John Sawers

Sir Robert John Sawers GCMG (born 26 July 1955) is a British intelligence officer, diplomat and civil servant. He was Chief of the Secret Intelligence Service (MI6),[1] a position he held from November 2009 until November 2014.[2] He was previously the British Permanent Representative to the United Nations from August 2007 to November 2009.[3][4]

Sir John Sawers GCMG
Chief of the Secret Intelligence Service
In office 1 November 2009 – 1 November 2014
Prime Minister	Gordon Brown David Cameron
Preceded by	Sir John Scarlett
Succeeded by	Alex Younger
Permanent Representative of the United Kingdom to the United Nations
In office 1 August 2007 – 1 November 2009
Prime Minister	Gordon Brown
Preceded by	Sir Emyr Jones Parry
Succeeded by	Sir Mark Lyall Grant
Director-General for Political Affairs at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office
In office 2003–2007
Preceded by	Sir Peter Ricketts
Succeeded by	Sir Mark Lyall Grant
HM Ambassador to Egypt
In office 2001–2003
Prime Minister	Tony Blair
Preceded by	Sir Graham Boyce
Succeeded by	Derek Plumbly
Personal details
Born	Robert John Sawers 26 July 1955 Warwick, England
Nationality	British
Alma mater	University of Nottingham University of St Andrews University of the Witwatersrand Harvard University
Occupation	Intelligence officer, civil servant
Profession	Diplomat

Early life and education

Born in Warwick,[5] Sawers was brought up in a family of five children in Bath and educated at the City of Bath Boys' School (which became Beechen Cliff School before he left), where he still holds the 440-yard hurdles school record.[6] He is a descendant of the historic Stratford family through his maternal grandmother.[7] He studied physics and philosophy at the University of Nottingham[8] and later spent periods at the Universities of St Andrews, Witwatersrand and Harvard.[5]

After completing his degree at Nottingham he served as secretary of the students' union for a year.[9][10]

Career

Foreign and Commonwealth Office

Sawers joined the Foreign and Commonwealth Office in 1977.[11] In his early career, Sawers worked in Yemen and Syria, on behalf of MI6.[1][12][13] He became Political Officer in Damascus in 1982 and then returned to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office to take up the role of Desk Officer in the European Union Department in 1984 and Private Secretary to the Minister of State in 1986.[11]

He was based in Pretoria and then Cape Town in South Africa from 1988 to 1991[11] during the first part of the transition from apartheid.[14] He returned to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office yet again to take up the roles of Head of European Union Presidency Planning Unit in 1991 and Principal Private Secretary to Douglas Hurd in 1993.[11]

From 1995 to 1998 he was in the United States and spent a year as an International Fellow at Harvard University[11] and later at the British Embassy in Washington D.C., where he headed the Foreign and Defence Policy team.[11]

From January 1999 to summer 2001 he was Foreign Affairs Adviser to UK Prime Minister Tony Blair,[11] dealing with all aspects of foreign and defence policy and working closely with international counterparts.[14] The period included the Kosovo War. He also worked on the Northern Ireland peace process and the implementation of the Good Friday Agreement. He reviewed the Iraq sanctions policy during this period and issued a document that included consideration of regime change.[15]

He served two years in the Middle East as Ambassador to Egypt from 2001 to 2003,[11] and for three months was the British Government's Special Representative in Baghdad assisting in the establishment of the Coalition Provisional Authority as the transitional government during the Occupation of Iraq.[11]

In August 2003 Sawers was appointed Director General for Political Affairs at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office. In this post he advised the UK Foreign Secretary on political and security issues worldwide and negotiated on behalf of the Foreign Secretary with international partners in the G8, EU and UN. He was particularly involved in policy on Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan and the Balkans. Sawers headed the British team in the EU-3 negotiations over Iran's nuclear program in 2006,[16] utilising his scientific background in discussions of nuclear matters.[17]

In 2007 he became British Permanent Representative to the United Nations.[11]

Sawers is a governor of the Ditchley Foundation, which aims to promote international, especially Anglo-American, relations.[18][19]

Chief of the Secret Intelligence Service

Sawers was announced as chief of the Secret Intelligence Service on 16 June 2009, succeeding Sir John Scarlett. He took up his appointment in November 2009.[1] In July 2009 his family details were removed from the social networking site Facebook following media interest in the contents.[20] On 10 and 16 December 2009 Sawers gave evidence to The Iraq Inquiry.[15][21] In July 2010 his salary was revealed to the public to be in the range of £160,000 to £169,999.[22]

During the Syrian Civil War Sawers supported the Chief of the Defence Staff General Sir David Richards in drawing up plans to train and equip a Syrian rebel army of 100,000 to overthrow President Bashar al-Assad, as an alternative option to the government’s plan for limited direct military involvement. The plans were rejected by the UK National Security Council as too ambitious.[23] Ultimately on 29 August 2013, Parliament refused to support the government's plan to participate in military strikes against the Syrian government.[24]

Sawers announced his intention to stand down from running the Secret Intelligence Service by November 2014, the fifth anniversary of his appointment.[2] He was replaced by Alex Younger.[25]

