Max Hastings ‘banned’ from Afghanistan

Is Sir Max Hastings, the distinguished war correspondent and former editor of the Daily Telegraph, being prevented from visiting the battlefields of Afghanistan by Defence Secretary Des Browne? He thinks so. In a column in yesterday's Daily Mail, Hastings, who has reported conflicts in the Falkland Islands and Northern Ireland, and is one of the most informed of media commentators on military matters, said that he had not been to the country since September 2006 "because the Defence Secretary declines to allow me to visit the army there".

He told The First Post today: "I asked to go, as I've so often gone to British battlefields all over the world, and was told that while the army was keen, the political end of the MoD wouldn't have it."

The MoD press office maintains that it is baffled. "I've looked through the logs and he hasn't made an official application," claims a spokesman, Tim Wiseman. But The First Post is reliably informed that MoD mandarins do not want expert journalists like Hastings visiting the war zone when they are being so critical of the political strategy for the Afghan mission. As Hastings wrote for the Daily Mail yesterday, "The Government deceived us on its way into this war. It must not be allowed to do so again on the way out."