what happened to katharine gun husband
Hood uses chemistry among each character to bring them to life. That accountability is key. Whistleblower Katharine Gun and journalist Martin Bright are interviewed for their new movie Official Secrets for the film's LFF screening. Lets find out! The side of that history that Gun didnt really know in its fullest detail until she worked on the film was the drama of how the story made it into the pages of the Observer. [5] While waiting to hear whether she would be charged, Gun embarked on a postgraduate degree course in global ethics at the University of Birmingham. We still dont know who within the American administration ordered the operation. [8] The plan might have contravened Articles 22 and 27 of the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations, which regulates global diplomacy. And all of a sudden his safe, you know, this civil servant wife is in a whole lot of bother that he never expected to have to deal with. Zooey Zephyr, Montanas First Trans Lawmaker, Speaks Out After Being Banned & Silenced by Republicans, Rising Tide of Fascism: Tennessee Rep. Justin Jones Warns of GOPs Growing Embrace of Authoritarianism, Courage Is Contagious: Zooey Zephyr & Justin Jones on the GOPs Silencing of State Lawmakers, Provocative & Dangerous: Biden to Send Nuclear-Armed Subs to South Korea as Activists Demand Peace, Oklahoma Parole Board Denies Clemency for Richard Glossip, Rejecting Plea from State Attorney General. And they had already taken him down into the custody suite, which is, by the way, where I had been before, Gun revealed. MARTIN BRIGHT: I did, yes. This is Democracy Now! Starring Kiera Knightley, Matt Smith, Matthew Goode, and Ralph Fiennes in pivotal roles, the film is one of the more accurate cinematic explorations of real-life instances. Initially, Gun decided to teach Mandarin Chinese in Britain. AMY GOODMAN: Well, explain that. So, you are there standing alone in the dock. In 2003, Gun was working as a translator of Mandarin at the government intelligence agency, GCHQ, in Cheltenham. I hope, when shes ready for this story, she will. Katharine Gun leaked that memo to the Observer, in the belief that the revelation of the proposed bugging and blackmail tactics might be enough to stop the war. We didnt talk about politics much. "[15], In September 2019 Ken Macdonald, the former director of public prosecutions, said the case against Gun was not dropped in order to stop the Attorney General's advice on the legality of the Iraq War from being revealed. After the case was dropped I did some media for 24 hours and then I immediately decided to run away and hide and not pursue the story any more. Thats [inaudible]. We pay respect by giving voice to social justice, acknowledging our shared history and valuing the cultures of First Nations. Does she tell her story when she meets new people? Katharine Gun - who's played by Keira Knightley in a forthcoming film - blew the whistle on a dodgy scheme by the American government. Considering the support it has received from its central character and the journalist who helped get the story published, 'Official Secrets' is an accurate dive into the events that happened. But, you know, these things happen. Enter Katharine Gun. I was aware I was doing something I wasnt supposed to be doing. Protesters against the invasion of Iraq, February 2003. We speak with a British whistleblower whose attempts to expose lies about the Iraq invasion was called "the most important and courageous leak" in history by. Her story, which reveals what a country will do when it wants war and claims it does not, is told in an updated book and a major motion picture soon to be released Official . Soon after, they moved to Turkey in 2011, and for the most part, the family has stayed away from the public eye. 2023 Guardian News & Media Limited or its affiliated companies. And Im saying, Ben, but how did you know, when you called for those documents, that theyd be there? And theres this pause. Just trying to figure out what to do next. Maybe there will be sympathy.. MARTIN BRIGHT: this was the real deal. So I saw people going in and coming out and going in and coming out. GAVIN HOOD: By Ralph Fiennes. Watching the film was like watching a case that was very similar to my own: Katharine Gun, photographed last month in Durham. Language links are at the top of the page across from the title. First day, what did you feel? But this is not the issue. Strange Hollywood person. We do not accept funding from advertising, underwriting or government agencies. [12] At the time, the reasons for the Attorney-General to drop the case were murky. So her moral certainty was rooted in those formative experiences? And I can remember sitting back and thinking, This guy is not all there. ED VULLIAMY: Its a story of endeavor, to no avail. In its