Foreign and Commonwealth Office

The complainant requested documents held by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) which are authored or owned by a named individual and contain the word “Iraq”. The FCO released five documents in redacted form and withheld one in full, citing the exemptions in sections 27 (international relations), 40 (personal information) and 43 (commercial interests). Having investigated, the Commissioner has decided that the information withheld under section 43 was not within the scope of the request. He also found that the information to which sections 27 and 40 was applied was correctly withheld. However, he identified a series of procedural shortcomings on the part of the public authority relating to delay and failure adequately to specify exemptions. He requires no steps to be taken.