Episode 2 Modern Spies

Britain's modern spies live in the shadowy world

of undercover surveillance, secret break-ins

and clandestine bugging.

Do you get nervous?

Sometimes.

Do you get a buzz from it?

Definitely.

LOUD EXPLOSION

It's a world of violence and drama

we all recognise from movies and TV.

But in this series I'm talking to real spies about their real work.

The key elements of the James Bond myth

are that we're some kind of military or paramilitary organisation.

In this programme,

I investigate how far modern spies can go to prevent an attack.

When does an undercover operation cross the line

and become entrapment?

It is a very fine line

and that's why undercover officers are highly trained.

Were British spies complicit

in sending terrorist suspects to Libya to be tortured?

And is assassination ever justified?

LOUD EXPLOSION

The question is whether the government has the authority

to use lethal force.

For the first time on television,

serving British intelligence officers

talk about the myth and reality of being a modern spy.

Do you have a licence to kill?

London 2012.

The armed forces and police are training

for one of the biggest security operations Britain has ever seen.

It could be a scene out of a Hollywood blockbuster.

But there are others whom we don't see.

The real James Bonds.

The shadowy figures of Britain's intelligence services

working to thwart any potential terrorist attack.

We have insight into the whole range of threats that the UK faces.

So you deal with one issue, you have to move very quickly onto another.

7/7 proved that the threat was real

when suicide bombers attacked London

killing 52 people and injuring over 700.

Shami is an MI5 surveillance officer.

For him, that day was a watershed.

That had a big effect on me, personally.

Initially, from seeing the death toll going up

and the fact that it was on my country, hit me even harder.

That's one of the major influences

in my motivation for joining the service -

to try and prevent anything happening like that again.

Emma is an MI5 intelligence officer investigating Al-Qaeda networks.

I think, for me, 7/7 was a shock and a wake-up call

about how serious the Islamic extremist problem actually was.

I think there are still networks

keen to carry out attacks against the UK.

We work hard on a daily basis to counter networks,

so although things may not necessarily reach the media as a disruption,

a lot of work goes on behind the scenes

in order to disrupt the potential threat towards this country.

Given what happened on 7/7

and potentially what could happen during the Olympics,

how far should today's modern spies go

in taking measures to prevent such attacks?

-And what is that?

-A transmitter.

It sends a scrambled signal via satellite.

We can record you and anyone in a range of ten feet around you.

Ah.

-And this?

-Camera. Activate.

It's digital, the shots can be sent to us by...

On the TV and in the movies,

spies have limitless powers of surveillance,

using state-of-the-art technology to pry into our lives.

This...ridiculous James Bondery, do we need it?

But what's it like in the real world

and how extensive is secret surveillance in Britain?

It's not known how many people in Britain are being targeted,

but MI5 says there are around

2,000 Al-Qaeda-inspired terrorist suspects in the UK.

You would expect

that the agencies and the police

would have to monitor those threats constantly.

And that's spying on people, spying on the lives of individuals,

who may or may not be involved in what you think they're involved in?

Well, you could say that

or you could say it's actually about preventing crime

and protecting life and limb.

Intelligence gathering is the key to prevention

and, to be effective, it often needs to be intrusive.

Phones are tapped, e-mails intercepted,

conversations recorded.

The intrusion appears boundless.

A lot of the information you get has got nothing to do with terrorism,

it's their personal, private lives.

That's what you're getting access to,

that's what worries people.

Absolutely. Potentially it can be.

Again, there is a requirement for the authorities in law

to direct those very intrusive elements of surveillance

at people who are believed to be active in crime or terrorism.

The threat MI5 faces was illustrated by a network of extremist Muslims

detected in 2010.

There was intelligence that suspected terrorists

were plotting to target major London landmarks,

including the Stock Exchange.

It marked the beginning of a massive intelligence gathering

and surveillance operation.

At its height, it involved

more than 1,000 police and undercover MI5 officers.

The network stretched from East London

to Stoke-on-Trent and Cardiff,

and had been targeted and watched for many months.

From the outset you're briefed

regarding the target you are going to be going up against

and from there

you're given the information

as to why you're going to be observing a certain person.

How much do you know about the target you're following?

You're told of the potential risks

in terms of not gathering the information required

and what these people are planning to do.

Surveillance officers watched members of the cell

as they scouted out other iconic targets in central London.

You've got that pressure on your shoulders from the outset

of making sure you've got it right.

You're constantly thinking about how you're coming across.

