Prime Minister orders inquiry into Dubai hit squad's fake UK passports

A commander in the Hamas organisation, Mahmoud al-Mabhouh, was assasinated in the Gulf state last month.

Two British citizens, whose passports were apparently used by the hit squad, have expressed shock after they were named among 11 suspects identified by Dubai police.

The Prime Minister said: "We are looking at this at this very moment."

"We have got to carry out a full investigation into this. The British passport is an important document that has got to be held with care," he told London's LBC Radio.

"The evidence has got to be assembled about what has actually happened and how it happened and why it happened and it is necessary for us to accumulate that evidence before we can make statements."

Former Liberal Democrat leader Sir Menzies Campbell, who is also a member of the Commons Foreign Affairs Committee, said the Government should fully investigate suggestions that the Israeli government had played some part in the assassinations.

"If the Israeli government was party to behaviour of this kind it would be a serious violation of trust between nations," he said.

"If legitimate British passport holders were put at risk it would be a disgrace.

"Given the current speculation, the Israeli government has some explaining to do and the ambassador should be summoned to the Foreign Office to do so in double-quick time."