the way you think the the, with those of us who live in the west and our citizens of western countries know that our governments like to talk about the rule of law. we're all supposed to be proud that we live by the rule of law under governments that respect their constitutions, their basic laws and court precedence. with that said, those of us who have worked for our country's respective intelligence services and national law enforcement organizations. no, that's just not the way things are in real life. certainly are government talk a lot about law and order and human rights. but what happens when one realizes those same governments are breaking the law both domestically and internationally. what happens when you can't report wrong doing through your chain of command because it's the chain of command committing the crime. i'm john carry out to. we'll talk about that and more on this episode of the whistleblowers.

ah, the. 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 any mesh on is a former intelligence officer from m, i 5, the case domestic intelligence service. when she began her career with the british government mash on intended to become a diplomat. but as happens in many countries, in the midst of the process, she was recruited by m i 5 and sent to work in the organizations counter subversion department known as f 2. she later told the yorkshire post that her job included quote, trying to track down old communist trotskyites and fascists. which seems like a waste of time on quote. during the 1992 general election mesh on and her partner david schaler were tasked with providing summaries on literally anybody who stood for election to parliament. mesh on later said that she and schaler were horrified by the scale of the investigations and they argued and my 5 should not be in the

business of spying on people who had never even been suspected of committing a crime. 2 years later, she and schaler transferred to t branch which investigated irish terrorism in 1996. however, life for both meshawn and schaler changed forever. in october of that year, both of them resigned from my 5, with the intention to blow the whistle on crimes. they had seen committed a inside that service. these crimes included maintaining secret files on the government's ministers responsible for overseeing the intelligence services. illegal phone taps, making false statements to government overseers. failing to prevent bombings by the irish republican army. failing to prevent the 1994 bombing of the israeli embassy in london. and the attempted assassination of then libyan leader mar daffy mash on . and schaler went on to the media with proof of their allegations. and that's when their problems began. we want to introduce our guest. now any meshawn,

welcome. any 1st i want to ask you about your decision to enter em. i 5 in the 1st place. you strike me as someone who has a conscience, someone who would never have been comfortable working on the other side of the law . it's clear that illegalities allegedly committed by m, i 5, bothered you from the outset. i was exactly the same way at the cia. tell me about joining am i 5 and about your initial impressions when you started reading those secret files, files that were clearly inappropriate. so i was recruited in 990 long time ago now and. and this was one year off to m. i've been put on an official footings the 1st time in 80 years of its existence, with the security have attacked. and also when the new official secrets act came into play, which was there to stop with a bloody that was based in 1989. during my recruitment, i was told time and time again that they had changed that they no longer have to

look at counter espionage because the soviet union was disintegrating. they no longer had so for reads under the bed political actress, u k. because the soviet union was disintegration and they needed a new generation of intelligence officer to investigate terrorist. and that's what i thought i was signing up to do. the recruitment processes about 10 months, in my case, it can go between 6 to a year in terms of recruitment. and i was reassured, every time i got through, i didn't think i was the right person to this job. and every time i still kept getting through and i thought by the end of it, i was quite reassured, and that it would be a good job to do and to make a difference and that she's have life actually. i mean, it sounds idealistic, but that's what i wanted to do. so that's why i joined in terms of the things i saw, an inside my 1st disillusionment was the fact that i was posted to the red under the bed section,

which was known as at to where they were still looking at per school from versus driscoll activists that social and we saw a huge number of us when i say we my and my former partner david shader. it became the primary with simpler, in 1997 for a huge number of files held not just on regular u k. systems but also people who are in politics, many of whom became part labor government in the 1997 general election. so you have a situation where the national political masters of and my 5 and i, 6, the foreign intelligence agency has filed, held him. so, you know, in terms of a democracy who's got the power, when you and david schaler resigned from m, i 5, your intention was to blow the whistle on illegality. david took the documents to prove your allegations to the mail on sunday, which published them in august of 1997. what was the immediate fall out from the