You're thinking about everything that's going on.

And thinking about who might be watching you?

That's right.

-Which could lead to a compromise?

-Yes.

But the surveillance went well beyond "eyes on" -

that's just watching their targets.

DRILLING

Listening devices were secretly planted in one of their homes.

It's, I think, common knowledge that the police and the agencies

can intrude into private premises

for the purposes of investigating very serious crime.

And planting a listening device inside, planting a bug?

These things are...

..tactics that can be resorted to

in appropriate circumstances

where there is evidence of very serious crime being committed.

With such formidable powers at their command,

who authorises such deep intrusion into people's lives?

There's a lot of form filling in and that is necessary and right

that this takes place in order to get that authorisation.

Does it ever worry you, ever occur to you

that what you do is to spy on the lives of others?

It doesn't worry me.

I feel like every action that I take as an investigator is proportionate

and is the right thing to do in order to protect national security.

Each act of planned surveillance

carries with it an accountability regime,

where officers have to report, justify

and make the case for those actions

and they have to be approved at very senior levels.

Does the morality ever worry you?

You always sort of try and use your moral compass,

but the main compass really must be the law

and therefore...

..the overriding morality, I think, that drives law enforcement people

and security service people

is to protect the public and the innocent.

In this case, the techniques used by MI5 and the police were vindicated.

Faced with the surveillance evidence,

nine men pleaded guilty and received long prison sentences.

There would have been no case without the operational tools

that the police have in law

to keep these individuals under surveillance for an extended period.

But what happens if surveillance -

however intrusive - is not enough to prevent an atrocity?

Getting evidence to convict terrorist leaders

may require even more controversial methods,

involving risky undercover operations known as stings.

FLUTE BAND PLAYS

One case in Northern Ireland

shows how just how easily an MI5 agent can cross the line.

Nearly 15 years after the Good Friday Agreement,

there's still an ongoing threat from violent dissident republicans.

The Real IRA pose a real threat in terms of their intent

but, also, we've seen over the last two years

a return to vehicle-borne improvised explosive devices

by that particular grouping.

And so they pose a threat

both to life and property here over in Northern Ireland.

ALARM BLARES

The Real IRA is the dissident group responsible for the car bomb

that killed 29 people in Omagh, in 1998,

the worst single attack in the Northern Ireland conflict.

MI5 and the police know who its leaders are

but can't always get the evidence to convict them.

SIREN BLARES

In 2004, MI5 had reason to believe that Paul McCaugherty,

a taxi driver from Lurgan,

was a high-ranking figure in the Real IRA.

The plan was to use undercover agents to infiltrate the group,

to catch McCaugherty red-handed buying arms.

But such operations raise serious legal and moral questions.

The risk is that the undercover agent or source

may cross the line and encourage the target to commit a crime.

It's called entrapment.

We're very careful in respect of entrapment.

Prosecutors advise us

and give us the red lines within which we must operate

to be able to bring evidence before a criminal court.

And the source has to know what the red line is,

the source has to know what he can do and what he can't do?

Yes, the source will be fully briefed

on exactly what their behaviour should be.

MI5's route to the target, Paul McCaugherty,

was to be through an unsuspecting acquaintance, Desmond Kearns.

Kearns and his wife were followed to a warehouse in Luxembourg.

There were suspicions that Kearns might be involved

in cigarette smuggling.

MI5 sent an undercover agent to chat up Kearns

and use him as a means of infiltrating the Real IRA.

The agent's codename was Amir.

The first and most crucial step was engineering a meeting

between the agent and his target - in this case Desmond Kearns.

It's known as the "bump".

What is a "bump"?

I said I'm not going to go through the tactics and methodologies

of undercover officers,

that would be totally counterproductive.

But in general terms, the bump is the critical first step

in the evolution of a sting operation, isn't it?

If you tell me that the bump is the critical first step, Peter,

then I'm sure it is.

Amir briefly engaged Kearns in conversation,

saying he could get him cheaper cigarettes.

But before they got going,

they were accosted by the irate warehouse owner.

What do you think you're doing?! Stop, please.

One more time. I tell you one time. I tell you two times...

I'm just leaving.

It looked like the bump had failed.

Sorry, apologies. Follow me.

But MI5 directed Amir to give it one more go.

Two days later, now in Brussels,

Amir choreographed a second bump,

using the altercation with the warehouse owner

as the reason for recognising Kearns.

Kearns took the bait and exchanged numbers.

-I know you from somewhere.

