London, Wednesday, October 9,
2002 SHAYLERGATE:
British Press Gagged on Reporting MI5's
£100,000 bin Laden Payoff David Irving
comments: I AM indebted to friends in
Canada who emailed this story
back to me. Focal Point
Publications has mirrored it on
its California website. The uncensored versions of
this article was posted on the
Propaganda Matrix website, which
writes today:
We can't
let it disappear down an
Orwellian memory hole. Please
E-mail all three publications and
asked them why they removed or
altered their reports. E-mail the
London Guardian,
the London Evening
Standard
and The
Scotsman
Even
local papers such as the
Leicestershire Mail and the Derby
Evening Telegraph have removed
the story from their websites!
They
were entiled ''SHAYLER AT OLD
BAILEY FOR TRIAL' and 'SHAYLER
ARRIVES FOR TRIAL.' Now they
are gone. As is a London
Independent article that was
entitled 'MI5 faces
accountability test as new chief
takes reins.' As of 4am UK time,
you can still see the original
titles of the reports as stored
on Google's Beta News Search
(these will probably also be
deleted in the coming
hours). [UPDATE:
It is now confirmed that all
details relating to the Shayler
case cannot be reported.
] The UK
government have successfully
gagged the cowardly pathetic
mainstream media, but I will
continue to track this story. The
Guardian reports - 'Shayler
hearing' 'An Old Bailey court
yesterday heard legal arguments
relating to the trial of David
Shayler, the former MI5 officer
charged with breaking the
Official Secrets Act. The judge
ruled that they cannot be
reported. Mr Shayler's trial is
now expected to be heard before a
jury next week." Richard
Norton-Taylor
writes for The Guardian. |
TONY Blair has tonight
ordered a D-Notice on British media
reporting government officials signing
court gag orders. This
regards the case of former MI5 officer
David Shayler, who has evidence to
prove MI6 gave £100,000 to bin
Laden and Al-Qaeda, arms to Iraq and
had prior knowledge of several terrorist
attacks on London in the 1990's.
The original articles stated that top
Labour MP's had signed gag orders, whereby
upon mention of this evidence in court,
media have to immediately leave the
trial. Newspapers all over the country,
including The Guardian, the London
Evening Standard and the
Scotsman have either completely
removed or amended their articles. This evidence is damning. The British
government is trying to bury the story
before it buries them. I first noticed
that the Guardian article I had
earlier posted on my website had
disappeared. Already aware that Blair may
well have ordered a D-Notice to eliminate
these reports, I immediately started
searching on Google for some more. [In Britain, a D-Notice
is where the government order a gag on
a particular breaking story.] I came across a very similar London
Evening Standard report and
immediately put it on my web site. Low and
behold, five minutes later the link was
dead! Amazingly, I still had the article
up on my screen on a different browser
window. I tried to archive the page to my
desktop but to no avail. I did manage to
print out a copy which I have scanned and
linked below. This story is massive because Shayler
has them on the racks on a number of
different issues, from colluding with bin
Laden, to arms deals with questionable
characters. This could be particularly
embarrasing for Jack Straw
(below right,
with friend), who I, using
mainstream reports, have identified as a
key placeman in hawking arms to Pakistan,
India and even Iran. Bilderberg member Peter
Mandelson is also trying to cover his
dirt by gagging these reports. The London
Times reported how his new 'think
tank' was being bankrolled by the
Rothschilds two weeks ago. The Rothschilds control the BBC, who
haven't even mentioned that the trial has
started, never mind the accusations
Shayler raises. The original London
Guardian report was entitled
'Ministers
issue gag orders for MI5 trial' - as
you will see if you click on the link,
it's disappeared down the memory hole. The text I extracted from the report
for my original link to it is as
follows... "Ministers issue gag orders
for MI5 trial: They appear to be
worried that he will make further
allegations about MI5 and MI6 knowledge
of a plot to assassinate the Libyan
leader, Muammar Gadafy, in 1996.
A book, Forbidden Truth,
published this summer claims that
British intelligence was in contact
with "Osama bin Laden's main allies"
who were opposed to Colonel Gadafy." The
London Evening Standard article was
entitled 'Calls
for secret Shayler trial' - again, it
has now been removed. Luckily I saved the
text to a Word file and printed the
article: [UPDATE - After
pressure, this article is now back
online! But for how long? Save it to
your hard drive. ] Before you read this, it is important
to understand the issue at hand. We're
talking about MI6 cooperation with bin
Laden, arms to Iraq and, as reported today
in the Scotsman, claims that,
'secret services ignored warnings that
might have prevented bombings in the
London in 1993 and 1994.' Shayler has evidence that MI5 wilfully
failed to stop the bomb attack on Israel's
London embassy in 1994 and the IRA's 1993
Bishopsgate bombing, which killed one
person. Here it is in Shayler's own words plus
the actual MI6 Gaddafi plot document -
MI6
Plot to assassinate Colonel Gaddafi:
Police enquiry confirms Plot is not
"fantasy". Here is the London
Evening Standard report I managed to
rescue. [Update! Take a look at
the scans of the article I printed off
- why was it removed? Judge for
yourself... ]
Calls
for secret Shayler trial By Patrick McGowan, Evening Standard THE Government has been accused by
lawyers of trying to interfere in the
trial of former MI5 officer David
Shayler by insisting that part of the
proceedings are held in private. Ministers are demanding that trial
judge Mr Justice Alan Moses agree
in advance that the case go into private
session without saying why and without
hearing arguments to the contrary from the
defence. Shayler's trial, on charges under the
Official Secrets Act, was beginning at the
Old Bailey today. He is being prosecuted
following newspaper interviews he gave
five years ago and the trial is expected
to last for at least four weeks. On Friday
Home Secretary David Blunkett and
Foreign Secretary Jack Straw signed
identical public interest immunity
certificates under which the press and the
public will have to leave court if
sensitive security issues are raised. The certificates do not specify what
information they are trying to keep secret
on the grounds that to do so would cause
the very damage the Government is seeking
to avoid. They claim: "Publication of information of
the kinds referred to would be likely
to assist those whose purpose it is to
injure the security of the United
Kingdom and whose actions in the past
show that they are willing to kill
innocent civilians, both inside and
outside the UK, in pursuance of their
aims." Mr Blunkett and Mr Straw also claim
present and future intelligence operations
would be compromised. PII certificates
signed by Conservative ministers were
controversially used during the
arms-to-Iraq trials in the Nineties. Normally the judge in a trial would
read documents in the case and, after
hearing arguments from both sides, decide
whether they should be disclosed. Now he
is being asked to make his decision in
advance. Shayler, 36, faces three charges.
