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Defence Secretary newspaper visit sparks tight security

Security was tight when a VIP dropped in for a chat at the Evening Press offices in York.

Police surrounded the paper’s city offices while Defence Secretary Geoff Hoon was locked away in an office with blinds drawn and armed security posted outside.

The minister had approached the paper offering to talk and be interviewed on the Government’s stance on Son of Star Wars, the American national missile defence project.

The Evening Press has been campaigning against the project’s use of the Fylingdales early warning station on the North York Moors because it could make North Yorkshire a target in any major conflict.

Special branch officers had visited the Evening Press headquarters the previous week to check security, and sniffer dogs were brought in to check the building hours before the visit.

The minister and his entourage – a party of 14 including York MP Hugh Bayley – spent 30 minutes explaining the Government’s views on the defence system to editor Liz Page and features editor/writer Chris Titley.

Earlier in the day Geoff Hoon had visited the Fylingdales radar base and met members of Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament and other protesters in a local pub.

Evening Press photographer Nigel Holland was one of the motorists caught in a massive police dragnet on the bleak moorland road passing by the spy base.

After explaining who he was and why he was there, he was photographed by a police photographer nearby. Holland responded by getting out his camera and photographing the photographer and other police officers.

And when he finally did get his news pictures, he was questioned again as he tried to wire images from his laptop in a public lay-by.

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