absence, Tony Blair won another election in 2005. Ben Emmerson decides the way to defend Katharine Gun is to ask for Lord Goldsmiths documents. Mr. Davies, in his book, has done more recently, AMY GOODMAN: And he said to you, Martin, at least in the film, This will jeopardize our access.. When you think, Oh, well, I wish we tried hard with the Americanwith our American colleagues. She becomes the corporate sister-daughter, she dives into the power suit and high-waisted pants or Katharine Hepburn moment. And yet this rather shy 30-year-old leaked details of an alleged plot to bug UN delegates before the Iraq war and was sacked from her . You know, lets say Iyoure a bit of a gambler, arent you? AMY GOODMAN: What did you think about your own prime minister? Gun is not active on social media and occasionally participates in small-scale conferences and discussions pertaining to politics. KATHARINE GUN: My MP, yes, at the time. Now, the defense of necessity is usually used in very more simple circumstances. Ten years ago, a young Mandarin specialist at GCHQ, the government's surveillance centre in Cheltenham, did something extraordinary. MARTIN BRIGHT: We didI tell you what, though, we did feel that we had failed. GAVIN HOOD: These are representatives at the U.N.. Theres no doubt. And so, I immediately went home, and Iand at the time, actually, well, my dad was staying with me, because it was Chinese New Year, and he was back from Taiwan, and he was supporting me, so he was at home. Official Secrets, directed by Gavin Hood, is the third in a loose trilogy of political . Mary Katherine Higdon of Griffin, Georgia, was arrested for the murder of her live-in boyfriend, Steven Freeman. MARTIN BRIGHT: Yeah, I mean, the story doesnt end. AMY GOODMAN: The San Francisco Film Festival. And my husband was desperately worried about what was going on. And so he went to Elizabeth and had a cup of tea, as you do in England. We are defending ourselves. As of 2020[update] Gun lives in Turkey and Britain. We can all have a view on Saddam Hussein and whether he should be deposed or not. There was a feeling ofas what you felt, Ed, in this case, yeah. KATHARINE GUN: So, on Wednesday morning, I called in sick. AMY GOODMAN: the person in charge of news. And I had already not been able to eat for about 24 hours. Theyre going to send him back to Turkey. He was Kurdishhe is Kurdish. And I went back, and I felt worse that day at home. And I had to thank her forI mean, you know, in totally selfish terms, helping me break the biggest story of my life. KATHARINE GUN: Need I say more? And she said, I have to go, mostlyto find strong female characters, I have to go back 100 and 200 years and wear a corset to play a strong female character. And she said, This isI want to do this, because its a strong female character not in a corset. There is a Guardian Live preview screening with Katharine Gun, Gavin Hood and Martin Bright on 12 October. GAVIN HOOD: Chile, Bulgaria, Angola, Cameroon, Pakistan, Mexico. As of 2019[update] she has lived in Turkey with her husband and daughter for several years. What's more, her decision and movement to expose lies about the Iraq invasion made it be titled as the courageous and vital leak as per Democracy Now. It was very difficult initially. AMY GOODMAN: And when did that come out? The day before the trial, Gun's defence team had asked the government for any records of legal advice about the lawfulness of the war that it had received during the run-up to the war. And so, but theres another irony about the position of the attorney general, which is, the director of public prosecutions in Britain generally has real autonomy in deciding what cases to prosecute, except in cases of the Official Secrets Act, when he or she must get the authorization of the attorney general to prosecute. In the very typical British manner, we just pretended we had never met, she recalled. AMY GOODMAN: So, theyre processing him. Because it offered her both a resolution, and none? KATHARINE GUN: Well, yeah, yeah. So, you know, it doesnt end, as Martin said. And I went back to Martin. She has a younger brother who teaches in Taiwan. MARTIN BRIGHT: Yeah, I mean, around that time. A film, Official Secrets, has been made of her story. He succumbed to his wounds and Knight dragged his body downstairs, skinned him, and hung his body from a meat hook in the living room. AMY GOODMAN: They said you could have pled. The author advocates anonymity. And I managed to get through to his assistant. Laggies. I mean, thats why MartinI remember Martin and Ed. (In fact, those -our and -ise endings had been introduced by an Observer editorial assistant, innocently following house style guidelines as she copied out the memo into the system.) Bright has also been closely involved with the film. She knows what it's like to have her face