-How are you doing?

Fine. Yeah, fine.

Over the following months they spoke several times

and on each occasion Amir reported back to MI5.

When they met again,

Kearns was happy to discuss a deal on cigarettes,

but did not bring up the subject of arms.

To political sympathisers of the Real IRA,

Desmond Kearns was an innocent party being manipulated by MI5.

MI5, they're always on the lookout, you know,

always on the lookout for people

who they think might be a bit vulnerable

and a bit easier to intimidate.

When they saw Dessy, they saw...

"This is a prime target for us," and they went to work on him.

Wasn't Desmond Kearns targeted

as a means of getting to Paul McCaugherty?

I really wouldn't want to comment

on the "targeting" of Mr Kearns, as you put it.

It was at this point that Amir, the MI5 agent, crossed the line.

In conversations with Kearns, he talked about buying "other items",

by which he meant guns.

In very simple terms, they're not allowed

to encourage somebody to commit a crime.

They can watch them do it,

they can sometimes help them gather material

if they've asked for certain things to be found,

so they can go and pretend that they're able to find weapons

or something like that,

but they cannot encourage people to commit a crime.

The MI5 agent may have broken the rules,

but it did produce the result that MI5 wanted.

Kearns said he knew someone

who might be interested in "other items".

The route to Paul McCaugherty was now open.

Now it was time to introduce a second MI5 undercover agent,

codenamed Ali.

Ali was posing as an arms dealer.

McCaugherty met with Ali on six occasions,

from Istanbul to Bruges.

All the time, they were under surveillance.

Can you do 100 kilos of plastic?

Look, I can do you a package.

Each meeting was secretly recorded - vital for the court evidence.

100 kilograms...

The discussions covered everything from the weapons to their delivery.

20 RPG,

20 AK-47 and 6,000 rounds of ammo.

So convincing was Ali, that McCaugherty handed over

46,000 euros as a down payment.

The operation lasted for over two years

before McCaugherty and Kearns were finally arrested.

The case went to court and MI5's strategy seemed vindicated

when McCaugherty was jailed for 20 years.

But the case against Kearns collapsed.

MI5's agent, Amir, had crossed the line.

The judge ruled that there were inconsistencies

in his evidence against Kearns

and his conduct might have constituted entrapment.

It is a very fine line

and that's why undercover officers are highly trained.

The exact parameters of what they can do are authorised

before they're deployed.

The case is reviewed after every deployment

and, of course, the evidence is scrutinised meticulously

by the courts.

The problem was that Amir was NOT a trained MI5 officer

but someone they hired because his face and background fitted.

We don't know about Amir's background,

but there are some cases

where undercover agents with shady credentials are recruited.

When you're recruiting an agent

who has been part of a criminal community

or a terrorist suspect community,

then there will always be question marks around their character,

their motivations and their abilities,

and they have to be very closely assessed.

They can work in that world, that's why they're recruited, yes?

They can be credible in that world

and they can be of extremely high importance

in preventing crimes, atrocities, terrorist attacks.

In America, undercover agents are used far more aggressively

to sting targets.

But serious doubts have been raised about entrapment

and whether innocent people - mainly Muslims -

have been encouraged to plan terrorist acts

by FBI undercover sources.

We have a large pool of human sources that we utilise,

that we cultivate and that we need to keep this country safe.

-CAMERAMAN:

-Smile for the camera.

Hello!

In January 2006,

a group of young Muslims videoed themselves

messing about in the snow during a vacation trip

to the Poconos Mountains in Pennsylvania.

-Two days, nothing.

-Like a bear!

-THEY LAUGH

The Duka family originally came from Albania 20 years ago,

to start a new life in America.

They'd set up home in Cherry Hill, New Jersey,

started a roofing business

and settled into an all-American neighbourhood.

Burim, the youngest brother, was born in America.

Our family, we're pretty close, very close, as a matter of fact.

We live with our nieces and nephews, that's how close we are.

We treat our own nieces and nephews as if they are our own kids.

We're very close.

-BURIM CHANTS:

-Allahu Akbar.

Sami Allahu Liman Hamidah.

Allahu Akbar.

My family came here for a better life for us, you know,

they came here to help us get a better education,

to help us get better jobs,

to help us, like, you know...

for everything... like, everything for the best.

But the American dream fell apart

after the brothers' trip to the mountains.

Just like many Americans, the Dukas enjoyed playing around with guns,

perfectly legally, including semi-automatics.

