Good for him. AMY GOODMAN: So, Katharine, as all of this is unfolding, the U.S. and Britain bomb Iraq. No, Gun replied, steadily. The movie tells the story of Katharine Gun (played by Keira Knightley), a translator with the U.K.'s GCHQ who, in 2003, leaked top secret documents to journalist Martin Bright (Matt Smith) that . AMY GOODMAN: So you just thought this was routine. 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. KATHARINE GUN: It was GCHQ internal security, yeah. is katharine gun still married to yasar. In the movie, her husband (Adam Bakri) is initially portrayed as a civilian, perceiving her job to be mundane. AMY GOODMAN: And what did you tell Katharine at that time? ED VULLIAMY: Yes. And as Martin has just said, and as Katharine put it so well in the film, you know, wars, unlike football and basketball games, do not end when the whistle blows. Gavin Hoods 2019 film Official Secrets is the thrilling political drama that explores the events that followed British linguist Guns 2003 media leak. Iraq war whistleblower Katharine Gun: Truth always matters. The law requires you to. What does she hope people will take from the film? You know, my initial instinct was Ive got to remain anonymous. I mean, obviously, at that point, then felt very sorry that someone had been arrested, but it was a huge relief at the time. Guns leak was perhaps the last example of whistleblowing that involved a red telephone box and a photocopier, rather than downloads. I mean, I dont think we imagined that we would be still friends and still talking about it 14, 15 years later. If you are a journalist, check and double-check your sources. We will never know. I felt awful after I denied it. I am currently reading a book about how to blow the whistle. She then went on to get a Masters degree in Global Ethics. And I did this sort of dive. 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: But once everyone did, you knew. But lets go back to the moment. I wonder what she made of the scattershot download methods of Edward Snowden and Julian Assange? So I was . And that if the perpetrators in these situations get away scot-free, that has a knock-on effect. 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. Does she tell her story when she meets new people? My childhood friend, for example, I remember hearing her father was on a blacklist because he had been agitating for the opposition. AMY GOODMAN: And Alton went from The Observer and ultimately made his way, ED VULLIAMY: Via variousvia Rupert Murdochs Times, yes. Democracy Now! I thought you said youre sick. And I said, I need to talk to you. And so we went into a small room, and I just said, I did it. And then she put her arm around me and went, Oh, Katharine. And then I burst out crying. Soon after, they moved to Turkey in 2011, and for the most part, the family has stayed away from the public eye. It doesnt matter if you catch them out in a lie, because they dont care, because they lie as a matter of course, and they change what they say from day to day. But to discover that it was such a young and such a junior employee was extraordinary to us, yeah. "[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. Following the incident, Gun struggled to find work that she loved, and her husband had grown disillusioned with Britain. And the other way is the good, old-fashioned self-defense. The classified email Gun got leaked to The Observer was evidence of the clandestine attempt of the American intelligence to reportedly seek help from the UK in wiretapping the members of the UN Security Council to motivate them to vote in favor of the invasion of Iraq. 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. Then we see her become this woman who's starting to really know herself and starting to try and identify her own feminine being and trying to find her own place in the boardroom as a woman, as an entity, as a sister and . AMY GOODMAN: But what caused you to say no? [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. Gun was defended by Alex Bailin KC. AMY GOODMAN: I mean, youre the guy who broke the story that showed that Britain was collaborating with the U.S. in trying to get dirt on U.S. ambassadors, AMY GOODMAN: to get them to vote for the war in Iraq, which ended up killingwhat do you say at the end of the film? Its so great to have you all with us. Theyre going to send him back to Turkey. The repercussions of a lot of what happened are still being felt today.. And so, we talked about motherhood and all sorts of things, but I was just so impressed with how intelligent she was and how incisive she was in getting to the crux of the matter. You dont know who the GCHQ person is. Gun was charged for exposing around the time of Colin Powell's infamous testimony to the UN about Iraq's alleged WMDs a top-secret U.S. government memo showing it was mounting an . When Brights story originally landed there were concentrated efforts to rubbish it in the gung-ho parts of the media. Bright has also been closely involved with the film. And I justI just determined to deny it. [10] Her case became a cause clbre among activists, and many people stepped forward to urge the government to drop the case. And she said, Gavin, I dont want to wear makeup. Because it offered her both a resolution, and none? "We still do not know all that