RT: Does MI5 Let Its Informants Commit Crimes?

This is another report from RT, which I don’t recall seeing reported in the British lamestream media. In this video put up on YouTube on 5th October 2018, the broadcaster’s reporter, Anastasia Churkina, discusses a court case being brought to a tribunal by four human rights groups, including Privacy International and Reprieve. They allege that MI5 has a policy of allowing its informants take part in serious crimes, such as murder, torture, sexual assault or other serious criminality, if it is in the public interest, according to their QC, Ben Jaffey.

This policy is supposed to have gone on for three decades, in various guises and under various prime ministers. Amongst the evidence is a heavily redacted note, and a letter from David Cameron to a judge involved in trying these cases, telling him that it has been government policy. It also tells him that such oversight does not provide endorsement of the legality of the policy, and that he would not be required to provide a view on whether any one particular case should be referred for prosecution.

This won’t surprise anyone, who’s read Lobster. The magazine, edited by Robin Ramsay, and now online, was set up to publicise and discuss real conspiracies by the western intelligence agencies to subvert the usual political processes. This has meant the overthrow of foreign governments that America and its allies find inconvenient or which pose a threat to American corporate or political interests. Which meant the CIA organizing coups to overthrow democratically elected left-wing regimes in South America, like Chile and Guatemala, and Britain and America collaborating in the overthrow of Mohammed Mossadeq in Iran.

It has also meant the monitoring and smearing of left-wing activists and political opponents in America and Britain. Domestically, there is much evidence that MI5 and the SIS collaborated with Loyalist paramilitaries in Northern Ireland, operating as death squads against leading Republicans. Over on this side of Irish Sea, there is a lot of evidence very strongly suggesting that MI5 were behind the 1970s smears against Harold Wilson that he was a KGB spy. There have also been serious questions about the deaths of Hilda Murrell and Blair Peach. I don’t doubt that the groups bringing this case are absolutely right.

Regarding the two groups named, Privacy International was launched in the 1990s to stop Britain becoming a surveillance state, in which the government uses electronic means to gather information on its citizens. These include the biometric ID cards and the plans for an ‘electronic bourse’ – basically, forms of electronic payment by card. The government has been keen to promote this scheme as it means that they can track how citizens spend their money.

Reprieve, from what I gather, is an organize that campaigns against the death penalty around the world. It has launched internet petitions calling on the government to intervene in the case of Britons imprisoned abroad and facing the death penalty, as well as direct appeals to the foreign governments involved. It’s kind of like Amnesty International.

I am really not surprised that RT seems to have been the only broadcaster to carry this story, unless I’m mistaken. Fleet Street really wouldn’t like to report on it, because it has been alleged that some of the right-wing press have connections to the intelligence agencies and have served as conduits for their propaganda. Like the Sunday Times when it was edited by Andrew Neil.

Tags: 'Reprieve', Anastasia Churkina, Andrew Neill, Ben Jaffey, Blair Peach, CIA, Conspiracies, Coups, David Cameron, Death Squads, Electronic Payment, Harold Wilson, Hilda Murrell, ID Cards, Intelligence Agencies, KGB, Lobster, Mahmud Mossadeq, MI5, Murder, Northern Ireland, Privacy International, Propaganda, Robin Ramsay, RT, Sexual Assault, SIS, State Surveillance, Sunday Times, Torture, Ulster Loyalists