Guy Nespina

I didn't know that.

But they told me, OK, so this has happened.

And they said, look, you're an exchange officer.

If you want to get on the aeroplane and go home, do that.

We understand.

We'll wait till the dust settles and then you can come back.

It's over to you.

And I bravely said, young and silly, I said, no, no, we'll carry on.

And I went back to my hotel and had a sit down and think about this.

And I thought...

If they're coming for me, I won't even see it coming.

I won't.

It'll just happen and I won't even know.

So I was there for a week or so.

I don't think I slept much, but because I knew that if this was going to happen, it wouldn't matter if I was walking around with an M16.

They would have got me.

He kona eipurangi tēnei ngā te reo irirangi o Aotearoa.

It is an extraordinary story in its own right. And it's also an important story because it shows just how deeply entwined New Zealand's intelligence community has been with its American ally and the way they have targeted adversaries together. And it's going to help us understand how that relationship works today.

And I don't want to do that. I'm just going to clap for that. OK. Right now, it's fair to say our interviewee is a bit on edge. There's any number of unintended consequences that might come from talking to us on the record.

Yeah, we've all seen the movies, right? CIA and the USA. They're supposed to be the good guys. But sometimes it's hard to know. Who's your source? What's his name? What's your source's name? Look, what's going on? Why are these people after me? That's one of Matt Damon's Jason Bourne films. I love that series. He had a journalist from The Guardian. They're at the Waterloo Station in London. Yeah, a fictional journalist who's in danger.