Timeline of the David Shayler saga

David Shayler is planning a return to Britain

As former MI5 officer David Shayler prepares to unveil plans to return from France to the UK, the BBC charts the events leading to his time in exile.

1995: MI5 officer David Shayler leaves the Intelligence Service. He is alleged to have taken MI5 documents with him.

August 1997:Mr Shayler reveals damning details of MI5 operations in a Sunday newspaper. They include the accusation that the government kept secret files on politicians who are now cabinet ministers.

1998: He accuses MI5 of failing to react to an impending terrorist attack on the Israeli Embassy in 1994. He also recounts how MI6 officers plotted an assassination attempt against Libyan leader Colonel Gaddafi in 1996.

August 1998:Mr Shayler is arrested in France and held without charge for nearly four months in a Paris jail.

September 1998: The story of David Shayler is published on his official website.

November 1998: The UK Government's attempts to extradite Mr Shayler are rejected by a French court.

January 1999: David Shayler continues to live with his girlfriend Annie Machon, a former MI5 officer, in a remote farmhouse in France.

February 2000: The government issues a writ against Shayler for breaches of confidence, contract and copyright laws on files held by MI5 and the British overseas secret service, MI6.

March 2000:Mr Shayler's girlfriend hands a dossier of documents he has prepared about the alleged Gaddafi assassination plot into the headquarters of Special Branch.

May 2000: To mark his 1,000th day in what he calls "political exile", Shayler plans to mount a crucifix outside the British Embassy in Paris in protest of his treatment by the British Government.