government? what was the response from the public committee pull out from the government was interesting because this was in union activity. landslide victory of tony blair. and we thought, you know, labor government, after how long of a conservative government in the u. k. would mean that they would take legation most seriously. what we want to do is create a bit of a scandal and ensure that there was going to be a proper inquiry into how the spies were running a mold. and to make sure that there were reforms put in place to regulate what they were doing, then they needed to be tight. and even the reforms are put in place in 980. so that was a, it didn't quite work out that way because one week off to the allegations came out and there was a huge press push for an inquiry one week after we made the allegations. princess diana died in paris. so everything else called blanked out with a huge media hysteria about the death of princess diana. so you can

try and trim most things in life and try and plan for those things in life, but something like that was on a different scale. and so we found the last in europe on the run and living in hiding and without much press support. off until that point though, the press further, can you get angry about the government response? because the government try to in junk them to try to get them tried to shut them up in terms of pressurising for a proper inquiry into what responds we're doing in a judge. blocked the mail on sunday from publishing the allegations you were making that concern. the i r a specifically. but what about the other information? what about the attempt on kodachi? for example? what was the reaction from the fremont from the courts and from the public? this is a weird one because the good article, as it became known, which was an m, i 6 funded backing, and quite a group in libya to try and assess the nature of her and head of state which went wrong. he killed innocent people. how much worse can it get?

was the biggest case, and this is why we actually question. this is why david wanted to go public. and this was the story that did not get published initially. and he had to fight it out that finally, after about a year when we're living and hiding, the bbc decided to make a panorama special. and the mel sunday and the sunday times decided to run with the story to finally. and it was at that point that david was arrested and put into prison and had to spend 4 months in an taurus, hell hole waiting at a failed extradition attempt back to the u. k. so in terms of how people reacted that, the and how the government reactions thought the press was incandescent. they wanted on. so they wanted know if this is true. and what happened was that the black government just came out and said this is pure fantasy. it has no basis in fact, and there's never been a proper police investigation into it. now when ah,

david returned to the u. k in 2000 and was put on trial in 2002 have to sentence by chicago 3. and then he got as possible back and when we went to pick it up from new scotland yard, the police officer said, we're really sorry. we were just following orders. we had to do this getting this process. but we knew it was saying was true. the cover up with astonishing and the fact that the cover was so systematic at that point. and yet, you know, you fast forward 2011 when there was the nato bombing of libya because they was humanitarian aid and get off. he was dragged out and tortured and murdered at that point, and that was seen as a glorification of the west power in 2011. so the moral slide between what happened in 1996 and have me 2011 in terms of perception in the west is terrifying the fact

that we can all of this sort of thing rather than keep it secret and condemn it shortly after the mail on sunday published your allegations, you and david schaler were forced to leave the country for france. you truly believed if you were to return to the u. k, you would be arrested. but you went back to london, and much to your surprise, you were not arrested. so you returned again to france. but in 1998 after david began working with a british media on a documentary about the cadets the plot. he was charged under the official secrets act, and the french detained him at the request of the british for 4 months. what happened then? i knew i was getting back to be arrested and i was indeed arrested at the immigration gate in gatwick airport. and then i was taken off to a counter terrorist and suite in central london police station. and then in terms of the rest, the day with key point is i was never charged with anything, let alone convicted whatever. because i hadn't done anything or, you know,

i did with, you know, support what david was trying to do. so yes, i was arrested, i was kept on police spell, which means you don't have money, but you have to keep offering bound, going back every month. and, and one of david's brothers was also treated this way and to his best friends as well. so it was very much a case of trying to intimidate david by threatening legal penalties against the people who love the most were speaking with m. i 5, whistleblower and mash on on the odyssey that she and her partner david schaler experienced after going public with allegations of official wrong doing. we're going to take a short break and go deeper into this important story. stay tuned. the. 2 2 2 2 2 2 ah ah

