Health

UK government refuses to hand over WhatsApp messages to COVID inquiry

Reuters By Sachin Ravikumar and Alistair Smout,

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Tags
covid-19
Censorship
United Kingdom
Rishi Sunak

British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak's government on Thursday said it would not hand over internal WhatsApp messages requested by a public inquiry into its handling of the COVID-19 pandemic and instead seek a legal challenge against the demand.

The inquiry, ordered by the government itself in 2021 and chaired by a former judge, had given the government a 1500 GMT deadline to hand over the documents.

But the Cabinet Office said the COVID-19 inquiry was going beyond its remit and that the WhatsApp messages and other records it was requesting were "unambiguously irrelevant".