"The judges made clear they were deeply unhappy with their decision, but said they had no alternative as a result of a statement by David Miliband, the foreign secretary, that if the evidence was disclosed the US would stop sharing intelligence with Britain. That would directly threaten the UK's national security, Miliband had told the court.

"This afternoon David Davis, the Conservative MP and former shadow home secretary, said ministers must urgently respond to the allegations that Britain was complicit in torture. He demanded a Commons statement from the government on the ruling, calling it "a matter of utmost national importance".

"Davis said: 'The ruling implies that torture has taken place in the [Binyam] Mohamed case, that British agencies may have been complicit, and further, that the United States government has threatened our high court that if it releases this information the US government will withdraw its intelligence cooperation with the United Kingdom.

"He told the BBC: 'The government is going to have to do some pretty careful explaining about what's going on."

"The judges said today that they found it 'difficult to conceive' the rationale for the US's objections to releasing the information, which contained 'no disclosure of sensitive intelligence matters' about how US officials treated detainees.

" 'Indeed, we did not consider that a democracy governed by the rule of law would expect a court in another democracy to suppress a summary of the evidence contained in reports by its own officials ... relevant to allegations of torture and cruel, inhumane or degrading treatment, politically embarrassing though it might be,' they said.

"The judges said they had been taken aback by the severity of the threat made by the US government.

"In another part of the ruling, the judges said lawyers for Miliband had told them the threat to withdraw cooperation remained in place under the new administration of President Barack Obama."