Already Knight Commander of the Order of St Michael and St George (KCMG), he was appointed Knight Grand Cross of the Order of St Michael and St George (GCMG) in the 2015 New Year Honours for services to national security.[26][27]

Later career

After retiring as Chief of the Secret Intelligence Service Sawers became Partner and Chairman of Macro Advisory Partners,[28] before becoming the Executive Chairman of Newbridge Advisory.[29] He also became a Visiting Professor in the Department of War Studies at King's College London.[30]

He is a member of the Steering Committee of the Bilderberg Conferences and participated in conferences since 2014 [31] He is a Senior Associate Fellow of the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI).[19]

On 14 May 2015 he was appointed independent non-executive director of BP Global.[32]

Private life

Sawers is married; the couple have three children, two sons and a daughter. Sawers enjoys hiking, tennis, cycling and the theatre.[5][9]

References

1. Michael Evans (16 June 2009). "Outsider Sir John Sawers appointed new head of MI6". The Times. London. Retrieved 16 June 2009.
2. Ewen Macaskill and Richard Norton-Taylor (26 June 2014). "MI6 chief Sir John Sawers to step down". The Guardian. Retrieved 5 July 2014.CS1 maint: uses authors parameter (link)
3. "Permanent Representative — Sir John Sawers". United Kingdom Mission to the United Nations, Foreign and Commonwealth Office. Archived from the original on 9 April 2009. Retrieved 16 June 2009.
4. A & C Black (2012). "SAWERS, Sir (Robert) John". Who's Who 2012, online edition. Oxford University Press. Retrieved 2 May 2012.
5. "The 'James Bond' taking top job at MI6". BBC. 1 November 2009. Retrieved 1 September 2009.
6. "Ex-Bath pupil to head M16". Bath Chronicle. 17 June 2009. Retrieved 17 June 2009.
7. Sawers family genealogy site (run by David Sawers, brother of John) - Stratford lineage
8. "Alumni: Sir John Sawers, former MI6 Chief: international security in a modern world". University of Nottingham. Retrieved 22 October 2018.
9. Barber, Lionel (19 September 2014). "Lunch with the FT: Sir John Sawers". Financial Times. Retrieved 22 October 2018.
10. "How safe are we?" (PDF). CONN3CT. University of Nottingham. Autumn 2015. p. 8. Retrieved 22 October 2018.
11. "Beckett: Senior Diplomatic Service Appointments". Foreign and Commonwealth Office. 10 December 2006. Archived from the original on 5 December 2007. Retrieved 16 June 2009.
12. "Lunch with Sir John Sawers". FT.com. Retrieved 29 December 2014.
13. "SIS - The Chief". Archived from the original on 15 April 2012. Retrieved 19 March 2013.
14. Laura Roberts (28 October 2010). "Sir John Sawers: profile of MI6 chief". Daily Telegraph. Retrieved 12 January 2015.
15. Michael Savage (1 February 2010). "Plan to oust Saddam drawn up two years before the invasion". The Independent. Retrieved 10 February 2010.
16. Kaveh L Afrasiabi (1 April 2006). "Iran: Options for a face-saving solution". Asia Times. Retrieved 17 June 2009.
17. Laura Trevelyan (16 June 2009). "New MI6 boss is 'excellent dancer'". BBC. Retrieved 17 June 2009.
18. "The Governors". Ditchley Foundation. Archived from the original on 28 September 2012.
19. "Sir John Sawers". RUSI. Retrieved 22 October 2018.
20. "MI6 chief's Facebook details cut". BBC News. BBC. 5 July 2009. Retrieved 5 July 2009.
21. "Iraq violence 'may have prompted UK rethink'". BBC News. BBC. 17 December 2009. Retrieved 29 January 2010.
22. "Quango chiefs' salaries revealed". BBC News. 2 July 2010. Retrieved 2 July 2010.
23. Richard Spencer (4 July 2014). "Britain drew up plans to build 100,000-strong Syrian rebel army". Daily Telegraph. Retrieved 4 July 2014.
24. Robert Winnett (29 August 2013). "Syria crisis: No to war, blow to Cameron". Daily Telegraph. Retrieved 1 January 2014.
25. "Appointment of the new Chief of the Secret Intelligence Service (MI6)". GOV.UK. Press releases. Her Majesty's Government. 3 October 2014. Retrieved 3 October 2014.
26. "No. 61092". The London Gazette (Supplement). 31 December 2014. p. N3.
27. "New year honours 2015" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 31 December 2014. Retrieved 31 December 2014.
28. "Partners". Macro Advisory Partners. Archived from the original on 4 February 2015.
29. "Sir John Sawers". Newbridge Advisory. Retrieved 7 August 2019.
30. "War Studies Annual Lecture". King's College London. 2015. Retrieved 20 January 2015.
31. "Steering Committee". Bilderberg Meetings. Retrieved 18 September 2017.
32. "Sir John Sawers". BP. 14 May 2015. Retrieved 22 October 2018.

Offices held