GUNFIRE

CAMERAMAN LAUGHS

But some of their cries were distinctly unpatriotic.

If you take a look at the video yourself,

you can see it's not training.

We're just having fun, shooting guns, in a public shooting range,

in the daytime.

You're shouting, "Allahu Akbar."

We're shouting "Allahu Akbar," that means "God is Great."

But guns and cries of "jihad" triggered suspicions

when the video was taken to a store

to be transferred to DVD.

The clerk took one look at the footage and rang the police.

GUNFIRE

Believing they might be on to a terror cell,

the FBI planned a sting to find out.

Allahu Akbar!

Just like their British counterparts,

the FBI uses hired sources whose faces match the targets.

Do you fit a source or a spy to a particular cell?

We do, to either a cell or to a gap.

Where we know we have a problem -

an individual or a group -

we will look across our sources

and we will find the right source to penetrate that group.

In this case, the FBI needed an Albanian.

Besnik Bakalli was in jail awaiting deportation to his home country,

where he'd been convicted of a shooting.

The FBI also recruited Mahmoud Omar,

an Egyptian with a criminal record who'd worked for the FBI before.

Both were paid to infiltrate the Duka family and their friends.

Now the FBI had to orchestrate the bump. Bakalli was sent in.

Putting him in a position to be seen by the targets

and speaking in a language that we thought may draw them

was one of the bump scenarios that we ran through.

After every Friday prayer

we used to go to Dunkin' Donuts, around ten, 15 guys.

We used to go over there, drink coffee, eat doughnuts, talk,

have a little fun,

and then, while we were leaving one day,

Besnik Bakalli was walking in

and he was on his cell phone, speaking Albanian.

And us Albanians, there's not many in New Jersey,

so we got a surprise and we said, "Oh, are you Albanian?"

and he said, "Yeah, I'm Albanian,"

so we got to meet him from there.

Omar, the other FBI source, also worked his way into the Duka family.

During long discussions with Omar, a friend of the Dukas talked about

a possible attack on a nearby US military base, Fort Dix.

But the FBI's two undercover sources had much looser rules of engagement

than their British counterparts.

There were long conversations that were never recorded

and it was never clear

who was making the running in the alleged plot.

The basic fundamental issue

with these individuals

is there is very little control over them.

They're under supervision and control

while they're wearing their recording equipment

and while they're going about their directed duties.

We have no way of knowing how they interact with these individuals,

these targets, when they're not under supervision,

when they're not being recorded.

How can you trust them?

That's the million-dollar question.

You really never can totally trust them

and I think, if you do, then you're in trouble.

We have to constantly try to validate what they're telling us,

so we will try to record the conversations,

we will give them tasks in which we already know the answer to.

It's always a danger and it is one that we take very seriously.

I personally think this whole case was set up.

My brothers are Muslims, practising Muslims,

very good people, helpful to the community.

They basically built America.

We were doing construction and roofing in America.

How is a person like that going to destroy his own country

when we're building it?

In the transcript from taped conversations,

one of the brothers apparently agreed

to carry out what sounded like a terrorist attack.

He said...

The Dukas' lawyer argues these remarks were taken out of context.

If you read a few lines further on, he says,

"I'm not going to do it, I can't do that."

So if you... That quote is horribly damning,

but if you have the whole transcript and you see what led up to that

and half a page later, it's like, "We can't do that."

In 2007, the trap was finally set.

Two of the Duka brothers went with Omar to his apartment to buy guns.

Just before the police stormed in,

the surveillance video went blank.

POLICE: Police! Get down, get down!

Drop your hands!

Down! Get down!

Get down! Down! Get down!

At the same time,

the FBI also swooped on the third Duka brother and his friend.

We were coming back from Mister Softee's

and, when we arrived at our apartment,

we just saw, like, FBIs.

They had cop cars and big vans everywhere

and they just made him get out the car.

After that, we really didn't see him until the next morning.

The three Duka brothers claimed they were buying the guns

for their next trip to the mountains.

The jury didn't believe them and they were all given life sentences.

The FBI's two undercover agents did well out of the operation.

Omar was paid around 240,000

and Bakalli 150,000.

The plan to deport him to Albania was dropped.

The family claim the whole case was based on entrapment.

From the government,

hiring informants to do something like this,

you know, they took what they wanted to take from the evidence.

They used what they wanted to use.

I know what my brothers really are, I know that they're innocent.

I know that they would never do anything like that.

