Foreign &
Commonwealth
Office
11 March 2009
Zimbabwe Unit
Our reference: 0978-08
Africa Directorate
King Charles Street
London
Mr Stephen Nash
SW1A 2AH
By email:
[FOI #4613 email]
Dear Mr Nash,
You requested an internal review of the decision, conveyed to you in a letter sent by email of
2 February 2009, not to disclose information the FCO holds
“on Mr Nicholas Van
Hoogstraten especially in relation to his companies in Zimbabwe” under the Freedom of
Information Act 2000.
I have conducted a full examination of all the material, both released and exempted, of
relevance to your request. I have concluded the following.
Search for information
Searches for information were conducted electronically and by hand in FCO archives.
Searches for material were conducted by all relevant departments including in Zimbabwe
Unit and in the British Embassy in Harare. I am therefore content that a reasonable search
was carried out in relation to your request.
Use of exemptions
We withheld information under section 35(1)(a) and section 40(2) and (3). In our letter of
reply of 2 February we explained we were withholding information under Section 35(1)(a) –
formulation of government policy, our letter explained that the public interest test had been
applied. The information in question relates to an area of government policy on which
discussions are ongoing and decisions are yet to be made, these factors outweighed the public
interest in releasing the information, we still believe this to be the case.
As was explained in our previous letter Section 40(2) and (3) do not require us to apply the
public interest test, we maintain that the information we hold is not releasable under this
exemption.
If you are not content with the outcome of this Internal Review you have the right to apply
directly to the Information Commissioner for a decision. The Information Commissioner can
be contacted at:
Information Commissioner’s Office
Wycliffe House
Water Lane
Wilmslow
Cheshire SK9 5AF
Yours sincerely,
Geoffrey Harrison
Zimbabwe Unit
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