# 83 Ross Allen, FCO's acting Director of Consular Services, plays fast and loose with the truth in relation to the cancellation and destruction of Mr Fletcher’s passport

Foreign Secretary Phillip Hammond

Phillip Hammond

Foreign Secretary

Parliamentary House of Commons

London

SW1A                                                                                                            

16^th Jan 2015

Dear Mr Hammond

re David Fletcher’s passport

Acting Director of Consular Services Ross Allen plays fast and loose with the truth in relation to the cancellation and destruction of Mr Fletcher’s passport.

This is now beyond dispute, based on documents that Mr Fletcher was provided with by the Foreign & Commonwealth Office in December 2014.

Mr Fletcher has been unable to communicate with me via email this past 5 weeks. It has been necessary to smuggle a selection of these FCO documents out of prison, have them photographed, sent to me electronically, then smuggled back into the prison.

Such  clandestine activity, worthy of a Jeffrey Archer or John le Carre novel, has been rendered necessary by the FCO’s refusal to communicate with me.

The logic behind the FCO’s refusal to allow me to assist Mr Fletcher in his quest for a fair trial, denied to him for close to five years now, is to be found in the cover letter accompanying the first tranche of FCO documents, which reads in part:

“In your email of 1 December you asked for confirmation that we would accept your Power of Attorney (POA) instruction and communicate directly through your friend, James Ricketson, on all matters relating to your subject access request and complaint. We have sought legal advice about this and I regret that we are not duty bound to comply with this request for the following reasons:

The POA does not compel us to deal with a third party in such circumstances when there is a clear ability to deal directly with the requestor.

…As you know we advised Mr Ricketson on 7th Nov  that we will not reply to any of his emails or speak with him personally either on the telephone or in person.”

In light of what I have learnt from these documents it is unsurprising that Ross Allen issued such a fatwa - decreeing that no communication with me would take place. In this way he can offer a lame ‘Yes Prime Minister’ bureaucrat’s justification for not responding to me when I point out that he has been (I am trying to be polite here) ‘parsimonious with the truth’ as regards the fate of Mr Fletcher’s passport.

Given that you have not as yet, Mr Hammond, issued a similar fatwa against me, (though you do refuse to even acknowledge receipt of my letters), I trust that you will answer the questions that Ross Allen refuses to answer.

Here is Mr Allen’s account of when and how Mr Fletcher’s passport came into the possession of the British Embassy in Thailand in July 2012:

“When a British passport is found and handed into an Embassy, the policy of Her Majesty’s Passport Office (HMPO) is that the passport will not be returned to the holder because we do not know who has had possession of the passport in the intervening period. During this time the passport may have been tampered with, cloned or otherwise compromised and therefore have become a security risk. Mr Fletcher’s passport was received at the British Embassy with no accompanying explanation. I am therefore satisfied that consular staff acted appropriately in cancelling the passport and returning it to HMPO.”

How can this assertion of Ross Allen’s be reconciled with FCO documents that make it quite clear that Mr Fletcher’s passport was in the British Embassy’s possession on 28^th July 2010 and 23^rd may 2011. Two extracts:

28^th July 2010

“Will take a/n’s passport to the IDC  tomorrow so that he can draw his money from the Western Union. Once we get hold on that amount the deportation will be in place. I am trying to find out about the flight cost and its availability and it is likely to be early next week.”

23^rd May 2011

“I told Mr Fletcher that we were now holding his passport…”

The only way that Ross Allen’s account could be true is if, some time after 23^rd May 2011, Mr Fletcher’s passport left the British Embassy in Thailand, was somehow lost, then “found and handed into” the embassy “with no accompanying explanation” a little over a year later! For this scenario to be credible, the following questions must be asked:

- Why, at some point after 23^rd May 2011, did Mr Fletcher’s passport leave the embassy?

- Where was the passport sent? To whom?

When Mr Fletcher’s passport was “found and handed into” the British Embassy it was known to embassy staff that Mr Fletcher was in a Thai prison, that he was fighting an extradition order from Cambodia and that his passport contained evidence that he was not in Cambodia at the time of the alleged rapes – March 2009. This leads to the question:

- Who issued the order that Mr Fletcher’s passport be cancelled and then destroyed?

I doubt very much that the cancellation and destruction of a passport happens without someone quite senior within the embassy signing off on the process. Who was this person?

I suspect that the destruction of a passport would not happen without the knowledge of the Ambassador to Thailand. Is this so? If so, Ambassador Mark Kent knowingly destroyed evidence that Mr Fletcher required for his defense in court in Cambodia.

Justice demands that precisely what happened to Mr Fletcher’s passport be investigated by a body independent of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office. I am not familiar enough with the British legal system to know what body should conduct such an investigation but I would have thought, at the very least, that the matter should be referred to the police – the destruction of evidence required by Mr Fletcher in his legal defense.

That the Foreign & Commonwealth Office should refuse to allow me to assist Mr Fletcher in his quest for a fair trial is, at the very least, petty and vindictive. Why should the FCO put so much effort into obstructing the course of justice?

The same applies with the Information Commissioner’s Office and the Parliamentary Health and Services Ombudsman – both of which should, in theory, function independently from the FCO and be committed to seeing to it that Mr Flether’s legal and human rights are protected. Not so. In relation to the FCO’s refusal to communicate with me, the covering letter also states:

“The Information Commissioner’s Office and the Parliamentary Health and Services Ombudsman support our approach.”

So, the Parliamentary Health and Services Ombudsman cannot communicate with Mr Fletcher and refuse to communicate with the person Mr Fletcher has asked them to communicate with! (Both ‘Monty Python’ and ‘Yes, Prime Minister’ spring to mind.)

The Ombudsman who, in theory, provides oversight for the FCO is working hand in glove with the FCO to thwart Mr Fletcher’s attempts, with my assistance, to be provided with the fair trial he has been denied for close to five years now.

Really, Mr Hammond, why do you allow this travesty of justice, accountability and transparency to occur within your ministry?

If Ross Allen cannot provide a plausible explanation for the whereabouts of Mr Fletcher’s passport between 23^rd May 2011 and July 2012 he has mislead both me and yourself and is not fit to occupy the position he does.

best wishes

James Ricketson