Heather Saunders
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Heather Saunders is the widow of British Brigadier General Stephen Saunders, the UK defense attaché in Athens assassinated by Revolutionary Organization 17 November on April 22, 2000. Per John Kiriakou: "His wife was what turned this whole thing around."

The Greek-television statement

Kiriakou: "She immediately went on Greek television and she said, 'This was not an attack against Stephen. It was not an attack against the British embassy. This was an attack against the Greek people. This organization is not a political organization nor is it a phantom group, it's a gang of criminals, and they're committing crimes against the Greek state.' And for the first time since 1975, public opinion began to change."

She and Stephen had two young daughters.

"They were going to hit you the day they hit Saunders"

Per John Kiriakou's telling on the Dalton Fischer Podcast: in the weeks after Stephen Saunders' assassination, Kiriakou's CIA boss told him, "have you seen the news? They were going to hit you the day that they hit Saunders." Revolutionary Organization 17 November's subsequent manifesto identifying Kiriakou as the "big spy" driving the armored car, plus the targeting team's confusion over the yhb / ybh license-plate prefix that both the U.S. and British embassies shared, led the CIA to evacuate Kiriakou and his family the same day.

Heather Saunders and her two teenage daughters survived him.

See also

- Stephen Saunders
- Revolutionary Organization 17 November
- Welch .45