slapped, her bones broken and her nose bloodied by her former bully of a husband, an active Marine Colonel and a man who she claims is "above the law and literally gets away with murder." Film-makers generally like to glamorise newspaper offices, making them All the Presidents Men hothouses of high-level argument and intrigue. How did she go about rebuilding her life? Within half an hour, the case was dropped because the prosecution declined to offer evidence. Ahead of a new film, Official Secrets, the GCHQ worker who tried to prevent the 2003 invasion of Iraq recalls those feverish days and their consequences Keira Knightley on playing whistleblower Katharine Gun: Iraq was the first time Id been politically engaged. And you said in places like Chile. And so, a lot, a lot later. MARTIN BRIGHT: You know, I mean, you dont want to get too conspiratorial about this. You have the U.S. in the longest war in U.S. history, in Afghanistan. Just occasionally Gun is invited to speak at conferences organised by the likes of accuracy.org or VIPS (the Veterans Intelligence Professionals for Sanity). Most people do. If you are a journalist, check and double-check your sources. The Observer published the dirty tricks memo as a front-page splash just over two weeks before the invasion. AMY GOODMAN: And so, you had to sell this. Shes pregnant. I wonder what she made of the scattershot download methods of Edward Snowden and Julian Assange? That is a difficult question, she says. Oh, yeah. AMY GOODMAN: And what did you tell Katharine at that time? But yeah, I mean, I was hugely impressed. This is viewer supported news. Is that when you both met? But as we said last night, this is the purpose of Albert Camuss great story La Peste, when Dr. Rieux is given the child dying of plague. Her father had studied Chinese at Durham University and now teaches at Tunghai University in the city of Taichung, central Taiwan. Ralph Fiennes, fantastic, wonderful actor. Gun, too, had expressed relief that the events are now part of a broader discussion due to the film and that she can finally talk about it without stress. Does she think that was a unique belief among colleagues at GCHQ? But you areis this part of the film true, where you have the authorities come in and say, Were questioning everyone, because someone here did this.. So, where is Gun now? How dodo they join the dots? This was all cooked up, unpublished and. What were your thoughts then? The Case Against Mary Katherine Higdon 43:11. Consider donating here. AMY GOODMAN: So then you have Scotland Yard taking over. MARTIN BRIGHT: Well, I wasof course, the irony of the situation is that when we heard that a GCHQ employee, a 27-year-old GCHQ employee, Mandarin translator, I think we even said at the time, had been arrested, we were absolutely delighted, because we knew for sure that we had a big story at that point. AMY GOODMAN: And, Ed, you see whats going on in this country, in the United States, not to mention where youre from, in Britain. You dont do you? Read More: Is Official Secrets a True Story? Did everything change? I think most people have red lines that they wont cross. AMY GOODMAN: You mean period dramas of strong women have to be a hundred years ago. I watched it in San Francisco, at the premiere, and my friend from childhood who lived there was with me. As Katharine Gun told me during our "Salon Talks" conversation, being played by Keira Knightley in a movie was approximately the last thing she ever thought might happen to her. [4], After spending her childhood in Taiwan, where she attended Morrison Academy until the age of 16, Katharine returned to Britain to study for her A-levels at Moira House School, a girls' boarding school in Eastbourne. I was teaching Mandarin in the local college in Cheltenham. So, of course, it was justyou know, he was kind of thinkinghe knew I worked for the intelligence services, but he didnt know what that was. KATHARINE GUN: Oh, yes, absolutely. Our Daily Digest brings Democracy Now! Truth has a habit of . Koza's email requested aid in a secret operation to bug the United Nations offices of six nations: Angola, Bulgaria, Cameroon, Chile, Guinea, and Pakistan. Gun was outraged after she learned - as part of her job with GCHQ - that the United States wanted . This is Democracy Now! I am currently reading a book about how to blow the whistle. I was the U.S. correspondent indeed, but very soon I was in Najaf, Nasiriyah, Fallujah, unembedded, watching this bloody carnage, thisthe implosion of this country. The online Drudge Report used the fact that the reproduced NSA memo used English spelling to cast doubt on its veracity. Ellsberg has called Katharine Guns action the most important and courageous leak I have ever seen. But to discover that it was such a young and such a junior employee was extraordinary to us, yeah. The second act