It's only entrapment if the person...

has not expressed that he wanted to do it

and is only looking for the tools to get it done

and I think it's an irresponsible government

who has that information and waits for it to happen.

You don't know whether you're going to be too late

and, again, in my job,

I always envisioned myself walking up to the front door of a house

and telling the mother and father that their child is dead

because we didn't take the action that we needed to take.

If FBI agents provide

AK-47s, M16s,

to the people that they suspect... isn't that entrapment?

No, not if the people are looking for it,

and you must understand that we do not give them...

Whenever we give them a weapon, it'd be inoperable.

Whenever we give 'em explosives, they are inert.

In other words, we do not give them anything that could harm persons,

but it is not entrapment

if the person has the predisposition to undertake the crime.

Has any case been lost because the defence of entrapment has succeeded?

I am not aware of a single case where that has occurred

in one of our terrorism cases, here in the US.

I've looked quite closely at some of these American cases,

and it's quite clear that there's

a very different legal framework in operation in the United States.

I doubt, I very much doubt

whether some of them would...

..would work in the United Kingdom legally.

I just don't think they fit within the British concept

of what is fair and proper for an undercover officer to do.

'We need to talk.'

Who is this?

-GUNFIRE

-Aah!

If the Americans go further than the British to obtain convictions,

what about the ultimate sanction?

HE YELPS

Do modern spies really have a licence to kill?

The name's Bond, James Bond.

British spies are adamant this is just a Hollywood fantasy.

The key elements of the James Bond myth

are that we're some kind of military or paramilitary organisation -

that's not the case,

and the other key element of the myth

is that we're some kind of rogue organisation,

that we go off and do our own thing, that we set our own tasking.

The reality is that we operate within a clear framework, within government.

Do you have a licence to kill?

No, we don't.

If you look at the way that Hollywood treats spies

and the way that MI5 is depicted in...in Spooks,

can you just... go off on an operation

and do more or less what you what,

follow your instincts and do what you think has to be done...

without checking?

We operate within a legal framework, so we're not above the law.

I mean, if we started doing things like that,

then we're no better than the people we're going up against.

we have these rules in place for a reason and it's to protect everybody.

But, while British spies insist they don't have a licence to kill,

the same can't be said for spies in other countries.

Tehran, November 2010.

Majid Shahriari, one of Iran's top nuclear scientists,

was travelling with his wife on his way to work.

As Shahriari slowly made his way through the rush hour,

he failed to notice a motorbike tailing him.

The pillion passenger was clasping a magnetic mine,

waiting for the moment to strike.

LOUD EXPLOSION

Majid Shahriari was killed in the explosion.

His wife was seriously injured.

Iran has accused Israel of being behind the killing.

And Israelis do have every reason

to destabilise Iran's nuclear programme,

since Iran has threatened to destroy their state.

I think that today all intelligence services agree that

in about... or by the end of this decade,

they're going to be equipped with a nuclear bomb.

Iran with a nuclear bomb,

that's going to change the situation in the Middle East.

Over the last two years,

four Iranian nuclear scientists have been killed.

They're believed to be pre-emptive assassinations

designed to stall Iran's nuclear programme.

The philosophical dilemma is,

either you're going to wait on your shore

until the shark will come and attack your swimmers,

or you're going to go and find your hunter in his place, in his location.

The finger of blame for these professionally executed "hits"

points to Israel's overseas intelligence agency, the Mossad -

or its surrogates -

although Israel has denied any involvement.

Is the Mossad behind the killing of Iran's nuclear scientists?

I don't know.

I don't know, but, as I told you, so many countries are so interested

in blocking the Iranian nuclear project.

Who do you think is behind the assassinations

of several of Iran's nuclear scientists?

I honestly don't know

and that is not something in which the United Kingdom is involved.

Do you think the Mossad is behind the killing

of Iran's nuclear scientists?

Next question.

But an assassination in Dubai, in 2010,

was almost certainly the work of the Mossad.

And it came straight out of the pages of a spy bestseller.

Airport cameras captured the moment

when an alleged Mossad hit squad of over 25 agents

entered the country under false passports.

Their target was Mahmoud al-Mabhouh,

a senior Hamas leader

wanted by Israel for killing two of its soldiers.

Members of the hit squad were also captured on the hotel's CCTV

as they prepared to liquidate their target...

some dressed for tennis.

It's thought that Mabhouh was drugged and then suffocated.

But by the time his body was discovered,

the team had slipped out of the country.

No-one has ever been prosecuted.

