No Pain, No Gain! UK Intel and Security Committee Annual Report Cleared Only After Complaint to BoJo

Last year, the UK's Intelligence and Security Committee (ISC) blasted Downing Street over its refusal to greenlight the release of the report that alleged Russian interference in the UK elections.

The Intelligence and Security Committee had to get through to the Prime Minister's office with a complaint urging him to sign off on the annual report after it had already been delayed for six months.

On Tuesday, the committee warned that the failure by Johnson to greenlight the report would pose a risk of it not being released before the House rises for Christmas recess.

"By convention the Committee requests that the Prime Minister responds within ten working days", one of the committee's latest statements read. "This period expired on Monday 8 November."

The November complaint finally brought success, as the ISC revealed on Wednesday that Boris Johnson had eventually sent his confirmation, and the intelligence report would be released before the house's recess.

Such reports need to be greenlighted by No.10 in order to ensure that no information that could prejudice the operations of British intelligence agencies such as MI-5, MI-6 or GCHQ will be published in it.

This is not the first time when Downing Street finds itself in hot water over delays of the ISC reports. Last year, Johnson met backlash from the committee after refusing to immediately allow the release of the so-called "Russia report", which claimed that Moscow had attempted to interfere in the Brexit voting process while the UK government ignored these efforts.

This report did come out eventually, released seven months after the 2019 general election, in July 2020. Its conclusions were blasted in Moscow as "unfounded, unsubstantiated and unconvincing", and London was accused of taking a “leading role in Russophobia”.