London, December 30

A former British spy has claimed that the Paris terror strikes last month were an inside job by western intelligence rather than by Islamic State (ISIS).

David Shayler, formerly with MI5, has released a video on YouTube claiming there is evidence that a "dark design" was behind the attacks on November 13, which claimed 130 lives.

"I think there is some dark design in the pattern of the attacks that took place in Paris on Friday, November 13. Once again it has been blamed on ISIS, but it appears to bear all the hallmarks of a Gladio-style operation," the 49-year-old claims in the video titled 'Shayler the Christ speaks to the Nation'.

According to a 'Daily Express' report, Operation Gladio was the codename for a clandestine NATO operation in Italy during the Cold War era to prepare for and carry out armed resistance there in the event of a Warsaw Pact invasion and conquest.

Claims that alleged terrorist attacks in Italy during the Cold War were actually carried out by secret NATO officers have been subject to parliamentary inquiries in Switzerland and Belgium.

Shayler resigned from MI5 after five years working there in 1996 and went on to leak a series of details about MI5 operations, including claims MI6, was involved in a February 1996 failed assassination of former Libyan dictator Colonel Gaddafi.

MI5 is British intelligence agency working to protect the UK's national security against threats such as terrorism and espionage.

In the latest video, Shayler also suggests that the two-hour siege by French police in the wake of the attacks had been staged.

"They [attackers] left ID. They would have been highly trained not to leave ID, so anyone who believes that has got to be pretty gullible," he said.

Since his leaks of intelligence information, the former spy went on to become a cross-dresser and made some outlandish claims, including that he is a reincarnation of Jesus Christ.

He also declared that all four attack sites in the French capital were his former haunts and indicated that they may have been chosen to target him.

"Did they deliberately plan to hit those places to map out over Paris a cross that would pass over where I used to live...to scare me.

"Now people might find that fanciful and egotistical, but I think that is a perfectly valid interpretation of the data that we have," he claims. — PTI