December 17, 2001	Monday	Shawwal 1, 1422

LONDON, Dec 16: Lord Nazir Ahmed, a member of Britain’s House of Lords, has alleged his telephone was tapped and transcripts passed to a minister after he said he could no longer support Britain’s stance on the Afghan crisis, the Mail on Sunday reported.

The telephone bugging allegation was denied strongly by government sources, who insisted that Nazir Ahmed, a peer for Britain’s ruling Labour Party and one of the country’s most prominent Muslim parliamentarians, was not under surveillance.

The Mail on Sunday reported that Ahmed claimed foreign office minister Denis MacShane called him for a meeting in the Foreign Office and told him: “We know what you have been saying, who you have been talking to. Everything you say is circulated to ministers.”

According to The Mail on Sunday, the meeting happened in October, two days after Lord Ahmed, a 44-year-old father-of-three, told a friend in a call on his mobile telephone that he could not support the British government’s policy of backing the US bombing in Afghanistan.—AFP