Downing Street pressed for more detail of donors named in Liam Fox report

The report naming six companies has raised questions about their identities and links to the Pargav slush fund Downing Street faces growing pressure to definitively identify a company named in the report by the cabinet secretary, Gus O’Donnell, into Liam Fox’s links with his best man, Adam Werritty. The former cabinet minister Peter Hain demanded that ministers clarify who is behind the company, IRG Ltd. The report’s publication on Tuesday was intended to draw a line under the furore around Fox’s links with Werritty, which led to Fox resigning as defence secretary. But the report, which named the six companies and individuals that funded Werritty’s Pargav “slush fund”, has raised more unanswered questions. Among the Pargav donors, including the mining tycoon Mick Davis, private investigations firm G3 and billionaire property mogul Poju Zabludowicz, is a company referred to as simply “IRG Ltd”. More than 30 companies and organisations use the same initials, including an Iraq-focused charity, an executive recruitment agency linked to the former Tory minister Virginia Bottomley and a pizza restaurant in Basildon. On Thursday , Hain put down a parliamentary question for the Cabinet Office minister, Francis Maude, demanding he “explain the nature and purpose of IRG Ltd”. Hain said: “The tentacles of this scandal spread even further and the government must come clean on what IRG is. There is no reason for the Cabinet Office to say it knows what IRG is, but not to admit it in public.” Among those being scrutinised is International Resources Group, a US company that claims it “organised and synthesised Afghanistan’s constitutional and religious, secular, and customary laws” after the fall of the Taliban. International Resources Group has refused to return the Guardian’s calls for the last three days. The Guardian visited IRG’s offices at a New York skyscraper and was refused entry by security guards. Its website, IRGltd.com , says it is “an L-3 company”. L-3 has denied that International Resources Group is the same IRG Ltd that funded Pargav. L-3 is a hi-tech telecommunications company in which the Tory donor Michael Hintze’s CQS hedge fund has had a $34m investment. In July, Fox told parliament that the Ministry of Defence would go ahead with plans to award a contract to L-3 to provide the MoD with new rivet joint aircraft to replace Nimrod. A spokesman for CQS, which has been extensively linked to Werritty, said Hintze had “no idea” whether the IRG company named by O’Donnell was the same IRG that is owned by L-3 in which CQS holds an investment. Hintze’s charitable foundation was the biggest single donor to the Atlantic Bridge, the now-defunct charity that appears to have supported Werritty’s jetset lifestyle before the creation of Pargav. Werritty ran the Atlantic Bridge from inside CQS’s plush offices over looking Buckingham Palace. Oliver Hylton, one of Hintze’s closest aides and the manager of his charitable foundation, arranged for Werritty to be given a desk in CQS’s HQ. Hylton, who has been suspended by CQS, was the company secretary of Pargav, which funded Werritty’s first class flights and five star hotels on trips to accompany Fox on official visits abroad. Last week Hylton handed over details of Pargav’s funding to the media. CQS declined to ask Hylton to identify IRG. Another IRG Ltd is a UK company which trades as Odgers Berndston, an executive recruitment agency and it counts former Conservative health secretary, Virginia Bottomley, as a director. It too has denied any connection to Pargav. A third organisation, the Iraq Research Group, said to be led by Stephen Crouch, the former chairman of the Tory Party’s Camarthen West and South Pembrokeshire constituency, has been identified in media reports as a possible candidate. The Guardian has been unable to contact Crouch. Simon Hart, the MP for Camarthen West, said Crouch used to make frequent trips to Iraq and said it was understood locally that he had a background in the military or intelligence. “We always thought he was working for the programme rebuilding Iraq and that he was working for an American company,” Hart said. Hart said Crouch once helped arrange a £5,000 donation to the local party from Tony Buckingham, an oil tycoon with interests in Kurdistan. A search of company records shows that almost 30 companies registered in the UK use the initials IRG. A Cabinet Office spokesman said: No 10 knows which organisation it is, but will not make it public. “We are not going to go into the detail of the people or organisations that are in the report.” A spokesman at Conservative central office said: “The Conservative party has no idea who IRG is.” Liam Fox and Adam Werritty links Liam Fox Adam Werritty Rupert Neate Robert Booth Karen McVeigh Gus O’Donnell guardian.co.uk

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