Tony Blair refused to share intelligence with Ireland over Sellafield menace, archives present | EUROtoday

MI5 reportedly rejected a plea from then-Irish prime minister Bertie Ahern for the UK to share intelligence relating to potential terrorist threats to the Sellafield nuclear facility.

Newly declassified authorities recordsdata reveal that following the devastating 2004 Madrid prepare bombing, Mr Ahern wrote to Tony Blair, warning of a “transnational catastrophe” that might impression Ireland if worldwide terrorists focused the Cumbrian website.

However, paperwork launched to the National Archives at Kew, west London, point out that Mr Blair declined the request for intelligence-sharing, citing the need to safeguard the confidentiality of UK sources.

Instead the Irish chief needed to accept an assurance that the British ambassador would transient his officers if any menace to Sellafield was uncovered.

It adopted a warning by MI5 that there could possibly be “no guarantees about who will have access to it” if delicate materials was shared with Dublin.

Writing to Mr Blair following the March 2004 coordinated bomb assaults by Islamist extremists on the Madrid commuter community which left 193 lifeless, Mr Ahern mentioned it underlined the “ruthlessness and determination” of world terrorists.

“I think it is fair to say that terrorist targets that could result in transnational catastrophes deserve to receive special attention,” he mentioned.

“I understand your concerns to safeguard the integrity of sensitive information about nuclear facilities and the need to guard against detailed information on the design and nature of nuclear facilities falling into dangerous hands.

“I believe, however, it should be possible to devise arrangements for the communication of sensitive information in a secure manner.”

However the Department of Trade and Industry, which had duty for the UK’s nuclear amenities, mentioned the MI5, the Security Service, was not proud of the proposal.

“These letters signal Irish determination not to let go of the Sellafield issue,” Shantha Shan, an official in secretary of state Patricia Hewitt’s personal workplace, instructed No 10.

“We have consulted with the Security Service and conclude that we must maintain a firm line not to release terrorist-related intelligence of any kind as there could be no guarantees about who will have access to it, no matter what arrangements were put in place.”

Mr Blair sought to reassure him that if the federal government have been to obtain intelligence of an actual menace to Sellafield, they’d search to share that evaluation as absolutely and as rapidly as attainable “subject to the constraints placed upon us by the originators of that intelligence”.

Mr Ahern was nonetheless sad, complaining that whereas he understood the necessity to defend intelligence sources “the protection of the lives and health of our citizens should have priority”.

The British ambassador Sir Ivor Roberts mentioned the renewed Irish concentrate on points like Sellafield was partially right down to the success of the Good Friday Agreement which meant relations with the UK have been now not seen “exclusively through the Northern Ireland prism”.

“Much of this year has been taken up in fighting a vigorous rearguard action against opposition parties and NGOs who have pressurised the Irish government into taking more forward position on Sellafield than they would instinctively have taken themselves,” he reported.

“This has led them to initiate a proliferation of legal cases against us in international courts and to step up the rhetoric.”