happened - what GCHQ did, and why things happened," he said. GAVIN HOOD: And then, for five days, I interviewed Katharine and just made notes. So, of course, I was a little bit sort of reserved. KATHARINE GUN: Mm-hmm. GAVIN HOOD: They failed. KATHARINE GUN: And yeah, becauseanyway, he was going in every week to basically prove that he was still resident or that they could pinpoint where he was. The film, Official Secrets, comes out officially at the end of August. The Tony Blair Conscience Fund or something? I was very concerned about joining any kind of organisation like Stop the War, and being used as a focal point or something. What happened next is the subject of a new Hollywood movie starring Keira Knightley as Katharine Gun. I wanted to stop bombs dropping on Iraq., The consequences have been damaging not just for Guns career. We met in London. And the case was dropped. Anyway. And the situation, the toxic abomination of Brexit in our country, has sort of rehabilitated Blair in a sort of bizarre way. So, you get this memo. I havent watched the films about either of them, she says. You didnt have that kind of support. GAVIN HOOD: Yes, strong women. 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. All I want to do is feel the emotions that this young woman felt, and dont want to be fussed over. And it was great. Almost a million Iraqis. AMY GOODMAN: The horror of what you did not succeed in preventing, though, which was the deaths of so many in Iraq, and that continues today, but you certainly touched the conscience of not just the nation, but the world, in what you did, talking about what womanwhat one woman could do. And I had to thank her forI mean, you know, in totally selfish terms, helping me break the biggest story of my life. I met her in August in Durham, when she was on a brief visit to see her father. 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 . But it was, yeah, a moment of great humility, actually. Shes out. You cannot talk to anyone about your intelligence work. AMY GOODMAN: Youre watching that on television. In an interview with Democracy Now!, Gun explained, After they charged me, thats when they tried to deport my husband. And really, you know, she had so many questions for me, and she really genuinely wanted to know about the whole situation. AMY GOODMAN: And this is a critical moment, when you say October, because thats when the U.S. Senate voted to authorize war. [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. So I tried to look for work. The second act of the movie is concerned with the internal newspaper politics of that decision. The diplomats were due to vote on a second United Nations resolution on the prospective 2003 invasion of Iraq. Shes just wearing her jeans and jumpers, you know, to work. 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.. We're looking at the real-life political thriller 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. These were, as I said before, bitter times. Why did you drop the case? And I didnt want to have a record. We rely on contributions from our viewers and listeners to do our work. Copy may not be in its final form. Photo: Kevin RC Wilson. 101 years old Katherine Coleman Goble Johnson was an American mathematician whose orbital mechanics calculations as a NASA employee were critical to the success of the first and subsequent crewed spaceflights in the United States. My marriage to my husband was very new at that juncture, and he had a very unstable status in the UK. Therefore, it is not surprising that Gun chose to move away from the center point of all the chaos once it died down. 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. So, no, I mean, I didnt want to say I was guilty when I didnt feel guilty. GAVIN HOOD: Chile, Bulgaria, Angola, Cameroon, Pakistan, Mexico. They said, Plead out., AMY GOODMAN: We dont want you to go to jail for years. I mean, thats why MartinI remember Martin and Ed. Get Democracy Now! So, I thought it would be great. You know, banks of civil servants couldnt do that. And also, I didnt want to even risk having a criminal record. Gun has spoken at the 51Fest and conferences arranged by organizations such as the Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS). AMY GOODMAN: Who is played in the film by? You want to know where he is? he said. I had had my own story on the fabrication of the weapons of mass destruction, the existence of a shadow intelligence-cooking agency within the Pentagon, which we at The Observer had for five months before Sy Hersh, with great respect to Sy, published it in The New Yorker. AMY GOODMAN: The networks, like Fox, and The Drudge Report, CNN refused to interview you, saying that this couldnt be a real memo because, unfortunately, your newspaper translated it into British. You were just waiting. KATHARINE GUN: to police custody, yes, and kept overnight in a police cell. MARTIN BRIGHT: Yeah, I mean, around that time. MARTIN BRIGHT: Yeah, who wrote the memo. And they attempt to deport your husband, who is a? Dr. Never mind the number injured. [12] A government spokesman said that the decision to drop the case had been made before the defence's demands had been submitted. British linguist, translator and whistleblower, This article is about the British whistleblower. I said, I think Ive got a scoop, Martin. Although Katharine Gun returned to the public eye in 2019 for the promotional press events for Official Secrets, she has largely retreated from the medias gaze since. I had, you know, encounters with Blair. 