Britain’s top spy within the IRA committed ‘grotesque, serious crime’ including torture and murder with MI5‘s knowledge, a report has concluded.

Long described as the Army’s ‘golden egg’, the agent, codenamed ‘Stakeknife’, was directly linked to at least 13 murders in his role in the IRA’s ‘nutting squad’ – or ‘internal security unit’ – which abducted, tortured and killed suspected informers.

Following a nine-year investigation, an official report today revealed that MI5’s role in running the agent was not ‘peripheral’, as the security service had long claimed.

Instead, MI5 was ‘involved in briefing and tasking Stakeknife via the [Army] throughout his operation as an agent.’

The Operation Kenova investigation examined the activities of Stakeknife, widely named as Belfast republican Freddie Scappaticci, and found his actions cost more lives than he saved.

Scappaticci died aged 77 in 2023.

The report concluded that MI5 may have attempted to ‘conceal the truth’ around Stakeknife after disclosing new material last year when decisions on prosecutions relating to the agent had already been made.

This was ‘the culmination of several incidents that were capable of being negatively construed as attempts by MI5 to restrict the investigation, run down the clock, avoid any prosecutions relating to Stakeknife,’ the report said.

Despite detailing the extent of his offending while in the pay of the Army and MI5, Scappaticci has never been formally named as Stakeknife in accordance with the British government’s ‘neither confirm nor deny’ policy [NCND] relating to security matters.

Following publication of the Kenova report today, Sir Iain Livingstone, who took over the investigation from Jon Boutcher when he became chief constable of the Police Service of Northern Ireland [PSNI], said there is a ‘compelling ethical case for the UK Government to derogate from the Neither Confirm Nor Deny (NCND) policy regarding the agent Stakeknife’s identity.’

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Freddie Scappaticci, known to be Stakeknife, was described as the Army’s ‘golden egg’

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The west Belfast republican, seen here at an IRA funeral alongside Gerry Adams, began spying for the British in the 1970s and continued until the 1990s

He added: ‘It is in the public interest that Stakeknife is named.’

The report also found that MI5 had a ‘perverse sense of loyalty’ to the agent and even took him on holiday on two occasions at taxpayers’ expense when they knew police wanted to question him on suspicion of murder.

Responding to the report’s findings, MI5 director general Sir Ken McCallum offered sympathies ‘to the victims and families of those who were tortured or killed by the Provisional IRA’s internal security unit during the Troubles’.

Kenova was launched in 2016. But following the publication of an interim report last year, MI5 said it had discovered hundreds of new documents on Stakeknife, which were not previously disclosed to Operation Kenova.

Sir Ken added: ‘Regrettably, after this extensive disclosure process was complete, we discovered additional relevant information.

‘MI5 informed Kenova and shared the material without delay.

‘I apologised to Sir Iain Livingstone, and asked former Metropolitan Police Assistant Commissioner Helen Ball QPM to conduct an independent review to establish why the additional material had not been initially found.

‘This review concluded that none of the material was deliberately withheld, but made recommendations on how MI5 could improve its processes for the future.’

Kenova found that Stakeknife met his handlers on average once every seven or eight days and he was so important that the Army set up a dedicated unit to deal with his intelligence known as the ‘rat hole’.

MI5 even had a permanent member of staff located in the ‘rat hole’.

Stakeknife was paid tens of thousands of pounds by his handlers and they even helped him purchase property and discussed ways he could obscure the ownership of his assets so as to protect them against potential future legal claims.

Scappaticci worked as an agent from the 1970s until the 1990s when he finally aroused the suspicions of the IRA.

His identity was revealed in the media in 2003 and he was resettled in Guildford, Surrey, by MI5 who provided him with a detached house and a Mercedes.

The report concluded that Stakeknife’s Army handlers ‘routinely massaged his ego… saying if he stopped reporting the loss would be felt throughout the intelligence world.’

In a press conference in Belfast following publication of the report, Mr Boutcher said that the government’s refusal to name Scappaticci as Stakeknife ‘is untenable and bordering on farce.’