at the end of the 18th century, great britain began to conquer and colonize australia. from the very beginning of the british penetration to the continent, natives were subjected to severe violence and deliberate extra patient. according to modern historians, in the 1st 140 years, there were at least 270 massacres of local depot. any resistance to the british was answered with doubled cruelty. hundreds of natives were killed for the murder of one settler. indigenous australians were not considered complete people. no wild beast of the forest was ever hunted down. with such unsparing perseverance as they are. men, women and children are shot whenever they can be met with squatter. henry myrick wrote in a letter to his family in england, in 1846. australia's bass is rightly described as blood soaked and races. if at the

beginning of colonization, there were one and a half 1000000 indigenous people living on the continent, then by the beginning of the 20th century, their number had decreased 100000 people. despite the indisputable historical facts, the problem of full recognition of the crimes of white australians against aborigines has not been resolved so far. ah, welcome back to the whistle blowers. i'm john carrie aka were speaking with m. i 5 whistleblower. any meshawn about her revelations of illegality and the difficult fallout for she and her partner any in august of 2000. you and david schaler did a very brave thing. you returned to the u. k. both of you knew what likely a way to do there, but you did it anyway. tell us what went into your decision to return. i think

there are number issues around why we decided to return at that point. we've been living in hiding and in excel for 3 years at that point and from and from my perspective, i could still travel back and forth because i'd never been charged with anything. but for david once, he'd been released from the french prison because the prince failed to extra vitamin 1998. it meant that if he had left the cross to go to any other european country, he would have been arrested and probably extradited from any other country. france had a particular lore back in the 1900 ninety's, which said that if you are a whistler, it was deemed to be a political offense and they did not extradite people for those political offences . so we taken advice before we went folks, we knew that was going to be legal protection and that's why you and so, yes, the, the courage that david showed when he went back to face the music, if they say, and to stand trial with quite exceptional. i mean,

i'd have to do it myself without having to stand trial. but he knew he would have to. he knew he'd probably be convicted and he would probably go back to prison. and after 4 months in paris, that was pretty bad. but he still did it because he wanted to have his evidence origin to the public records in a public court of law. what happened with it? he returned in 2000 didn't go on trial until the end of 2002, during which there were a number of legal hearings which actually shut down every line of defense he could have used. so by the time he got in front of his jury of his peers, he was not allowed to say why he'd done what he'd done in any way. so of course your convictions and he went back to prison. it was disgusting. this is the way the all wistful, those are treated. and i think can i'm talking for a british back to the web. back in the day we face 2 years per charge in prison. that trying to increase that to 14 years per charge imprison. now,

not just for the whistleblower, but also the journalist. and of course what we're looking at in the usa and you will know because you've been to prison is if you blow the whistle, you can face up to 35 years in prison. a per charge of chelsea manny did, and it was snowden. he will probably face life and julian songs. but not that he's a whistle though. he didn't publish it, but even the penalties were pulling everything over in the usa. so anyone who blew the whistle and anyone who then is told to go and face the music and wants to put it on the public record, what they've playing the whistle on faces. it's huge penalty in the west and people explore 8 countries like russia, or china, or iran, whatever for stigmatizing and penalizing dissidence. that's precisely what the west of doing when they treat whistleblowers in this way to the british government tried hard to convict and to imprison david,

even if they decided not to charge you with a crime, you were by his side through the entire time in the end david was given 6 months in jail for violating the official secrets act. we all know this incredibly short sentence was meant as a fee saving measure for the government. when governments go after former employees for violating the official secrets act or in the united states, the espionage act, they usually seek decades in prison. they didn't get it in this case. what happened? how did this play out? partly, and he was facing a match for 6 years in prison. so that was 3 charges, a t as each under the 1989 official secrets act after he was convicted that before he was sentenced, i was allowed to give a mitigation fee to the judge. this is the only time either of us had ever been able to anything in public, in court about why we've done what we've done. so i explained that and explained our motivation explained what had happened, explained everything. and the judge actually said that he had been minded to give

