A former British ambassador to the US has warned the White House it is playing a "dangerous game" over claims Barack Obama used Britain's GCHQ intelligence agency to spy on Donald Trump.
Sir Peter Westmacott said officials in the administration were "peddling falsehoods" which risked damaging the US-UK intelligence-sharing relationship in a way that was a "gift to our enemies".
Writing in The Guardian, Sir Peter, who only retired last year, urged Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson to take up the issue when he visits Washington later this week.
READ MORE: SNP politicians appear 50 times on Kremlin channels
His intervention came after White House press secretary Sean Spicer during one of his daily press briefings last week cited a claim by a Fox News analyst that Mr Obama had used GCHQ to bug Trump Tower.
The claim brought a rare public denial by GCHQ which described the claims as "utterly ridiculous" while Downing Street said it had secured an assurance that the allegation would not be repeated.
But at a joint news conference with German Chancellor Angela Merkel on Friday, Mr Trump said only that Mr Spicer had just been quoting retired judge Andrew Napolito who he described as a "very talented legal mind".
"We said nothing," he said. "I don't make an opinion on it,"
Sir Peter said senior US officials were well aware the president was playing a "dangerous game" which revolved around Mr Trump's "famous reluctance to admit mistakes" combined with his suspicion of intelligence agencies.
He warned it risked undermining a relationship that was "critical" to US-UK efforts to counter a range of threats including terrorism, Russian aggression, Chinese cyber-attacks, and the nuclear threat from North Korea.
"The intelligence relationship between Britain and America is unique and precious. It is based on unquestioned mutual trust, between operatives and politicians on each side of the Atlantic," he said.
"That is something both countries have taken for granted since the Second World War.
READ MORE: SNP politicians appear 50 times on Kremlin channels
"Gratuitously damaging it by peddling falsehoods and then doing nothing to set the record straight would be a gift to our enemies they could only dream of."
Sir Peter's comments will be seen as underlining the strength of feeling among the British intelligence and diplomatic communities at the actions of the White House.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel