The Wire

Kirsty Sword Gusmao’s life reads like the pages of a Tom Clancy thriller. Working for a development agency teaching English in 1990s Jakarta, she became an undercover agent in the clandestine Timorese freedom movement. Operating under the code name Ruby Blade, one assignment was to courier information to imprisoned Timorese independence leader, now President, Xanana Gusmao. Romance blossomed and the pair married in 2000. She says Timor-Leste’s women continue to face a struggle.