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Binyam Mohamed

My Lords, does the Minister agree with me—I go straight to the main issue of the Statement, which is publishing American intelligence material without American permission—that there is an unbreakable rule, known by every intelligence officer, however junior or senior, that if service A receives material from service B, service A cannot pass it to anyone else without the express permission of the originating service, service B? In my day, it was called the third-party rule, and probably still is. It always came into play everywhere and anywhere it was relevant. Does the Minister agree that the importance of this rule should be obvious to everybody? It is the basis on which intelligence is able to be exchanged and passed to other services. It is not for anyone—not another service nor even learned judges—to make a judgment on whether the material deserves to be regarded as sensitive or protected. Only the originator of intelligence material knows its source details. Does the Minister agree that if British material was ever published or passed to anybody else without our express permission we would be very angry, feel very betrayed, and certainly review our relationship with the service that had let us down?