04/08/2003

Government deny MI6 chief will retire early over Iraq row

The Foreign Office has moved to scotch media reports suggesting that the head of MI6 is to leave his post after disagreeing with the government's use of intelligence in the build up to the Iraq war.

Sir Richard Dearlove, the current Chief of the Secret Intelligence Service (SIS) – more commonly referred to as MI6 – is not retiring prematurely, the Foreign Office said.

A departmental spokesperson said that media reports suggesting that Sir Richard would retire early are "false and have no foundation whatsoever".

"Sir Richard was appointed Chief ('C') of SIS in August 1999 for a term of five years and he will leave this post in August 2004 on completion of his normal tour of duty," the spokesperson said.

"The suggestion that Sir Richard's retirement next August or the appointment of an Assistant Chief are in any way connected to events relating to Iraq are also fabrications."

In recent times, the tenure of service as 'C' has been around five years – both Sir David Spedding (1994-99) and Sir Colin McColl (1988-94) served over five years – and of their three predecessors, nobody served longer than five years as 'C'.

(GMcG)

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