abuses”.

They highlighted the police investigation into the activities of Stakeknife, the Army IRA mole, who is alleged to have been involved in murders with the knowledge of his handlers.

MI5 has provided the Investigatory Powers Tribunal, which is hearing the challenge, with “information about all crimes ‘authorised’ since 2000”. The agency claimed it was under no obligation to tell police or prosecutors when its spies committed crimes, but, if they were arrested and charged, it may “make representations” that prosecution was “not in the public interest”.

MI5 claimed crimes committed by agents would not necessarily break human rights laws as they would be in pursuit of its “protective obligations” to shield the country from threats such as terrorism and espionage. No offences committed since 2000, it claimed, “breached any ECHR rights”.

The groups’ lawyers suggested MI5 was “rather ambitiously” trying to suggest “torture or killing” could be authorised under the policy without breaking human rights duties.

The Security Service has not been given powers to commit crimes by Parliament – unlike MI6 – nor has it asked for such authority, said Ben Jaffey QC, for the complainants. He told the tribunal: “The fact they haven’t done so – and it is absolutely apparent from the legislative history that Parliament is uninterested in providing such powers – shows it is unlawful. They are trying to do by the back door what they are unable to do by the front.”

The tribunal continues.