LOUD EXPLOSION

For Hollywood, the image of Israel's vengeful spies

spelt good box-office business.

Steven Spielberg dramatised how the Mossad hunted down Palestinians

suspected of being behind

the murder of Israeli athletes at the Munich Olympics in 1972.

The Black September terrorists were captured on television,

with tracksuited German police closing in

as the attack unfolded in the Olympic Village.

11 Israelis were killed.

In the months that followed,

the Mossad was tasked with eliminating those Palestinians

suspected of being behind the massacre.

The operation was codenamed Wrath Of God.

The Mossad killed 11.

Back in 1993, I interviewed

the former head of Israel's military intelligence,

who admitted that the Mossad was given a licence to kill.

It's one of the rare occasions in which Israel has confirmed it.

I mean, eliminate the leaders of Black September,

as much as possible, or as many as possible.

Kill them?

To be honest, yes.

Who was to carry out the killings?

People of the Mossad.

How?

By all kinds of means.

It could be by booby-trapping, could be by shooting,

could be by...blowing up a car.

This is all that's left of the car hit by an Israeli missile,

fired from a helicopter in November 2000,

just outside Bethlehem.

It wasn't a Mossad operation,

but one masterminded by Israel's equivalent of MI5 - Shin Bet.

Unlike the Mossad, Shin Bet openly admits it.

The target was Hussein Abiyat,

the commander of one of the West Bank's most militant groups.

The problem was that he was deep in Bethlehem

and, in order to put a hand on him, we needed to risk soldiers...

in a level that was too risky.

Abiyat died instantly

when the missile homed in on a tracking device

that an informer had planted in the car.

How does the Palestinian community regard your son today?

Hussein is a martyr.

Before his martyrdom, he was a hero.

And a great leader.

The killing of Abiyat became a test case in Israel

when human rights campaigners took the government to court.

I remember myself as head of Shin Bet,

I, right at the beginning of my term,

I said, "I'm not going to accept any grey zone in my terminology.

"Either we have right, or black and white.

"We're allowed to do or not allowed to do.

"We work for the State

"and either it's authorised by the State, or not."

I don't think that we have to be shamed

for eliminating arch-terrorists.

The Supreme Court ruled the killing was legal.

It said such operations were lawful if there was

"strong and convincing intelligence",

if no "less harmful means" could be employed

and every effort was made to

"minimise harm to innocent civilians".

But two innocent civilians were also killed in the missile attack.

One was the wife of Mohammed Naji Danun.

She'd been visiting her sister.

When she came out, the missile was heading towards Hussein.

She was close to the car.

When the missile hit, it exploded

and they were killed.

She was neither carrying arms in resistance,

nor was she carrying missiles.

She was completely peaceful.

America assassinates its enemies too.

Unlike Israel, America's policy has never been tested in court.

The CIA has overseen the use of aerial drones,

the unmanned spy in the sky, armed with deadly Hellfire missiles.

LOUD EXPLOSION

It's estimated drones have killed up to 3,000 people,

including many Al-Qaeda commanders and hundreds of civilians.

These missions are known as "targeted killings".

And they've more than doubled under President Obama.

I think the drone strategy has been instrumental

in keeping Al-Qaeda on the run.

Keeping their head down.

That doesn't allow them to settle, open their training camps,

keep them moving,

so right now they have a very difficult time

running the operations they need to run to support their terrorism.

The most high-profile victim of these targeted killings

was the radical Islamist cleric Anwar al-Awlaki,

the spiritual leader of Al-Qaeda's affiliate in the Yemen.

We are against evil

and America as a whole has turned into a nation of evil.

His fiery sermons on the internet

have radicalised many young Muslims around the world

and turned some into terrorists.

One was the so-called underpants bomber Abdulmutallab,

who tried to blow up a plane over Detroit.

Others included the young British Muslims

who planned to bomb the London Stock Exchange.

Last September, after many months of covert surveillance,

the CIA finally caught up with al-Awlaki.

LOUD EXPLOSION

Earlier this morning, Anwar al-Awlaki,

a leader of Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula,

was killed in Yemen.

The death...

AUDIENCE APPLAUDS

The death of Awlaki is a major blow

to Al-Qaeda's most active operational affiliate.

But al-Awlaki's targeted killing proved highly controversial.

He was a US citizen, born in America,

and US citizens are entitled to the protection of the Fifth Amendment

of the American Constitution.

It says, "No person may be deprived of life or liberty

"without due process of law."

And al-Awlaki had never been charged with any crime.

