New evidence has emerged in South Africa linking Mark Thatcher directly to the alleged coup plotters against the West African oil state of Equatorial Guinea.
Lawyers acting for one of the alleged British-led plotters, Greg Wales, on Friday night tried to prevent publication of the information, claiming it is in breach of the Data Protection Act.
But phone records in the hands of South African authorities show that throughout the run-up to the coup attempt last March, Thatcher was in contact with Wales, the London-based businessman who has been accused of a central role in the plot.
On the day that a key contract was signed to provide a plane for the alleged coup, Wales called Thatcher in South Africa from London. He called him again the next day, January 17.
Thatcher faces trial in South Africa for his alleged role in the coup, and preliminary hearings are expected to begin next week. He denies involvement.
Wales, who lives in Chiswick, west London, and has links with the former mercenary group Executive Outcomes, does not dispute his links with Thatcher, although he denies discussing a coup with him, or the signing of the contract in question.
His London lawyer, Sarah Webb, said: ”He can’t remember what the phone calls were about, but they were not about contracts.
”He’s a friend of Mark Thatcher. He’s known him for seven or eight years. He went to his Christmas party.”
They speak to each other six or seven times a month, she added.
She claimed the phone records were obtained illegally and it would be a criminal offence to make them public. In fact, disclosure of such data is permitted when it is in the public interest.
In Cape Town, Thatcher’s lawyer, Alan Bruce-Brand, declined to comment.
At Westminster this week, British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw gave a detailed explanation for the first time of the British government’s advance knowledge of the alleged plot.
The government first heard of the allegations in late January, he said in a written answer to the Conservative frontbencher Michael Ancram.
”Confidential diplomatic exchanges” were, he said, backed up by reports circulating in the media, particularly an article on January 30 in the Spanish newspaper El Mundo.
The British Foreign Office could get no more definite information, he said, so took no further action, but it did review its civil contingency plan.
President Teodoro Obiang of Equatorial Guinea has accused the United Kingdom government of covertly backing the coup by not giving him any warning. Obiang was tipped off by South Africa and the alleged coup was aborted. — Guardian Unlimited Â