Talk:John Sawers' Iran letter

hi, i'm a newbie on wikisource (but oldie on wikipedia :).

Source: The Times: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2-2098203,00.html

Here are arguments relating to the copyright status for John Sawers' letter:
 * Downing Street memo - is also a leaked letter important in UK politics, relating to an attack on Iraq (cf attack on Iran), so their copyright status is presumably similar
 * The Times published it, presumably without permission from the author, but with the legal right to publish the letter. i would guess that in some formal sense, the document as a whole, including the original paragraph John Sawers, a leading... would be protected by Times' copyright, but that the citation of the letter is allowed under copyright law.
 * It's hard to imagine that the Times had official authorisation from Sawers to publish this.

So IMHO it's public domain or counts as something like political speeches. Boud 15:30, 1 April 2006 (UTC)