POLICE are investigating a website that sells fake passports after it was falsely linked to a North-East stamp collector

The immigration service has also been made aware of the Vista International Success Agency website after it was found to have links with an address in Teesdale, County Durham.

A Internet directory listed contact details for the agency as belonging to Gordon Bonnett, 67, from Upper Teesdale, who runs an Internet site specialising in foreign stamps

The agency offers passports for countries that no longer exist, such as Rhodesia and Burma.

The passports cost up to £415, and the website suggests they could be used by Western tourists who want to protect their nationality when confronted with "terrorists, weirdos, angry mobs, anti-wealth zealots or hijackers".

The website said the passports were legal, but warned that using them as travel documents was illegal.

The agency was reported to police after an Indian web directory gave Mr Bonnett's details as a contact for the company.

Police are now investigating the website and have passed details to the immigration service.

An immigration services spokesman said: "I think immigration officers will be well trained in what is and what is not a valid travel document, and will certainly be able to recognise one that is fake.

"I would imagine the information that has been provided by police about these documents will be passed on to immigration officers across the country.

"However, it would not be up to the immigration services to prosecute if the passports are illegal. That would be a matter for the police and the Crown Prosecution Service."

The agency website also offers a mail-forwarding service that lists sites around the world.

One is in Barnard Castle, and offers a PO box number as well as a street address, which costs £24 a month, with a £21 deposit.

Although, Mr Bonnett also offers a small mail-forwarding service for travellers and expatriates on his website, www.maganstamps.co.uk, he has nothing to do with the agency.

He said: "As part of my stamp-collecting, I get a lot of parcels, and so I thought it would be an idea to offer this mail-drop as I am used to a lot of mail.

"I have no knowledge of this passport company and have been co-operating with police. It seems they have lifted my name and address and used it without my permission."

Other services offered by the agency include immigration advice and the chance to buy a piece of the moon, alien-abduction insurance, offshore accounts and nobility titles.

No one from the agency was available for comment yesterday, and a London phone number given on an Internet directory as a contact number was unavailable.