of the movie is concerned with the internal newspaper politics of that decision. AMY GOODMAN: That was 2014. And, with great respect, I think he did. During the season 5 finale of American Idol, Katharine McPhee was named the runner-up against winner Taylor Hicks. You know, any tiny lingering doubts we had about whether this was a sophisticated Russian forgery, as some people suggested, or, you knowwe absolutely knew that this was real. The woman in her 20s attempted to stop the war and firmly stood to her truthful morals. ED VULLIAMY: Mr. Alton, screechy, ultra-right-wing. I mean, I literallyI couldnt eat. [6] She left teaching in 1999, and after some temporary jobs, finding it difficult to find work as a linguist, Gun applied to GCHQ in 2001, after reading a newspaper advertisement for the organisation. You know, I mean, once itsif you plead guilty and you go away for three months, and its, you know, maybe not so bad as going away for two years, but still I would have had a record. And the potential chink in the Official Secrets Act we had found, which could have become a defence for others, the defence of necessity [of speaking up to save imminent danger to life], it wasnt tested in court.. I mean, this is difficult for me to say this, but, for those of your viewers who are interested in what happens in the mediaMartin and I, here we are, doing our bestthe two people involved, who are in the film, ED VULLIAMY: The top people are, respectively, managing editor of the Daily Mail, which is a sort of rather. AMY GOODMAN: And these ambassadors are the ambassadors of? It was weird. But jokes aside, the reason she said to methe reason I constantly find myself going. Of course I did, yes. Never used in the idea of, youve broken the law, breached the Official Secrets Act. I heard things that stuck. delivered to your inbox every day! . Gavin Hood, the director of Official Secrets, expressed scepticism about Macdonald's statement and called for the declassification of the official documents referred to by Macdonald. I do not gather intelligence so the government can lie to the British people., Sixteen years have passed since Katharine Gun said those words, but they still ring in the air. Jed didnt sort of put the two of us together. AMY GOODMAN: So, and we want to get to all that, but nowwe want to get to all that, but right now youre showing this film around the country. Yes. When asked by Salon how it felt to see a famous actress act out her life for an audience . She grew up in Taiwan, where her father had gone to teach, and her accent is hard to place. Thats our job. Shes not wearing tons of makeup. How often does she go through that fateful weekend, where she wrestled with her conscience after seeing the memo? GAVIN HOOD: What she discovers saysis a request from the NSA to GCHQ to hack, bug the private communications and the office communications of U.N. Security Council members, in particular the nonpermanent members, the more junior members. As well as illuminating Guns story, though, the film gives what was, by any standards, one of the great scoops of recent British journalism the credit that is long overdue. Were on the set. My childhood friend, for example, I remember hearing her father was on a blacklist because he had been agitating for the opposition. Its the intelligence agency, like the NSA, the National Security Agency, in the U.S. She leaked a memo revealing that the United States was collaborating with Britain in collecting sensitive information on United Nations Security Council members, countries, in order to pressure the members, the ambassadors, into supporting the Iraq invasion of March 2003. [5] After contemplating the email over the weekend, Gun gave the email to a friend who was acquainted with journalists. When do you first meet, you, the person who exposed this story, Martin Bright, and Katharine Gun? And whats so marvelous about what Gavins done is to just sort of bring this back into the present. And then I went on to interview Martin and Ed and then Ben Emmerson, the lawyer. So, I thought it would be great. But lets go back to the moment. We continue our conversation now with Katharine Gun, the whistleblower and former employee of GCHQ. The war did not end when George W. Bush said, Mission accomplished. It was only just beginning. It was in a police cell that she uttered those two sentences that now seem to define the person she was and is. Following the incident, Gun struggled to find work that she loved, and her husband had grown disillusioned with Britain. It is loud, clear, confident, creative, interesting. GAVIN HOOD: Theres an outrage. Were also joined by Martin Bright and Ed Vulliamy, the two journalists who reported Guns revelations in The Observer newspaper, at a time when the paper was editorially openly supporting the Iraq invasion. Some journalist needs