BRITAIN’S most senior Asian policeman was illegally bugged and spied on in a clandestine operation sanctioned by Sir Ian Blair, the Metropolitan police commissioner, according to leaked Scotland Yard documents.

The papers allege that Tarique Ghaffur, an assistant commissioner, had more than 300 of his telephone calls tapped in an elaborate but fruitless operation directly overseen by Blair. Ghaffur was codenamed Vivaldi.

He was photographed and taped as he attended more than 30 meetings with a fellow officer at restaurants and cafes in west London.

The document is a summary of allegations drawn up by Ghaffur’s lawyers as they prepare this week to announce formal legal proceedings for race discrimination against Blair, who was placed under formal investigation by the Home Office this month. The move followed revelations in The Sunday Times that he had been involved in the process that led to £3m of police contracts being given by the Met to his friend Andy Miller.

Ghaffur is claiming that he was singled out for surveillance because of his race. He says in the document that he was later sidelined in his role as the Met’s head of specialist crime and then in effect sacked as its head of security planning for the 2012 Olympics.

It states: “AC Ghaffur was the subject of direct surveillance and given a pseudo name. This was a direct attack on his honesty and integrity.”

Although the surveillance operation was officially targeted at another officer, Ghaffur alleges that it was designed to trap him in a compromising position.

False rumours had been circulating for years about his private life, and Ghaffur’s legal team feels the illegal bugging operation was a “fishing” expedition designed to substantiate them.

Officially the operation was targeted against Ali Dizaei, who was wrongly suspected of having contacts with prostitutes, corruption and spying for Iranian intelligence.

Ghaffur, who was the senior Yard officer responsible for signing off on surveillance operations, claims that Blair was hoping to trap him into indiscretions even though he did not have the proper legal authority to monitor him.

In December 2006 a judge chairing the investigatory powers tribunal ruled that the entire operation against Dizaei was illegal.

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