david touching those from prison. she was going to give him 6 months. so that sounds really light compared to what goes on in the u. s. and it sounds really like what might come in to say in the u. k, when they bring in what they are going to call, the new espionage act, which is an amalgamation of the old official secret fact which is going to indeed increase the terrorists who with los angeles to 14 years walking to you. so this is all to discourage others. of course it's a power play. and i think it's so important to remember that people do not blow the whistle just because they want to, you know, get a certain bitter glory, whatever they ruin allies. by doing it, they turn their lives inside out and upside down. and they can never again, a professional status as you know, as i know, and for people to be penalized and even worse and more badly with the

senses. you know, 14 years in prison because you're a treasure or something like that, you're not charged you trying to protect the rights for your country and your family system. you're trying to protect the very nature of democracy rather than trying to allow the government to encroach on all civil liberties. i cannot say this strongly enough at this point as well because one of the things i learned from always yet is of whistling. and also having the privilege to it with other with letters, including the cell. and also what we had to this is that the more we will move in c online world. and the more that we live our lives online, the easier it is for the spies to look at us to follow is to watch it. and if we don't have people, most recent, of course, edward snowden, which is almost 10 years ago, coming out and saying this is what is happening between nation states and corporations and the hackers and a criminal hackers and all that sort of thing. we are so vulnerable, we are sitting dogs with our lives on line. so we need to be aware of it. we need

to spread the word about that. we need to protect people who come out and reveal certain information. robin prosecute and then peskin put them in prison after discussing. one of the things that is consistent for all whistleblowers is after the actual act of revealing evidence of waste, fraud abuse, and the legality. life is jeff never the same. how have things changed for you and for david over the past 20 years? oh, as a big question. and no, i totally agree. and i would say this is true or whistleblower if across all sectors. not just intelligence government military. although we tend to be the ones who pay the biggest penalty, so most people will lose their professional reputation. they might lose their with all to earn a living. and that might lose, you know, to homes or their families, whatever it is, which is bad enough. and it should not happen if people want to expose wrong doing

and improve the work organizations. but we are the ones who, if you know, face prison goes to prison as well. so i think the win win situation will be a such a strategy where people can be encouraged to expose wrongdoing and not certainly public key ordered for it, but just be recognized and not just treated as troublemakers. so that would be the 1st step. but yes, in terms of how you rebuild a life of doing that, it's an incredibly hard, i suppose, for me. i mean, it cost me my relationship with david schaler that disintegrated in 2007 but also is trying to rebuild. what i found useful was trying to learn lessons from what i gone through, particularly when it came to medium in depletion. because i watched how the major been manipulated during david's case. i mean,

i remember sitting in the courtroom when his judgment, final judgment. read out. and it said, david cello, you know, hadn't done, we've done for money, no lives who put it risk, blah, blah, blah. and the next day, all the headlines said you can use it. so i don't. how did that happen? so the media manipulation and moving forward to what's going on online and deep fakes. and the rankings and the disappearances of articles online is frightening. but i think the key issues that i've really brought forward in my work now is about privacy. because during those 7 years of the whistling story, you know, going on the run living in hiding you the next i'm going to court cases double blow . i never felt that i had privacy my at home to this day. i didn't feel i have privacy talking on the phone with my emails in my own home isa. i'm not saying that that's happening. i've just aware of that potential potential threat. so this is

why i've dive deep into a lot of these, those technical issues, trying to figure out how we can protect ourselves, both individually and societally and democratic k as well. so i'm going to do a shameless plug. i have a new book out. it's called a proxy mission, and i'm sorry about that. but and also i also, i work with an organization called the world ethical data for him and the world ethical pace, translation to try and look at piece of issues and take deep dive into them and mitigate some of these issues as well. particularly the intersection corporations, government and the state and government and things like that. because if people are not aware, one of the potential threats and 2 of the potential tarnishes which might be much more utopian, robin dystopian than we have no hope. so it's all that education, it's all about trying to make people aware. and i think that's what with a blow to that just the, the think this is the key motivation for all of us. i think of whistles and to try