to go and have a hardcore interview with Lord Goldsmith. And so, theyre first prize was get the United Nations Security Council to pass a resolution saying that we, as a collective United Nations, are going to take out Saddam Hussein. And nor do newspaper stories. I was teaching Mandarin in the local college in Cheltenham. I think a lot of our current issues go back to that time. ED VULLIAMY: said on the program, I filed that story seven times. I wish wed pushed it harder with the boss class within The Observer. You know, in the end, there was a feeling, I think, whatI know that Katharine and I have talked about this a lot. She was 27. Katharine Gun was a young specialist working for Britains Government Communications Headquarters when she exposed a highly confidential memo that revealed the United States was working with the United Kingdom to collect sensitive information on United Nations Security Council members in order to pressure them into supporting the Iraq invasion. One question that recurs, she says, comes from audience members asking what they should do, how they should behave, in the current mendacious political climate. After competing in the singing competition, she launched an acting career and was . Counted amongst the likes of Edward Snowden, Julian Assange, and John Kiriakou is Katharine Gun, a whistleblower whose actions revealed the shocking underbelly of international politics and also inspired a big-budget movie that introduced many to the issue. whistleblower and former specialist for Britains Government Communications Headquarters. And after about three weeks of this meeting these extraordinary people, I said to Jed, I think I think I would like to do this. And thats where the story came from. I wanted to go to the making of the filmKeira Knightley, did you meet with her?and also ask you, Gavin, about Keira taking on this role. But it may say more about the BBC than it does about him, that with this track record you can get to the top. And Jed called me up and said, Have you heard of Katharine Gun? And you get this moment where you feel like you should have, because of the way hes saying it. Also with us, the director of Official Secrets, Gavin Hood. I mean, couldnt have been happier with the casting choice, because Ben Emmerson is a force of nature, absolute force of nature, and a great international lawyer. AMY GOODMAN: You succeeded in preventing his deportation. We know this because Katharine Gun leaked a short 300-word NSA memo on this shortly before the invasion. There have been other attempts to make a film over the years. Gun leaked the memo to the press in 2003, setting off a chain of events that jeopardized her freedom and safety, but also opened the door to putting the entire legality of the Iraq invasion on trial. I mean, we had imagined all sorts of things about who our source might be. I dont have to be in makeup or wardrobe for hours. And she just said what she loved about Katharine isand I hope this isnt said the wrong way, and I keep saying itshes one of us. In 2003, Katharine Gun, a young specialist working for Britain's Government Communications Headquarters, exposed a highly confidential memo that revealed the United States' collaboration with . I felt awful. Im Amy Goodman, as we bring you Part 2 of our extended look at a new film thats out called Official Secrets, thats coming out at the end of August, that tells the story of a British intelligence specialist, Katharine Gun, who risked everything to blow the whistle on U.S. dirty tricks at the United Nations in the lead-up to the Iraq invasion in 2003. Gun is grimly amused to see his current return to the moral high ground over Brexit. But I wasnt thinking about myself really. A very good book by Britains most decorated journalist, called Nick Davies, called Flat Earth Newsits about the British press, but it applies everywhererealized that actually the then-editors of our paper were effectively accountable to the Tony Blair enforcement machine. [14] On the day of the court hearing, Gun said, "I'm just baffled in the 21st century we as human beings are still dropping bombs on each other as a means to resolve issues. To see Part 1 of our discussion, go to democracynow.org. When Gun was approached with the idea for a script by Gavin Hood (who had recently made Eye in the Sky, the film about drone warfare, with Helen Mirren), the pair of them first talked for five days in London, getting the story straight. AMY GOODMAN: Who is played in the film by? Inside the world of ministers secrets, Iraq war whistleblowers trial was halted due to national security threat, Permanent Record by Edward Snowden review the whistleblowers memoir, 'They wanted me gone': Edward Snowden tells of whistleblowing, his AI fears and six years in Russia, I had a moral duty: whistleblowers on why they spoke up, 'You've caused