UN says British bugging 'illegal if true'

British bugging of UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan’s office is illegal if proved to be true, the world body said today.

Annan wants the practice to stop, “if indeed it exists,” said his spokesman Fred Eckhard at UN headquarters in New York.

“We would be disappointed if this were true,” Eckhard said of the allegation by a former British Cabinet minister.

“Such activities would undermine the integrity and confidential nature of diplomatic exchanges.

"Those who speak to the secretary-general are entitled to assume that their exchanges are confidential.”

Clare Short, who resigned as international development secretary shortly after last year’s campaign to topple Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein, claimed British intelligence agents spied on Annan in the run-up to the Iraq war.

Blair refused to say whether the allegation was true, but called Short “deeply irresponsible”.