U.K. was concerned over Canadian navy spy, documents show
Canada's allies have closed ranks when it comes to talking about spy scandal
The United Kingdom conducted a government-wide damage assessment following the spying by former Canadian naval officer Jeffery Paul Delisle, according to documents obtained by CBC News
Using access to information requests in several countries, CBC News gathered information about what the so-called Five Eyes intelligence community thought about Delisle.
The intelligence allies include Canada, Australia, New Zealand, the United Kingdom and the United States.
Delisle pleaded guilty last October to one count of breach of trust and two charges of passing information to a foreign entity that could harm Canada's interest. He sold secrets to Russia for over four years.
In February, Delisle was given a 20-year prison sentence.
The British government has released six redacted documents. They show there were a number of questions the U.K.’s defence intelligence office wanted answered by the Canadian government.
The documents show Canada's allies have closed ranks when it comes to talking about Delisle. Apart from the "top secret" title, everything except the number of questions were redacted with long lines of x’s.
"Potentially the results could be of significance not just for XXXX," read one document.
"I met with XXXX when I was back in the U.K. and have already started comparing these XXXX," read another.
"I was rather under the impression that XXXX could be a case of crossed wires."
The British documents do show there was probably concern from Canada’s allies, but the documents do not shed any light on the level of that jeopardy.
At Delisle’s trial, several people testified the former sub-lieutenant damaged Canada's intelligence-gathering abilities as well as its relations with allies.
His lawyers downplayed the scope of the security breach.
During the trial, written damage assessments by Brig.-Gen. Rob Williams, director-general of military signals intelligence, were presented as evidence.
They said the spy affair puts Canada's relationship with its partners in jeopardy