That Julian Assange has asked the judge in his extradition trial to allow him to sit with his lawyers at the defence table, rather than behind the glass screen of the dock, is typical of the man.
Challenging power at any point that it manifests itself, even in the physical arrangements of a courtroom. The dock used to be open and in the centre of British courtrooms. Now the defendant sits behind a sheet of perspex glass with a few vents in it, at the back or the side of the courtroom.
There is at least honesty in the arrangement in this case. The procedure is a dealing between states, with a piece of courtroom theatre in the middle.
It is obviously worth it for Assange to participate, rather than standing mute, since there is a chance that the judiciary may find unacceptable the request to render a journalist to a potential 175 year jail term.
It’s unlikely. Unlikely too is that British PM Boris Johnson will recover a dash of his purported libertarian flair and refuse the request, but that’s worth a go too.
But the process is so draconian, and world opposition growing so strongly that there is a greater chance now than there might have been six months ago. So it’s worth trying anything.
What’s missing at the moment is any concerted and coordinated campaign by the major press of the world to stand up, not only for a journalist, but one with whom some of them worked closely and extensively for years.
The Guardian, The New York Times and others should be leading a global campaign, with coordinated front pages protesting the US charges and the hearing.
Perhaps they have something cooking, and they’re waiting for an initial verdict. But I wouldn’t put any interesting amount of money on it.
While The Guardian has featured a few opinion pieces protesting Assange’s treatment and made some editorial comment in his support, well, it hasn’t exactly been cry freedom, has it? The best you can say is that it’s undone some of the immense damage it did to Assange after he broke with them during the Cablegate releases of 2010.
The lack of a concerted response is all the more bewildering, given what is being revealed day-by-day in the hearing/trial as to the intent of the US as regards the criminalisation of journalism.
The multiple espionage counts aimed at Assange are for allegedly assisting someone — alleged to be Chelsea (then Bradley) Manning — in bypassing a password protecting data. The data had already been acquired by the informant; the alleged act was akin to a journalist cracking open a briefcase of documents leaked to them.
The ludicrous maximum sentence — two human life-spans — is pure theatre of terror. The point of a 175 year maximum sentence is the absurdity of it, the state’s indifference to actual human life.
That got a bit of attention from journalists whose daily business might involve a document drop. Then it faded.
But now in building a case the US is relying on some extremely fuzzy allegations about the release of unredacted files regarding the Afghanistan War logs — the first of the four drops from the full Cablegate archive.
This is an obvious attempt to play to the gallery of public opinion during what should be a technical legal hearing. After all, the question is whether an Australian citizen operating out of London could be even indictable for a US charge of espionage.
The introduction of alleged consequences (let in to “show” that the extraditable defence was non-trivial) is a measure of the process’s political nature.
It should also be a measure of yet another wake up call — mainstream journalism loves the snooze button — as to how the Assange case is being used for the global criminalisation of journalism.
The idea that you should try and minimise harm that would arise from reporting on conflict situations is a good one. The idea that any harm that is not avoided is something for which a journalist is culpable is absurd, and unlimited in its ramifications.
We’re not talking about the moral case of whether you should redact names in reporting on war, gang crime, etc. You should.
But if you don’t, through pressure of time, carelessness etc, are you responsible for the acts of violent others?
What if you, or a subeditor, fails to save redacting changes? What if you miss a name? What if you describe a landmark, a cafe, a tattoo that identifies someone?
The idea that even the most insouciant publication of hot information should remove the protection of journalism is a category error. Yes yes, if someone compiles a hit list of names and addresses and publishes it on “www.globalnews69lol.com”, it is absent protection.
But the Afghan War logs were published clearly as journalistic exposure of a war shrouded in secrecy, and with the participation of mainstream outlets — who were all in such doldrums in the digital age that they were desperate to attach themselves to WikiLeaks’s cyber expertise.
Indeed, the Assange case makes clear how catch-all this can be. When later on WikiLeaks released the full Cablegate archive online, they were roundly criticised — not least by David Leigh, one of The Guardian’s Cablegate operatives.
Yet, as WikiLeaks then pointed out, there were numerous encrypted versions of the Cablegate archive already floating around online — which were made accessible when the full long decryption password to them was made available by … David Leigh and Luke Harding in their quickie book on Cablegate, done so in order to heighten the book’s cloak-and-dagger atmosphere.