The point is that American citizens enjoy constitutional rights

as well as rights under international law

and, as an American citizen,

Anwar al-Awlaki enjoyed the right to due process

under the Fifth Amendment to the US Constitution.

I do think it's fair to say that the United States has crossed

not just a political Rubicon, but a legal one as well.

It's a very significant step.

In using the drones,

isn't America setting itself up as judge, jury and executioner?

To the extent that war sets anyone up as judge, jury and executioner,

that would be true, but it's war.

And it's clearly war. There's a movement -

granted, it's not a government and they're not uniformed -

but it's a war and it's a global movement,

and it's run by a very capable enemy...

..and that's how wars are...

prosecuted.

I think it's very important to fight it within the law

but people's interpretations of the law are different.

The law is never strictly black and white,

or rarely is it strictly black and white.

The United States has the right, just like any other country,

to defend itself,

but the question is how that right is actually exercised -

whether the government has the authority to use lethal force,

even against threats that aren't imminent.

And if it does have that authority,

who gets to decide whether a threat is sufficiently significant,

that the use of lethal force is appropriate?

If I were sitting back in the business and looking at someone

who is plotting the murder of innocents

and someone said, "You don't have the capability

"to bring him to justice in the United States,"

and you know that he's plotting with people

who've already shown the capability and intent to murder innocents,

what do you do?

I would say, "Boy, this is not fun and it's not pretty

"but I can't afford the sacrifice of 250 people on a plane to happen."

In America's eyes,

the killing of Osama Bin Laden in May last year

was part of that war.

In an airborne assault

coordinated by the CIA,

US special forces shot him dead in his bedroom.

Most Americans don't believe

Bin Laden should have been brought to trial

and don't lose any sleep over drones assassinating terrorists.

Britain uses unarmed drones in Afghanistan

and is being sued for allegedly providing intelligence

to the Americans.

But the government is adamant

that it is not engaged in assassinations

and that its spy agencies work under strict rules.

We are not allowed to have,

there is no space to have

renegade James Bond-type officers.

There's a very clear process that you need to go through.

Everything needs to be authorised.

We operate within the law

and there is a process both internally within SIS

and also for seeking ministerial approval

that ensures that that's the case.

So do ministers have to approve operations

that you may be involved in, in the end?

Yes, they would.

So ministers have to approve

particularly risky and sensitive operations.

How accountable are the Secret Intelligence Services

when everything is still largely shrouded in secrecy?

Well, they're accountable in various ways.

They're accountable through elected politicians,

to an unusual degree, I think, in this country

compared to many other countries.

In other words, to me or to the Home Secretary.

Their principal operations

require the approval of the elected leaders of the country.

But in the 1980s,

when the threat to Britain from the Provisional IRA

was at its most intense,

allegations of a British shoot-to-kill policy

were given fresh impetus.

The controversy peaked in 1988,

when three members of the IRA were shot dead in Gibraltar.

The suspects had been under

MI5 and Special Branch surveillance for months.

When intelligence indicated

they were about to bomb a British military band,

soldiers from the SAS opened fire.

The IRA members were unarmed.

The government repeated its denial

that there was any shoot-to-kill policy.

And that's not the only denial.

The government has also denied any involvement

in extraordinary rendition,

where terrorist suspects are effectively kidnapped

and taken to foreign countries to be tortured.

This was the dark shadow cast over the Bush and Blair regimes.

Hollywood tackled the brutal realties head-on.

Sir?

There's been some kind of mistake.

Why have my clothes been taken from me?

I want my clothes.

No-one has told me why I'm here or what I've done.

I...

This is crazy! I want my clothes!

And I want to speak to a lawyer immediately!

Yes. Yes, of course you do.

But in recent months

evidence has emerged from the rubble of the Libyan revolution

that British spies may indeed have crossed the line into illegality.

A NATO bomb had blasted a large hole in Libya's intelligence headquarters

and, in the process, blew a large hole in Britain's insistence

that it had never been complicit in rendition and torture.

Back in 2004,

Tony Blair's government had embraced Colonel Gaddafi,

having encouraged him to abandon his weapons of mass destruction

and renounce terrorism.

Lucrative oil deals

and rich business pickings

were part of the prize.

Gaddafi was now Britain's ally in the war on Islamist extremism.

One of the main opposition groups to Gaddafi

was the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group.

MI5 believes it was closely allied to Al-Qaeda

and involved in channelling British jihadis to Iraq.

Were you a terrorist?