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. It cost Gun, who now lives in Turkey with her husband and daughter, her job. I was teaching Mandarin in the local college in Cheltenham. 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. KATHARINE GUN: Yeah. Oh, yeah. You know, this is hundreds of thousands of people killed. But it is tempting to believe that is the case with Katharine Gun. A New Film Tells Her Story, 15 Years Later: How U.K. Whistleblower Katharine Gun Risked Everything to Leak a Damning Iraq War Memo, Links to news stories (20032006) about Katharine Gun, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Katharine_Gun&oldid=1149317616, Short description is different from Wikidata, Articles containing potentially dated statements from 2020, All articles containing potentially dated statements, Articles containing potentially dated statements from 2019, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 3.0, This page was last edited on 11 April 2023, at 13:29. 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. Katharine Gun (ne Harwood), 47, is married to Yasar Gn, a Turkish Kurd, with whom she has a 13-year old daughter. Shes pregnant. Presumably the events mark a before and after in her life. These folksbecause there are two legal ways you can go to war in international law. That accountability is key. 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. You have the U.S. in the longest war in U.S. history, in Afghanistan. AMY GOODMAN: And, Ed, you see whats going on in this country, in the United States, not to mention where youre from, in Britain. The difference, I think, is that hereand your program and your viewers are testimony to thisyou have an opposition. We were mostly in our mid-20s, so it was the usual stuff, who is going out with who. 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. I mean, the pack of cards has gone from Afghanistan to Iraq to Syria. You werent particularly worried. The woman in her 20s attempted to stop the war and firmly stood to her truthful morals. Ellsberg has called Katharine Guns action the most important and courageous leak I have ever seen. 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 . I call them the Usual Suspects., She thinks, given the current state of politics, that she might start to speak out more. So, you know, it doesnt end, as Martin said. [13] Speculation was rife in the media that the prosecution service had bowed to political pressure to drop the case so that any such documents would remain secret. Gun, a translator with the British intelligence service known as Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ), received a document just before the war from an NSA manager, seeking British intelligence support in spying on . AMY GOODMAN: And then what happened? This is Democracy Now! KATHARINE GUN: My MP, yes, at the time. The people who went in and smashed it up in 2003, do they watch the news? GAVIN HOOD: This amazing lawyer, with great dignityElizabeth Wilmshurst, whos in the movie, Ralph Fiennes playing Ben Emmersonhas the cup of tea with her. With me, it was this. AMY GOODMAN: Ed Vulliamy, you were the U.S. correspondent for The Observer. I would love to know. And he didnt come back out again. I heard things that stuck. Gun is a singular presence, and she answers with characteristic care, speaking slightly haltingly, weighing her words. Youre terrified. 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. [9] Gun spent a night in police custody, and eight months later was charged with breaking the Official Secrets Act. And we worked five, six hours every day. Authorities had attempted to deport Yasar back to the Middle East. The trials and tribulations of daringly telling the truth and facing its consequences must certainly not be a light burden to bear. Its millions. He was Kurdishhe is Kurdish. Youre a bit, AMY GOODMAN: So, there is an uproar. You come home. So, where is Gun now? And at the end of the Q&A, I went to try and find him, and hed gone. AMY GOODMAN: So, before the time of the trial, Katharine, youthey have clamped down on you. And they failed, in part, I believe, because Katharine Gun leaked that memo. She worked at the time at GCHQ, the British equivalent of the NSA." And through the lights, I couldnt quite see who the guy was. Few are aware that her husband had also been thrown into troubled waters when Gun blew the lid off the alleged spy efforts in 2003. But yeah, I mean, I was hugely impressed. 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. That is a difficult question, she says. In 2003, Gun was working as a translator of Mandarin at the government intelligence agency, GCHQ, in Cheltenham. In the film, Official Secrets, she is played by Keira Knightley. 2023 Guardian News & Media Limited or its affiliated companies. [25][26] Together with journalist Peter Beaumont, Gun advised and consulted over the years it took to make the film and they are "very happy with the result.[20]. We thought that maybe it would be a security expert who had got wind of this, or someone, I mean, relatively senior within GCHQ who was worried about what was going on, and, you know. Somebody says, Lord Goldsmith, the defense to your charge against Katharine Gun is they want your documents. Case dropped. 