Is Leigh culpable for anything anyone does after accessing the archive using the password he provided? Of course not.
The US government is playing to the new ethos of “safety” to present all risk associated with journalism as illegitimate. It is a new and malign development in the global crackdown on standard journalistic practice.
The Assange hearings aren’t a sideshow to that — they’re a beta test of what interlocked states can get away with. Mainstream editors should be campaigning on this before they end up in their own trials-that-aren’t-trials.
Still, maybe they’ll be spared the glass screens and the dock; from what Assange has won them. Again.
Thanks Guy, great piece. Point well made that it’s absurd to think journalists should be legally culpable for harm caused by a third party using details disclosed in a story. On the question of whether anybody has in fact come to harm as a result of Wikileaks document dumps, Michael Brissenden’s 4 Corners interview with Obama Administration’s, P.J. Crowley, was utterly revealing. All Crowley could say, after ten years, is that there are people mentioned in Wikileaks releases who bad things have since happened to – and the bad things *may* have been associated with the activities recorded in documents released by Wikileaks. .
The implications are far worse than this Guy. Extraterritoriality is the latest frontier of US imperialism and no doubt being keenly watched by other imperial pretenders.
The risk is that, in time, any person in any country with extradition laws, could be whisked off the to the US under many of its laws. The big risks will be intellectual property and financial services. Theyve already tried it on over movie downloads. What about if you subscribe online to an automatically renewing US website subscription that it’s impossible to cancel except by cancelling that credit card ? A common occurrence these days. Or buy knock off patented medications online from India or China ? Etc.
It’s not all about journalists.
Just happened to pen a ‘letter to the (UnFairfacts) editor’, and a ‘complaint’ to ‘our ABC’, along these very lines (and, then some!) just 2 days ago.
Utterly appalling, fact-lite, disingenous and vicious coverage, all round, from local ‘big media’, for years.
They really are shot to bits, sliding towards complete irrelevance (to anyone still able to think even a little critically).
Whereas, if you go here – https://wwwdotyoutubedotcom/watch?v=630X89TbI74 , you’ll find;
“The Assange Story. WikiLeaks founder’s journey from whistleblowing hero to exile”
Yep, made by them, and released on the same day the trial began in ‘the Magistrates’. Never forget, they were the ones who gave political asylum to Snowden (after it was Assange who got Snowden out of Honkers, when Greenwald and Laura Poitras had run out of ideas, and the evil doers were on their way).
Lots of trams, the Fitzroy Town Hall, and all sorts of roustabouts who still understand what human rights, press freedom, the rule of law and democracy, are supposedly about.
Yep. Watched it on the said news service when it screened on that day. That service is the one I go to routinely after watching the versions of news peddled by our ABC/SBS. It’s like a cleansing shower that helps wash away the feelings of disgust.
Meanwhile, particularly good day-by-day coverage of the kangaroo court trying Julian Assange can be found here: https://wwwdotcraigmurraydotorg.uk/ . Your format for bypassing Crikey moderation seems to work so I’ll try it.
100% with ya, Iskandar. Been a ‘Vladvision’ watcher for many a year, once I twigged to the fact they were the bolt hole resorted to by some of the West’s finest journalism practitioners, who’d been cast from the mainstream for ‘non-compliance’.
I mean, FFS! – Chris Hedges, for example. Has his own interview show on Vladvision, and interviews genuinely interesting people, other journos included e.g Matt Taiibi.
Then there’s ‘Mad’ Max Keiser. who ‘back in the day’, meaning immediate post-GFC days, was welcome on everything from the Beeb, to Alan Jazeera (where Greste got paid to push their Muslim Brotherhood mantra – and he has the gall to criticise Assange. Still, he must be rapt his victimhood has been rewarded with a tenured academic position – the bloke’s filth!)
Mad Max is running a show called ‘Front Running’ ATM, on Vladvision, as a lead up to the Yank 2020 elections. Regulars include the truly great Dr Michael Hudson, one of the greatest economic historians ever to be spat out of the rancid Yanks system (didya know his old man, devout Minneapolis socialist he was, was bequeathed Leon Trotsky’s unpublished writings, from Trotsky’s time in exile in Mehico? These are genuinely fascinating people, and you will never, ever see them on Orzie, or any other, mainstream media. This coming Sunday’s ‘Front Running’ has both the octogenarian Doc Hudson, and Orzie economic ‘dissident’, Prof Steve Keen.
