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MI5 chief: who is Jonathan Evans?

By Channel 4 News

Updated on 12 February 2010

As the head of MI5 rejects accusations his organisation helped "cover up" details in the Binyam Mohamed alleged torture case, Channel 4 News takes a closer look at Jonathan Evans.

Head of MI5 Jonathan Evans. (Credit: Reuters)

Writing in the Daily Telegraph, MI5 chief Jonathan Evans has rejected allegations that MI5 tried to cover up its activities connected to the alleged mstreatment of Binyam Mohamed.

"That is the opposite of the truth," he has claimed.

Evans also warned that failing to maintain a "fair and balanced view of events" gives a propaganda advantage to "our enemies (who) will also seek to use all tools at their disposal to attack us.

He said: "That means not just bombs, bullets and aircraft but also propaganda and campaigns to undermine our will and ability to confront them."

Call me Bob?
Educated at Bristol University, he joined the security service in 1980. Mr Evans rose through the ranks to serve in Northern Ireland as a senior intelligence official in the 1990s.

He worked with the Force Research Unit (FRU), which was responsible for infiltrating Irish terrorist groups. It is widely believed he was known as "Bob" to agents. In 2007, he denied this to Channel 4 News.

His activity in Northern Ireland became connected to accusations from undercover soldier Kevin Fulton who claimed his warning about the IRA's Newry bombing in 1992, in which a woman died, was not acted upon by security services.

Fulton also complained he was denied a new identity and pension he had been promised.

Rise to spymaster
After Northern Ireland, Mr Evans served as head of international counter-terrorism investigations from 1999 to 2001.

After the 911 terrorist attacks, MI5 expanded by more than 50 per cent. Since 2001, Mr Evans has played a leading role in tackling the threat posed by Al-qaida.

He took over as head of MI5 2007, succeeding Dame Eliza Manningham-Buller to become the agency's 16th director general.

Soft collars
In January 2009 Jonathan Evans agreed to be interviewed by journalists, the first serving MI5 boss to do so. This rare departure revealed an unexpected informality in Evans's leadership style.

As Michael Evans wrote in The Times, "Where once there may have been starched shirts and stiff gins, there are now soft collars, coffee and custard-cream biscuits."

He also talked frankly about the terror threat facing Britain from "homegrown" attackers, groomed by Al-Qaida.

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