They allege he disclosed information,
disclosed information obtained by
interception of communications and
disclosed documents. The Crown Prosecution Service has
already given notice that it will apply
for some parts of the trial to be held in
camera. This will apply to evidence on
"sensitive operational techniques of the
Security and Intelligence Services". It is expected that the court will also
be asked to keep the identities of MI5
agents secret and allow them to give
evidence from behind screens. Today
Geoffrey Robertson QC, representing
civil rights group Liberty, will oppose
the Government's move. Michael
Tugendhat QC, appearing for various
national newspapers, is expected to argue
that the Government has provided no
evidence that national security will be
threatened by the trial and will underline
the importance of open justice. During the arms-to-Iraq cases Mr
Justice Moses was prosecuting counsel and
Mr Robertson was counsel for the defence
when three directors of the machine tool
company Matrix Churchill were accused of
selling equipment to the Iraqi regime.
Shayler will be defending himself during
the trial. He is expected to claim that British
secret service agents paid up to
£100,000 to al Qaeda terrorists for
an assassination attempt on Libyan leader
Colonel Gadaffy in 1996. He is seeking permission to plead a
defence of "necessity" - that he acted for
the greater good by revealing wrongdoing
by the security service. Although much of
the trial may end up being held in camera,
the arguments about which parts should be
kept secret will be held in public. Only
after they are concluded is the jury
expected to be sworn in so the trial
proper can begin. [UPDATE: The London
Evening Standard have published a
shorter, watered down, version of this
story. It does not mention MI5's
£100,000 transfer to Al-Qaeda. Yet
more evidence of a top down cover-up -
read the new whitewashed piece here and
compare it to my scanned original that
was pulled along with all the others!
]
The Scotsman also released a report
which remains
online but both the title and the
article has been amended!!! The new
article talks about new MI5 head Eliza
Manningham-Buller, only mentioning the
Shayler case in passing. It certainly does
not include information concerning the
Labour MP's involved and government prior
knowledge of terrorist bombings in London.
I archived the original at http://www.propagandamatrix.com/renegade_mi5_agent_to_face_jury.htm. The report was originally entitled
'Renegade MI5 agent ready to face jury' it
is now called 'Has MI5 really emerged from
shadows?' This is the report with the most
damning information (the one they erased).
Here is the text of the original - again
archived at http://www.propagandamatrix.com/renegade_mi5_agent_to_face_jury.htm Renegade
MI5 agent ready to face jury KAREN MCVEIGH DAVID Shayler, the
former M15 officer branded a traitor by
the government, is due to take on the
legal establishment today, as his trial
opens at the Old Bailey in
London. The renegade agent, who faces six years
imprisonment for breaching the Official
Secrets Act after making a number of
sensational revelations about M15 to a
national newspaper in 1997, will represent
himself for part of the landmark case. The trial will centre around a number
of allegations made by Shayler about M15
holding files on prominent politicians,
including former cabinet minister Peter
Mandelson and Jack Straw, the Foreign
Secretary. He also claimed the secret services
ignored warnings that might have prevented
bombings in the London in 1993 and 1994.
Shayler, 36, faces two charges under
section one of the Official Secrets Act
for disclosing documents and information
about the work of M15 and another under
section four, for disclosing information
about telephone taps. He has failed so far to win his
argument that his revelations were in the
public interest. The High Court, Court of
Appeal and the House of Lords, have all
ruled that he cannot claim he disclosed
information in the public interest or out
of necessity. They also ruled out the main plank of
Shayler's defence - that the Officials
Secrets Act is incompatible with the Human
Rights Act. Shayler, who made other
allegations for which he was not charged,
including a claim that M16 was involved in
a plot to assassinate the Libyan leader,
Colonel Muammar al-Gaddafi, will argue
that he is only guilty of "exposing
wrongdoing". "I aim to persist in my argument that
the Official Secrets Act as it currently
stands is totally incompatible with the
Human Rights Act," he told a newspaper
yesterday. Some of the hearing is expected
to be taken up by an application by
newspapers objecting to plans to hold
parts of the trial in secret. The prosecution applied for hearings to
be held in camera after its concerns that
Shayler will make fresh allegations to the
jury to back up his public interest
defence. Shayler's decision to defend
himself, against the advice of his legal
team, for part of the trial was prompted
by the belief that he will be freer to
argue his case than his barrister,
Geoffrey Robertson, QC, whose hands are
tied by earlier court rulings.
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