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. AMY GOODMAN: The San Francisco Film Festival. It is not often that a persons character is revealed in two sentences. AMY GOODMAN: Well, explain that. And they attempt to deport your husband, who is a? Certain friends did not want to see me any more, or be seen with me some people get very paranoid. I denied it. Of course I did, yes. [5], Gun graduated with an upper second-class degree, then took a job as an assistant English teacher with the JET program in Hiroshima, Japan. AMY GOODMAN: So, theyre processing him. I think of journalists as being bullet-proof in a way, she says, but obviously not., She and Bright have done several question and answer sessions in the US after the film has been screened at various festivals. Maybe? AMY GOODMAN: This is the NSA guy who wrote the memo. You know, these things happen. Katharine Gun (ne Harwood), 47, is married to Yasar Gn, a Turkish Kurd, with whom she has a 13-year old daughter. And we can say that, you know, thatso, he comes back, under all this pressure. Katharine Gun outside the Old Bailey after charges had been dropped against her, 2004. 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. KATHARINE GUN: And also, Im justwell, whether its natural inclination or whether its what was kind of drummed into us at GCHQ, but it was, you know, this the sense of being private and not trusting journalists or people who are trying to ferret out information from you. Thats our job. Macdonald stated that Gun would not have received a fair trial without the disclosure of information that would have compromised national security. AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report. Get Democracy Now! Whistleblower Katherine Gun, right, is played by Keira Knightly in the movie Official Secrets. It was with the help of MP Nigel Jones that Gun finally managed to free Yasar, reasserting his right to stay in the UK. There are lots of loose ends here still. Lets find out! 2023 Cinemaholic Inc. All rights reserved. There is a Guardian Live preview screening with Katharine Gun, Gavin Hood and Martin Bright on 12 October. Official Secrets is based on the actions of Brit Katharine Gun, who revealed that America had been eavesdropping on diplomats from other countries. 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. [6] Gun had previously been unaware of GCHQ, later saying that "I didn't have much idea about what they didI was going into it pretty much blind. And at some point, with great respect to Lord Goldsmith, he caves. 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. We sat in the bar of a city centre hotel, and talked about the ancient history of 2003. Film-makers generally like to glamorise newspaper offices, making them All the Presidents Men hothouses of high-level argument and intrigue. And when he didnt come out, I was panicking, you know, and I ran inside. The simple fact is, she says: Truth always matters at the end of the day., Official Secrets is released on 18 October. Its all so resonant. I hope when shes ready for this story, she will [see the film]. In its absence, Tony Blair won another election in 2005. Within half an hour, the case was dropped because the prosecution declined to offer evidence. Truth has a habit of . Language links are at the top of the page across from the title. She is played, with steely English resolve, by Keira Knightley. Details at membership.theguardian.com. The film -- quite plausibly -- depicts the charges being dropped against Gun for the simple reason that the British government feared . Theyre watching, you know, video games and bombs landing on Baghdadshock and awe. You know, he couldntand it was the first time he had heard about it. (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.) And they said they would try their best. The love between Katharine and her husband, Yasar Gun, is undeniable, and the punishment they must to endure together is heart stopping. And Mr.. They live on a smallholding, renting a house, in rural Turkey. 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. 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. As Coordinator for Shalom Mission Communities, a peace church fellowship near the southern border, Joel, his wife, Anali, and their new baby girl, Daniela Bea, are actively helping . Who is her husband? I watched you last night at one of the premieres of the film, a kind of secret showing of Official Secrets. I think the number isand forgive me, I should have the figurethree-and-a-half thousand British and American soldiers, 37,000 wounded. The first is a U.N. resolution for war. And then, on Tuesday, they called me in, and I went in. GAVIN HOOD: Ben Emmerson. What I did is a very unusual thing to do, because the results are not generally good. [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. The relationships that form as a result of Gun's acting are quite inspiring. She is also well known as a GCHQ spy. You get pulled over. And then I went on to interview Martin and Ed and then Ben Emmerson, the lawyer. If we found other information, it may have been different, but this information seemed to show us that wed been lied to.