Blaise Metreweli

The United Kingdom has appointed Blaise Metreweli as the new head of its Secret Intelligence Service (MI6) — making her the first woman ever to lead the spy agency in its over 100-year history.

The historic announcement was made by Prime Minister Keir Starmer on Sunday, who praised the appointment at a time when the UK faces “threats on an unprecedented scale”.

“Be it aggressors who send spy ships to our waters or hackers disrupting public services, the role of our intelligence services has never been more vital,” Starmer said in a statement from Downing Street.

Metreweli will succeed the outgoing chief Richard Moore later this year. As head of MI6, she will carry the traditional title of “C” — not to be confused with “M” from Ian Fleming’s James Bond series, although fiction did get ahead by casting a woman in that role, famously played by Judi Dench.

She is currently MI6’s Director General of Technology and Innovation — codenamed “Q” within the agency — and has served across both MI6 and MI5, the domestic intelligence agency.

A graduate of Cambridge University with a background in anthropology, Metreweli joined MI6 in 1999 and has spent most of her career in operational roles across the Middle East and Europe.

Her appointment marks a significant moment for British intelligence, following in the footsteps of past breakthroughs in MI5 and GCHQ. The domestic intelligence agency MI5 appointed its first female chief, Stella Rimington, in 1992, followed by Eliza Manningham-Buller in 2002. The UK’s cyber intelligence agency GCHQ appointed Anne Keast-Butler as its first woman director in 2023.

Metreweli’s elevation reinforces the growing representation of women at the highest levels of the UK’s national security leadership.