NI: the D-Notice System (feature)
01 July 1994
The Defence, Press and Broadcasting Committee, otherwise known as the D-Notice Committee, has been in action warning journalists and photographers not to reveal details of two incidents relating to the intelligence war in the North of Ireland. One concerns the Chinook helicopter crash of 2 June at the Mull of Kintyre which killed 25 intelligence personnel and four RAF crew while travelling from the North of Ireland to a conference at Fort George, Scotland. The other relates to the arms shipment from Poland to Teesport, brought to the attention of the public on 22 November 1993 in the run-up to the Downing Street Declaration. The weapons were said to be destined for Loyalists (see "MI5/MI6 - Trick or Treat?" Statewatch, vol 4 no 1).
The D-Notice system is an 80 year-old voluntary self-censorship procedure which invites editors and publishers to consult with the secretary to the Committee, Rear Admiral David Pulvertaft, or his deputy, Commander F N Ponsonby, if they have doubts regarding material which might come within the ambit of the eight D-Notices. If publishers and broadcasters do not follow the 'positive advice' to keep quiet, they may be threatened with action under the Official Secrets Act, or, as effective, find 'off-the-record' briefings hard to come by. The Committee, which in April 1993 was chaired by Sir Christopher France, Permanent Under Secretary at the Ministry of Defence, re-issued its guidance to the media in 1992. (see "D-Notice Review", Statewatch, vol 2 no 6).
The latest warnings involve Notices 6 and 8 concerning the intelligence agencies and photography respectively. Notice 6 requests (among other things) that nothing is published without reference to the secretary of the Committee about the identities. whereabouts and tasks of persons employed in intelligence, or about organisational structures, communications networks, numerical strengths and details of resources. The use of the D- Notice system also needs to be viewed in the context of the new classifications of secrecy announced earlier this year (see "New UK Secrecy Definitions", Statewatch vol 4 no 2).
Following the Mull of Kintyre crash, a seven mile exclusion zone was established to exclude journalists and photographers. Initial denials that Security Service (MI5) and military intelligence personnel were on board, quickly gave way to the publication of names as senior officials sought to deal both with the intense media interest and the "catastrophic loss", as Sir Hugh Annesley put it. While photographs of the RUC Special Branch officers killed in the crash were released, a D-Notice directive was issued regarding photographs and addresses of the other personnel on board.
The Chinook crash killed ten senior members of RUC Special Branch, including the head of SB, Assistant Chief Constable Brian Fitzsimons. RUC SB is formally constituted as the RUC's E Department which is subdivided by function and three regions (Belfast, North and South). E1 looks after vetting of personnel, internal security, the supply of under cover vehicles and security of communications (mail and telecommunications). E2 is the department responsible for legal liaison, the interrogation centres and SB activity in prisons. E3 collates all intelligence gathered by field operators, informers and uniformed officers. It is split into three sections. E3A evaluates intelligence on republicans while E3B and E3C are concerned with loyalists and leftist and other groups (eg animal rights) respectively.
E4 is the operations division which carries out the day-to-day field work of intelligence gathering. E4A carries out person-to-person surveillance and achieved a certain notoriety through "shoot-to- kill" actions in the 1980s which were the subject of the Stalker inquiry. Technical surveillance - the installation of bugs, tracking devices etc. - is the responsibility of E4B. Finally, E4C and E4D carry out photographic and video surveillance.
The two heads of Belfast a