make people aware. so even though my whistle playing was 25 years ago, i still try and make people aware now of, of the things that i find fascinating and interesting. and i can see might be a potential threat. but there might be potential bonuses and benefits from the technology that we're now working with, particularly as we now will have to live a life on line any. you have been one of julianna's sanchez, most outspoken supporters in the u. k. tell us what's new in julian's case. we know what is probably his final appeal of his extradition to the united states is being heard right now. we've come to understand those of us who support julian. she expect nothing from the u. k. government. what are julian's chances in the british court system at this point? is there any hope for him in the european court of human rights? and is there any reason to believe that the new prime minister re, she's soon act will be any different toward julian than boys johnson and list trust

were. i think my face probably said it all, and i would doubted the british system is raked and offer they were a bit of a vessel stay towards the us. anyway. we know that, you know, they're asking you, they need the us busch, the whole point about the, the song case is that he is little strange in publisher and journalist award winning his global award over the years. and he is imprisoned in the u. k. unwanted by the us on the espionage child, which is a printing office. so the, the key point is one and it should not be happening to someone who is notion american who hasn't been by, is not involved in spin, or she is a publisher, pure and simple. he is the case around him as well, means that all journalists around the world are equally vulnerable to predictions

by the us legal system. anyone who writes anything that might challenge us again, many of it, you know, some sort of war somewhere in some country, most people don't even have an interest. and of course the people in the country are going to be totally interested in totally horrify by it. but it just means that reporting proper journalism is going to be stifled. because if that can happen, julian, as an award winning global journalist, it can happen to anyone else. i remember a quote i, i think it was in new york times editor way back in the day with geico, bill keller. and he was one of the very 1st journalist partners that julie was with along with the guardian in the u. k. and the new times editor said, we don't consider him, a publisher, said him, just the source. and i found this absolutely astonishing. because either he's a publisher, which means that okay,

she's published that the new york times published that, i mean to equally vulnerable or she is a source. but the source protection of the forces is the prime direct to any good journalist. so how can you say he's just before not protect him? so in a sense that shows the whole concept of proper investigative journalism in both feet with both barrels. i can't believe that the editor in new york times at that point set up. so, julian's case is so important, it's such a case of principle as well as the case of a poor man being tortured psychologically for years now and roman wrongfully tact. but it's such a principle for janice around the world. and i can't believe that more journalists and shame on them for not doing it across the west. not standing up for him. thank you so much to our guest, any mash on and thank you for joining us. i'm john kerry octave to next time for

another episode. of the whistleblowers, the. 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 i at this hour, american and coalition forces are in the early stages of military operations to disarm iraq, to free its people. and to defend the world from great pains whose with we will bring to the iraqi people, food and medicines in supplies and fleet with

awe in time i'm rick sanchez and i'm here to play with you. whatever you do, you do not watch my new show. certainly why watch something, but so different. my little opinions that you won't get anywhere else work of it please. or do you have the state department to see i weapons makers, multi 1000000000 dollar corporations, to your fax for you,

go ahead. why change and whatever you do, don't watch my show, stay mainstream because i'm probably going to make you uncomfortable. my show is called direct impact, but again, you probably don't want to watch it because it might just change and the waiting thank ah, miles won't be depleted if that degrading russian old hole says they are increasing on security at princeton. let's not win this war. you will be held to account bombastic messages against moscow. continue to emerge from countries who claim they're not directly involved in the ukraine conflict. that's as thousands of on the war protesters rally outside were those remarks were and they need a secured with auto head on the program a few later award winning journalist double.