Official who lost Iraq files 'in clear breach' of rules

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*An official who left top-secret intelligence documents regarding al-Qa'ida and Iraq on a train should not have had them in public, the Government said yesterday.

Ed Miliband, the Cabinet Office minister, said a full inquiry had been ordered into the "clear breach" of security rules by the individual, who has been suspended. He insisted national security interests did not appear to have been damaged or any operations or individuals put at risk. And he refused to be drawn on a suggestion that the official was an MI5 officer on secondment to the Government. One of the documents is a report by the Joint Intelligence Committee on "al-Qa'ida vulnerabilities" and is understood to look at the state of the terror network in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Commissioned by the Foreign and Home Offices, it was classified "UK top secret" and so sensitive that each page was marked "For UK, US, Canadian and Australian eyes only".

Matthew Norman, page 49

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