Certainly not.

We were working for the sake of a just cause,

which was to rescue the Libyan people

and our country

from Gaddafi's rule.

Its leader, Abdel Hakim Belhadj,

had met Osama Bin Laden in Afghanistan,

whilst fighting the Russians.

Many people have met with Osama Bin Laden

and it's not possible at all

to describe those who have met Osama Bin Laden as terrorists.

We had to meet because we were all in the same battle.

GUNFIRE

In 2004, Belhadj was in Malaysia.

At the time, he wasn't aware of Britain's new alliance with Gaddafi.

He was planning to fly to London to apply for political asylum

and sounded out the possibility at the British Embassy in Kuala Lumpur.

I wasn't informed that my application for asylum

had been approved or not.

They did receive the request

but, no, we didn't receive a positive reply from the embassy.

Belhadj never got as far as London.

MI6 tipped off its intelligence partners

that Belhadj was on the move.

The CIA was alerted and intercepted him en route.

Belhadj claims he was then drugged and rendered to Libya

where he was incarcerated in Gaddafi's notorious Abu Salim jail.

I was there for four and a half years in that cell.

Sometimes years would pass,

I mean, a whole year passed and I was prevented from seeing sunlight.

All this in addition to the other torture which we endured.

Evidence of Britain's apparent complicity in Belhadj's rendition

only came to light last year when secret documents were found

in the ruins of Gaddafi's spy headquarters in Tripoli.

They included correspondence to the head of Libyan intelligence,

Musa Kusa.

It was signed "M,"

assumed to be Sir Mark Allen, the senior MI6 officer,

who'd personally orchestrated

Gaddafi's new relationship with Britain.

In one of his letters, Sir Mark refers to Belhadj as "air cargo"

and congratulates Libya's spy chief on its "safe arrival".

Sir Mark points out, "The intelligence was British,"

and sees no reason to "channel requests for information"

through the Americans.

What this correspondence and this letter represent

is very regrettable proof that they have participated in this matter

and they are trying to show

that the Libyan Intelligence Service now owes them something.

We now understand that MI6 sought and received government approval.

Jack Straw, the then Foreign Secretary,

denied on BBC radio

that the government had any involvement in rendition.

'We were opposed to unlawful rendition.

'We were opposed to any use of torture or similar methods.

'And not only did we not agree with it,

'we were not complicit in it, nor did we turn a blind eye to it.'

But he also added...

'No Foreign Secretary can know all the details

'of what its intelligence agencies are doing at any one time.'

Jack Straw's office told me he had nothing further to add.

Do you blame the British?

Of course, the MI6 service

is considered a major player in my arrest

and this act has caused me harm and suffering.

We have come into office with very strong views about rendition

that may lead to the torture of suspects.

But unlawful rendition is not something that I would approve, no.

The documentation clearly says,

and this is a communication

from a person we assume to be Sir Mark Allen,

a very senior former SIS official,

who refers to Mr Belhadj as cargo

and says that we - ie SIS -

provided the intelligence that made his rendition possible.

Doesn't that indicate that we were previously complicit in rendition?

Well, this is subject to legal proceedings,

so it's not possible for a minister to comment on it.

But the evidence is there in black and white.

Well, the evidence...

You've heard some evidence? You're not a judge.

I've not heard it, no...

You may not have seen all the evidence from all the sources.

The Metropolitan Police are now investigating these allegations.

Ironically, Abdel Hakim Belhadj is now a leading figure

in the new Libya that Britain helped create.

At the same time, he's suing the British Government

and Sir Mark Allen,

alleging complicity in his rendition and ill-treatment.

The Libyan story raises a central question.

Why should we believe what governments tell us

when it took a bomb to uncover the truth?

I think the vast majority of people in the country understand

that a great deal of secret intelligence has to remain secret

and there isn't anything sinister about that,

we do that so that we keep

many of the methods and techniques of our agencies a secret

so that they are affective in saving the lives of our citizens,

in protecting our allies

and protecting the British national interest in the world.

And so... Yes, some things are going to have to be kept secret.

In a democracy, we have to make sure that secrecy

is both accountable and justified,

as the ethical landscape in which modern spies operate

is often grey, not black and white.

In making this series,

I've found that their world can be just like the movies,

from undercover stings to secret sources

and, in other countries, even shoot-to-kill operations.

But the real modern spies are nothing like James Bond.

Their work is dangerous, highly complex,

often mundane and rarely glamorous,

but in the end it can and does save lives.

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