BRITAIN: Britain's top policeman, already under pressure over the mistaken shooting of a suspected suicide bomber, faced calls to quit yesterday for secretly recording a phone call with the country's senior legal adviser.
Sir Ian Blair, London's police chief, also recorded calls with members of a commission investigating the shooting last July of Brazilian Jean Charles de Menezes, his office said.
The revelations have prompted calls from some quarters for Sir Ian, who took charge of London's 30,000-strong force only last February, to quit.
A police spokesman said that last September Sir Ian had secretly taped a call from attorney general Peter Goldsmith, which media reports said had centred on the admissibility of telephone wire tap evidence in British courts.
Mr Goldsmith said he had spoken to the police commissioner yesterday and had received an explanation and apology. "As far as the attorney is concerned, the matter is closed," a spokeswoman for Mr Goldsmith said.
A statement released by the police chief's office said: "He [ Sir Ian] thought that they would be discussing a complex issue and, as he was without a note-taker, it would be helpful to have a record of the conversation."
The police also said Sir Ian had taped three calls with members of the Independent Police Complaints Commission, a government-funded watchdog investigating his conduct after the de Menezes shooting.
Sir Ian's fate rests with the Metropolitan Police Authority, which oversees the London police force.
However, he was given the full backing of his namesake, prime minister Tony Blair, who discussed Mr de Menezes's shooting with Brazilian president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva during his visit to London last week.
"What's important is we recognise controversy is not new to the position of being commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, because it is a difficult role," Mr Blair's spokesman said.
The police chief has been under growing pressure since Mr de Menezes (27) an electrician, was shot dead on a London Underground train last July 22nd by officers who mistook him for a suspected suicide bomber. - (Reuters)