Journalist in MI5 case to face fresh inquiry

By Sandra Barwick and Michael Smith

AN Ombudsman appointed by The Guardian is to re-examine the involvement of Victoria Brittain, the paper's deputy foreign editor, with Kojo Tsikata, a former Ghanaian security chief.

It was disclosed in August that Miss Brittain was the object of an MI5 investigation after more than ?250,000 was paid into her bank account on Mr Tsikata's behalf, much of it allegedly from Libyan sources.

The money was transferred to pay the bills of lawyers working on Mr Tsikata's libel action against The Independent newspaper.

Col Gaddafi of Libya was allegedly helping to fund the libel action to show his solidarity with the then government of Ghana.

The revelations, made by David Shayler, a former MI5 officer in The Mail on Sunday, led to an internal inquiry in The Guardian.

Miss Brittain has stated that she had never knowingly received money from Libya, and says that her bank statements do not show the origin of the funds she handled on Mr Tsikata's behalf as an old friend.

The Guardian's inquiry, which examined bank statements provided by her, confirmed that they did not show the source of the deposits made into her accounts on behalf of her close friend.

She has said that Mr Tsikata had earlier used her Abbey National bank account to put through money to pay for his son's private education in Britain, and its use as a channel for funds for his legal action was a natural extension of this.

No explanation has yet been given as to why Mr Tsikata, who visited London regularly, preferred this route to a direct transfer to the client account of his lawyers, Bindman and Partners, or why he did not open an account of his own here.

The independent ombudsman appointed by The Guardian is John Willis, former director of programmes at Channel 4, who has written for the paper in the past.

He will consider crucial questions about Miss Brittain's role in the affair.

These will include:

The circumstances surrounding her friendship with Mr Tsikata, in so far as it related to her work as a Guardian journalist.

The monitoring of her friendship by MI5.

Her part, if any, in the libel action brought against The Independent newspaper.

The arrangements by which Mr Tsikata financed and paid for this libel action.

Did she, could she, and should she have known the source of the money being transferred into her accounts?

Did her actions compromise her journalistic integrity, or that of The Guardian?

In this week's Spectator, Miss Brittain defends herself against criticism from Stephen Glover, a columnist for the magazine and The Telegraph.

In a letter, she says that he has failed to produce "a shred of evidence" that she knew, could or should have known where the money which passed into her account was coming from.

She does not answer Mr Glover's question of where she thought or had been told the large sums of money did come from, given that Ghana is a poor country and Mr Tsikata's salary as head of security was ?4,000 a year.

Yesterday a spokesman for The Guardian, when asked to put this question to Miss Brittain again, said that there was nothing more to add to Miss Brittain's previous statements. "She has said she had no idea how much he earned," the spokesman said.

Asked if she was saying that she would not even put the question to her, she said: "Yes. I am not able to talk about it."

In the libel case, the appeal court found that The Independent's story was covered by qualified privilege, as a fair and accurate report of a tribunal.

However, Mr Tsikata is now continuing his action against the newspaper and two journalists, claiming that the publication was malicious, which, if proved, would undermine the defence of qualified privilege.

In her letter to the Spectator, Miss Brittain accuses Glover of trying to smear Mr Tsikata and herself by extension, over the core matter of the libel action against The Independent's article, published in 1992.

It centred on the murder of three High Court judges and an army officer in 1982.

Mr Tsikata had been named by a Ghanaian inquiry as the mastermind behind the killings, but Ghana's Attorney General, appointed by the government, later declared that he was innocent.

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