Both Jack Straw and Robin Cook have signed public interest immunity certificates, the so-called "gagging orders", to prevent the activities of the security services being disclosed during the trial of former MI5 officer David Shayler. Shayler is charged with breaking the Official Secrets Act but says he exposed wrong-doing.

Former MI6 officer Richard Tomlinson is set to publish his book, The Big Breach, in Moscow this week. Despite efforts by government lawyers to prevent British newspapers disclosing the book's contents, extracts have been published on the web and in Komsomolskaya Pravda, a Russian newspaper.