an international incident': how my work mistake came back to haunt me, Fortheir eyes only: the secret stories ministers dont want you to read, Take it from a whistleblower: Chilcot's jigsaw puzzle is missing a few pieces, Hollywood beckons for whistleblower who risked jail over Iraq dirty tricks. Katharine Gun outside the Old Bailey after charges had been dropped against her, 2004. Inside the world of ministers' secrets", "Iraq war whistleblower's trial 'was halted due to national security threat', "Official Secrets: A Conversation With Director Gavin Hood", "Official Secrets review Keira Knightley excels in Iraq war whistleblower drama", "15 Years Later: How U.K. Whistleblower Katharine Gun Risked Everything to Leak a Damning Iraq War Memo", "Film on British whistleblower's life to hit Turkish theaters", "Whistleblowerin Katharine Gun - "Ich wrde es wieder tun", "Sundance 2019: Premieres Include Harvey Weinstein Docu, Mindy Kaling, Dr. Ruth, UK Spies, Miles Davis & Ted Bundy", "Daniel Ellsberg speaking about Katharine Gun", In 2003, This U.K. Whistleblower Almost Stopped the Iraq Invasion. [2] In 2003, she leaked top-secret information to The Observer, concerning a request by the United States for compromising intelligence on diplomats from member states of the 2003 Security Council. You work for the British government, her interrogator said, with a sneer. According to evidence, he woke up during the attack but could not fight her off. "[12], Two years after her trial, Gun wrote an article titled "Iran: Time to Leak",[22] which asked whistleblowers to make public any information about plans for a potential war against Iran. to your inbox each morning. Shes beginning to understand the issues, but she hasnt seen it yet. And he says, I need toso, Im interviewing Ben in a pizza shop, right? KATHARINE GUN: Yeah, I was very excited to meet Keira in London before they started shooting. Get Democracy Now! You dont know who the GCHQ person is. When Katharine Gun came across a memo while working for the British government in 2003, her whole world changed. AMY GOODMAN: And a story that could have saved so many lives, except. I would love to know. The country, at the time, was being drummed into war by the Blair government, desperate to achieve the United Nations sanction for the imminent American-led invasion of Iraq. They live on a smallholding, renting a house, in rural Turkey. And we still dont know why the British government dropped the case. Katharine Gun is the Most Important Whistleblower You've Never Heard of. The people who went in and smashed it up in 2003, do they watch the news? Katharine Gun, a shy and studious 28-year-old who spent her days listening in to obscure Chinese intercepts, decided to tell the world about a secret plan by the US government to spy on the United Nations.. She had received an email in her inbox asking her and . Therefore, it is not surprising that Gun chose to move away from the center point of all the chaos once it died down. The trials and tribulations of daringly telling the truth and facing its consequences must certainly not be a light burden to bear. So, you get this memo. Her act of whistleblowing cost her a career as a translator at the Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ), made her stand in a highly publicized trial for violating the Official Secrets Act, and reduced her chances of getting another job due to being an internationally recognized whistleblower. Much of the news desk was opposed. AMY GOODMAN: And Alton went from The Observer and ultimately made his way, ED VULLIAMY: Via variousvia Rupert Murdochs Times, yes. AMY GOODMAN: And did they say they were going to charge you with the Official Secrets Act? And now you go back into work. [5] Less than a week after the Observer story, on Wednesday 5 March, Gun confessed to her line manager at GCHQ that she had leaked the email, and was arrested. Katharine Gun and Martin Bright could be forgiven for fielding Hollywood's overtures with a degree of skepticism. And, he says to me, she explained that Goldsmiths positionif I called for those documents, I would find out that he had been consistently saying that war without a U.N. resolution would be illegal. In 2003, she leaked top-secret information to The Observer, concerning a request by the United States for compromising intelligence on diplomats from member states of the 2003 Security Council.The diplomats were due to vote on a second United . Frequent Fox News guest and conservative commentator Mary Katharine Ham announced the death of her husband, Jake Brewer, on Sunday morning in a heartfelt Instagram post . You know, he couldntand it was the first time he had heard about it.
Svp Chief Operating Officer University Of Maryland Medical Center,
Donald Bren Family,
Northern Arapaho Child Support,
How Did Edith Vanderbilt Die,
Articles W