Exclusive: Mark Sedwill, The Halo Trust, Conflicts Of Interest & Covert Intelligence

The Cabinet Secretary is actively involved in a global charity conflict of interest where he is both a fund raiser and fund holder. The subversion of a worthwhile organisation by intelligence goals should be resisted wherever possible.

Many of you won’t be aware of the Halo Trust. But you will be aware that Princess Diana once walked through a minefield in support of it: over thirty years, around the world, it has rendered nearly two million mines harmless, and both trained and employed thousands of local nationals to clear minefields. It was founded in 1988 by three philanthropists, Sue & Colin Mitchell and Guy Willoughy. Willoughby became a driving public force, and was the Trust’s CEO for 27 years. Under his stewardship, other celebrities like Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt became actively involved.

The Halo Trust has long been one of the most trusted neutrals in global charity. At the sharp end of landmine removal, it remains a gold standard of bravery, clearing up the mess left behind by those involved in largely third world wars. More often than not, of course, such wars are instigated, manipulated and spun by First World officers seemingly keen on starting a Third World War.

The Slog has posted and commented several times as an observer of the Civil Service Head, Cabinet Secretary and Military Intelligence officer Mark Sedwill. He has always been, and remains, a EUNATO man directly connected with strategic diplomacy and ops in the Secret Service. At least partly as a result of the beliefs and actions of men like Sedwill, HALO field officers have had to risk their lives rendering mines harmless

Sir Mark Sedwill is paid a basic salary of £175,000 in his job as Cabinet Secretary. He also gets paid bonuses regularly, and has a pension that runs into millions.

Oddly, however, since 29th March this year he has also been an active senior director of The Halo Trust.

Some history is required here in order to understand fully the involvement of multi-talented Cabinet Secretary Sedwill in Halo.

In August 2014, Halo founder and CEO Guy Willoughby was ousted from halo. At the time of his departure, the trust received largely Sovereign donation support sufficient to give it an operating budget of £40 million.

Early in 2015, a senior, active military officer and commander- James Cowan – replaced Willoughby.  He had a 33-year army career behind him and was commander of the UK 3rd Division. Mark Sedwill (left) also joined in July 2015. The Trust’s Articles of Association were changed, removing  the rights of Trust Members to confirm or dismiss trustees – ie, the Board.

Increasingly of the opinion that Halo was drifting away from its true mission and financial probity – governance costs increased from £56,000 in 2013/14 to £350,000 in 2014/15 – Angelia Jolie resigned as a Trustee.

Other changes of a disturbing nature followed, involving the increased influence of the US unelected State in Halo Funding…..of which, more details follow below.

Sedwill resigned from Halo in 2017, perhaps because he was rather busy at the time getting Theresa May into Number Ten without being elected, her main rival having been smeared by allegedly malign forces. He was then further tied up with the business of using his protegé Oliver Robbins (unelected) to undermine Chief Brexit Negotiator David Davis (elected) and thus negotiate directly with ‘Brussels-am-Berlin’.

His position (unelected) once more secure following Boris Johnson’s December 2019 success (elected), Sedwill rejoined Halo on March 29th 2020.

In its accounting Reports, Halo has often referred airily to ‘donations from the UN and EU as well as national governments, and the growing body of private organisations and citizens who support our work’.

The emphasis of its major support, however, tells a somewhat different story.

Around 25% of all Halo support now comes from the unelected State in the US – the State Department, BOPMA and indirectly branded military-dimplomacy sources via Halo Trust USA.

A further 15% comes from the UK bureaucracy’s International Development and Security funds.

And finally, nearly 10% comes from NATO’s favourite EU ally, Germany.

This raises two issues that Boris Johnson, the House of Commons, UK taxpayers and supporters of The Halo Trust need to think about:

1. Halo enjoys easy access to a number of territories because its reputation as an impeccable philanthropic Trust goes before it. How long is that going to last when it becomes clear that State Department, Pentagon and NATO funds and operatives are involved at the top of the organsation?
2. In terms of Sedwill’s uniquely powerful position vis a vis the UK Executive, the Civil Service and the Secret State, there has to be a massive conflict of interest for him. He surely cannot be both the man signing off every foreign budget in Britain and a man on the Board of a huge organisation seeking funds from Sovereign treasuries.

I put these questions to three international charity sector opinion leaders. These were their responses:

“I am surprised he is allowed to have any links to a charity that raises mega funds from government.”

“I didn’t know that, no…it really is disgraceful that a senior military intelligence adviser and active participant in dubious diplomatic miltary actions is involved at a high level in The Halo Trust.”

“It’s most odd, but then, not untypical of how people like Tony Blair have operated…..start a war one year, become a consultant for peaceful regeneration the next. Order some mines one year, dig up and neutralise them the next.”

HALO’s own Annual Report not only confirms ‘an increased scale of activities’, it also hints strongly at US subsidiaries and contracts…but fails to mention that the man with the power of increase or veto on a quarter of all Sovereign Halo funding is none other than Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, a man who very few regard as a Peacenik:

Over the years, similar links have led to overwhelming international distrust of organisations like The White Helmets in Syria. There can be no doubt that Halo has been one of the most inspiring formations of recent history, and is still doing a great job on the ground in the vast majority of cases. As a late convert to pacifism, I’m the last person who would want its stated mission to be harmed in any way.

But in such cases, it is a question of (no pun intended) trust.

Military Intellligence feeds upon philanthopic endeavour, because organisations respected for such credentials gain access far more easily to war zones where covert operations can be carried out. 

American Intelligence hijacked genuine scientists allowed into the USSR after Chernobyl. China suspects that CIA officers were also among the Military Games staff present in Wuhan at the time of the Covid19 outbreak. The Syrian government has long believed that the White Helmets are a cover for US-Israeli Intelligence operatives. And Hungary correctly discerns that the Central European University is a Trojan Horse full of Sorosites.

The solution for real philanthropes is not to ask people like me to shut up…..for down that road lies Rotherham.

The solution is to weed out the cuckoos, and restore faith in the mission.

At the UK level, many of us believe that it is profoundly dangerous to have so much power in the hands of one career bureaucrat whose obvious bent since Day One has been international intelligence strategy involving the US, UK, EU and NATO interests.

We would like to see Sir Mark Phillip Sedwill resign as a Trustee Director of Halo. We would like to see him – on the basis of these latest hitherto unknown machinations on his part – removed from UK Government.

Above all, we would like to see the UK media, Cabinet and inner Johnson Circle wake up to the existence of a thoroughly malign influence in their Administration, and raise public awareness of the growing unaccountability of senior civil servants and technocrat advisers when it comes to all policy formation.

Over to you, guys.