Just over a week ago I looked at the implications of a High Court ruling in London overturning the British government decision to drop an investigation into alleged bribery and corruption in a major deal between arms maker BAE Systems and Saudi Arabia.

Now we have the Serious Fraud Office announcing that it will appeal against that High Court ruling that said it acted "unlawfully" when it dropped investigations into alleged bribery and corruption involving BAE Systems and Saudi Arabian arms dealings.

That's despite the warning from Transparency International, Action Aid, CAFOD, Christian Aid, Global Witness and Oxfam that any appeal would cause all sorts of further damage to the UK's reputation.

"We believe that any move by the Government to seek an appeal, or to pressurise the SFO to do so, would compound the reputational damage to the UK. It would also undermine implementation of the United Nations Convention against Corruption, where tensions between developed and developing countries have already slowed progress. Corruption threatens democracies and human rights. It erodes development and destroys lives and livelihoods, especially of the poor. It puts businesses and their employees at risk, and it weakens the integrity of markets."

But then, all the British Government is doing is just looking after business and its Saudi friends.