Foreign Secretary David Miliband has admitted that two secret CIA rendition flights did land on British soil, despite years of denials that any of the so-called "ghost flights" had ever touched down on British territory.

Prime Minister Gordon Brown said he "shared the disappointment that everybody has" about the stops. Brown, speaking in Brussels, Belgium, said he had just been informed.

"The important thing now is we put in place the best possible procedures to ensure that this will not happen again," he said.

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Mr Miliband told the Commons this afternoon that in 2002 the two flights landed at a joint US-UK military base called Camp Justice on the British overseas territory of Diego Garcia, in the Indian Ocean, to refuel, contrary to previous American assurances.

One flight was en route to Guantanamo Bay, and the other to Morocco.

"In both cases, a US plane with a single detainee on board refuelled at the US facilities at Diego Garcia," Mr Miliband said.

He said neither was a British national or resident. One was now in Guantanamo Bay while the other had been released, he added.

"Extraordinary rendition" is the CIA term for the kidnapping of terrorist suspects for interrogation abroad.

Some have allegedly been subjected to illegal torture techniques including "water boarding" in third-party countries where such practices are not illegal.

The Government has always said that such flights would break British law and had assured MPs and human rights campaigners that none has ever taken place from UK soil or landed at a British base for refuelling.

Diego Garcia, a tiny island 40 miles long in the Indian Ocean, is owned by Britain.

After the enforced depopulation of the island, it was turned into an airbase to protect oil supplies to the West during the Cold War.

Now it is used for refuelling bombers on operations in Iraq and Afghanistan.

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