Select Committee on Foreign Affairs Minutes of Evidence


Examination of witnesses (Question 560 - 567)

TUESDAY 30 JUNE 1998

SIR JOHN KERR, KCMG, MR FRANCIS RICHARDS, CMG, CVO, and MR ROLAND SMITH, CMG  

  560.  ***
  (Mr Richards)  ***

  561.  ***
  (Mr Richards)  ***

 Sir John Stanley:  Thank you.

Chairman:  Are there any more matters? We have now come to a position where I can ask Sir John as a result of those replies are there matters you would wish to put in open session?

Sir John Stanley:  One question.

Chairman:  Could we now go into open session for the additional question. Could members of the public be called back.

Mr Ross:  Could you put the question now otherwise I will object.

Sir John Stanley:  Just to try help people shuttling in and out, the question I would like to ask in public session is what was the role of the military intelligence liaison officer who was deployed to which Mr Smith referred?
  (Sir John Kerr)  I think it would be far better, Mr Chairman, if Sir John asked that in private session.

Chairman:  Sir John, are you content with that?

Sir John Stanley

  562.  Obviously I am all for open Government and if that is a question that can be asked on a public basis fair enough, but if our witnesses believe it can only be answered on a confidential basis obviously we must continue in private.
  (Sir John Kerr)  The employment of military liaison officers is something we do not normally discuss on the record in public.

  563.  I asked what the role of this particular military liaison intelligence officer was.
  (Sir John Kerr)  After a moment of drama the answer is not a terribly exciting one because his role was to give advice to the High Commissioner and provide military reporting to the Ministry of Defence on the situation in Conakry and Sierra Leone. I am sorry that after saying I would prefer to answer in private it is not, I agree, a very exciting answer.

  564.  Are you happy for that question to be put to you and answered in public?
  (Sir John Kerr)  If you wish, Sir John.

Mr Illsley:  Why is that question dependent on the three questions you put in the private session? Why does the public question tie into the answers you got? Why could you not have asked that bit before we went into private session?

Sir John Stanley:  Because I did not know the answer.

Mr Illsley:  How do they link in?

Chairman:  We are now in a position of deliberating in the Committee before our witnesses. May I suggest we now have the re-run of that question in public and I will then call this morning's session to a close. Please allow the public to enter so that Sir John can ask his question.

On recommencement of the Public Session:

Chairman:  I will now ask Sir John Stanley to pose a question to the witnesses.

Sir John Stanley

  565.  Sir John, your colleague, Mr Roland Smith, referred to the deployment of a military intelligence liaison officer during the period in which the Sierra Leone government was in exile. Will you tell us the role given to the officer concerned?
  (Sir John Kerr)  Yes. He was deployed to Conakry on 15 February and moved to Sierra Leone from 5 to 17 March, and his role was to provide military advice to the High Commissioner and military reporting to the Ministry of Defence on the situation in Conakry and in Sierra Leone.

Dr Godman

  566.  Just very quickly, and I promise it will be a brief one: is the Foreign Secretary of a mind to initiate a debate on the Floor of the House on Legg before he comes before this Committee to answer questions on the findings of Legg?
  (Sir John Kerr)  I have not asked him. I am sorry, I have not the faintest idea, Dr Godman.

Chairman

  567.  I am obliged. Sir John, may I thank you and your colleagues again on behalf of the Committee. We have made far more progress than we might have anticipated before. That is in no small measure due to the readiness of yourself to co-operate with the Committee and I thank you warmly for that.
  (Sir John Kerr)  Thank you, Mr Chairman.


 
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