Brits drop case, after US get caught breaking international law
wrong heading - whoops!
US too big to be prosecuted?
[The British Government has dropped charges against a translator accused of leaking a top secret United States memo in the run-up to the Iraq war.
Katharine Gun had been charged with breaching Britain's Official Secrets Act.
But prosecutors at London's Old Bailey court have withdrawn their case against the 29-year-old, a former employee of Britain's global surveillance centre, GCHQ.
Britain's Observer newspaper has reported the memo revealed the US intended to bug the offices of delegates from six Security Council members whose votes were crucial to authorise military action against Iraq.
After her arrest, Ms Gun said she had followed her conscience in leaking the memo, which she said exposed serious illegality and wrong-doing on the part of the US Government.
Representing her in court was James Welch, a lawyer for the human rights group Liberty.
"It's quite appalling that a whistleblower who acted in good conscience should have been threatened with two years' imprisonment for exposing the fact that the United States Government asked our Government to do what was clearly illegal and which would have undermined the deliberations of the United Nations," he said.
wrong heading - whoops!
US too big to be prosecuted?
[The British Government has dropped charges against a translator accused of leaking a top secret United States memo in the run-up to the Iraq war.
Katharine Gun had been charged with breaching Britain's Official Secrets Act.
But prosecutors at London's Old Bailey court have withdrawn their case against the 29-year-old, a former employee of Britain's global surveillance centre, GCHQ.
Britain's Observer newspaper has reported the memo revealed the US intended to bug the offices of delegates from six Security Council members whose votes were crucial to authorise military action against Iraq.
After her arrest, Ms Gun said she had followed her conscience in leaking the memo, which she said exposed serious illegality and wrong-doing on the part of the US Government.
Representing her in court was James Welch, a lawyer for the human rights group Liberty.
"It's quite appalling that a whistleblower who acted in good conscience should have been threatened with two years' imprisonment for exposing the fact that the United States Government asked our Government to do what was clearly illegal and which would have undermined the deliberations of the United Nations," he said.
