Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, for what reasons his Department took seven years to respond to freedom of information request entitled FCO 37/3979 Training of the Sri Lankan military in the UK.

The Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) received a request for access to information held on file reference FCO 37/3979 in June 2018. A response was issued four months later in October 2018. The material in question is subject to ongoing legal proceedings under the Freedom of Information Act 2000. We cannot comment on ongoing legal cases.