The Sun-Herald Melbourne, Sunday, February 20, 2005   Ruddock met Israeli 'spy' once, at baggage carousel By Kerry-Anne Walsh [AUSTRALIAN] ATTORNEY-GENERAL Philip Ruddock has revealed that the suspected Israeli spy who was due to join the family for Christmas lunch just days before he was expelled was someone he had met once, briefly. Israeli diplomat Amir Laty was quietly recalled to Israel in late December [2004] following concerns expressed by ASIO that he could have been "inimical to national security". The middle-ranking consular official has since complained that he was booted from Australia because of his friendship with Mr Ruddock's 26-year-old daughter, Caitlin (above). Asked yesterday if Mr Laty had ever visited Mr Ruddock at his home, or at his Sydney or Canberra offices, Mr Ruddock's spokeswoman said: "The Attorney cannot recall having formally met or having had a conversation with Mr Laty. "The only time he ever had contact was briefly last year at a baggage carousel at Canberra airport when Mr Laty approached him and introduced himself. To the best of his knowledge, the Attorney has never spoken with him before or since." Mr Laty was invited, then uninvited, to the family lunch as a friend of Caitlin's. The Opposition has been gagged from probing the curious and secret circumstances surrounding Mr Laty's departure and his association with the Ruddock family because senior MPs have been briefed by ASIO and are thus bound by secrecy. A spokesman for Opposition foreign affairs spokesman Kevin Rudd said the Labor MPs who had been briefed, which included party leader Kim Beazley and homeland security spokesman Robert McLelland, had given an undertaking not to talk publicly or privately about the matter. Even the Democrats were reluctant yesterday to probe how a diplomat suspected for months of being a spy could become so close to Australia's Attorney-General that he was going to attend a family Christmas dinner. Australian authorities became concerned late last year that Mr Laty's activities were more about intelligence-gathering and espionage than consular duties. Reports have suggested that ASIO concluded his presence in the country was "inimical to national security". Aside from his friendship with Caitlin Ruddock -- they were students together six years ago in Beijing -- his amorous liaisons with women in sensitive posts in the Defence Department and Prime Minister's Department also caught the attention of Australian intelligence authorities. One source said Mr Laty turned up at cocktail parties held by senior Liberal staff in the pre-Christmas party season, and secured invitations to dinner parties held by journalists and senior bureaucrats. One person who attended a dinner party with him said he was "charming", and was particularly interested in cultivating female friends who held senior political, journalistic and bureaucratic positions. Australian authorities' alarm at the activities of the middle-ranking consular official heightened when he flew to New Zealand late last year to see two men exposed as Mossad agents who were awaiting sentence on passport fraud charges. Mr Laty's quiet recall occurred shortly after he returned from the trip. Neither the Israeli nor Australian governments have explained his expulsion.   Our dossier on Mr Irving's exclusion from Australia by Philip Ruddock, on the grounds of "character" Our dossier on the Mossad   Australian man of Character who doesn't want a Jew to Marry his Daughter: was Israeli diplomat Amir Laty expelled for fooling around Down Under with Minister's daughter? Ruddock denies it

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