§ Mr. AncramTo ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what steps his Department is taking to improve access to human intelligence for(a) British and (b). NATO forces operating in Afghanistan; and when he expects a human intelligence capacity to be available to British armed forces in Afghanistan. [159017]
§ Mr. StrawIt is the well-established and longstanding practice of successive Governments not to comment on operations of the Intelligence Services. The security and intelligence agencies are outside the scope of the Code of Practice on Access to Government Information (Paragraph 6, Part 1).
§ Mr. AncramTo ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will list the(a) Afghans and (b) foreign nationals being held by the Coalition at Bagram airbase; and how long he expects they will be held. [158836]
§ Mr. Straw[holding answer 8 March 2004]The British Government do not have detailed information about non-British detainees at Bagram. No British citizens are currently being held at Bagram and none of the detainees held there was captured by British forces. The International Committee of the Red Cross has been able to assess conditions at Bagram since 22 January 2002.