Dubai Hamas murder: fresh questions over what Foreign Office knew

By Gordon Rayner, Chief Reporter Published: 5:22PM GMT 19 Feb 2010

Mahmoud al-Mabhouh was found dead in his hotel room in Dubai on Jan 20. Photo: REUTERS

Investigators first announced they had identified several "European passport holders" as suspects on Jan 29 nine days after Mahmoud al-Mabhouh was found dead in his hotel room.

The alleged involvement of European passports was reported by the BBC on that date, and reports that some of the passports were British began circulating in the Gulf days later.

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Yet the Foreign Office has maintained that it had no idea of any British link until Feb 15.

"The Dubai authorities told us about the role of British passports on 15 February, several hours before their press conference. We told them the following day that the passports used were fraudulent," said a spokesman.

"The head of the Dubai police has also made clear that Embassies were not contacted until shortly before the identity of the suspects was revealed."

The Irish authorities have said they first began looking into reports of Irish passports being used on Feb 5, and were in "daily contact" with their counterparts in Dubai from then on.

William Hague, the shadow foreign secretary, suggested that ministers, civil servants or members of the security services should be called before parliaments Intelligence and Security Committee to explain what they knew, and when.

He said: "We will be looking for ways to raise this in parliament next week and we would expect that the ISC would want to look into this matter."

Police in Dubai have said they are "99 per cent certain" that the Israeli intelligence service Mossad was behind the murder.

The Foreign Office has denied outright a report suggesting that before the murder Mossad told MI6 that an "overseas operation" was going to be carried out using fake British passports.

Meanwhile Paul Keeley, one of the six Britons whose identities were stolen by the alleged assassins, announced his intention to sue the government of Israel, where he has lived for the past 15 years.

He said: "What I"ve been going through over the past two days has been a terrible nightmare. How did they steal the information from my passport just like that? I"m going to sue them. They have destroyed my reputation and I"m afraid for my life."

But Britains complaints about the abuse of passports received short shrift in the Jerusalem Post newspaper, which said Mr Mabhouh "deserved to be assassinated by Israel".

A leading article added: "The pigheaded refusal to acknowledge that sometimes the end justifies the means reflects Europe"s moral impoverishment."