And, yes, Craig Murray – an honest ‘former diplomat” I trust you understand why Murray has cred i.e. Blair, Uzbekistan, the complete rottenness of that war mongering profiteer?
Seeing you’ve seen some sort of trustworthiness in what I suggest is worth taking note of, may I recommend a coupla other sites worth perusing?
Try ‘Moon of Alabama’ – the chief is a former chief tech officer at a major Yank tech company.
Then, there’s ‘The Saker’, a dead set giant of geopolitical strategy. Part Russian, part Swiss, former ‘intel officer’, who know lives in the US.
Dmitry Orlov, engineer taken to the US in the ’90’s by his parents, now back living in Russia, because he twigged to it being ‘all over’ for the Yanks. Smart as a whip, and one of the great ‘dystopians’.
I was struck, a few years back, by some of Oliver Stone’s interviews with Putin. Putin driving, Stone in the passenger’s seat, asks Putin why Russian came to grant Snowden asylum.
Putin shrugged, and said; ‘That’s international law, our officials assessed Snowden’s case as valid, so we granted him asylum’.
Stone then asked; ‘Have you ever thought about whether that was the right decision, considering the political ramifications?’
Putin; ‘I never think about Snowden. The decision was made according to international law, and that’s all we consider’.
A PhD in International Law, Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin.
Trump? Morrison? Johnson? Macron? The rest of the West?
Pygmies.
Then, there’s the world’s greatest FM since Chou En Lai, the great, GREAT, Sergey Lavrov.
Militarily? ‘Shoigu the Practical’, informed by the preeminent strategic genius, Valery Gerasimov?
What the Yanks and the West got? ‘Rapture fancier’ Pompouseo? ‘Recruits’ from Private Equity outfits, like Espers? Australia? Kidding, right?
This is not a contest, it is a farce. People, patriotic people, learned patriotic people, versus vast numbers of profiteering rubbish, like Joe Freakin’ Hockey, who fancies himself as an earner on ‘The Beltway’, where the only people who earn are those who shill for the putrid, murderous Yank war machine.
They will lose, and soon, cos they’re self interested imbeciles, who stand for nothing, and no citizenry.
Consortium News, of course, founded by the late, great, Robert Parry, whose advocacy for Assange has few peers.
Counterpunch, one of the great sites for intelligent discourse, founded by the pair of (the late) Alexander Cockburn and Jeffrey St. Clair, co-authors of the brilliant tome, ‘White Out’, about the Amerikan ‘security state’s’ involvement in the global drug trade.
Speaking of which, ‘My Man’ Afshin Rattansi, UK citizen of Iranian descent, host of ‘Going Underground’, produced in London, for distribution of Vladvision’s platforms, on Tuesday eve interviewed Nils Melzer, on Assange – an epic performance.
But, the 2nd half of the show was also well worth the effort – Antony Lowenstein, Ozzie lad, on the output from his latest project – on the global drug trade, and the Yanks centrality to that particular enterprise. He went to Honduras, and stood up the details of a supply chain that few recognise, let alone admit – from Latin America, to Africa’s poorest, such as Guinea, and from there into Europe and Limeyland, so the likes of Boris can gag about having ‘enjoyed’ coke.
These people are filth, every last hypocritical one of ’em.
Oh, BTW, ‘Off-Guardian’, ‘Black Agenda Report’ (Glenn Ford, Margaret Kimberley and Danny Haiphong being standouts), ‘The Grayzone’ (Max Blumenthal, son of DemoRat legend, Sydney, being particularly interesting – ‘Management of Savagery’ being a very enlightening read , plus Anya Parapamil, Aaron Mate etc), plus the fantastic Whitney Webb at Mintpress News – she’s a star, and ever so ‘investigative’, to a fault – some great ‘scoops’.
Cast the eye about, as you obviously do, and ye shall be rewarded as I have been for years.
I have nothing but disdain for what is dished up by local and world ‘big media’ – they are complete rubbish, and the Assange case has been a live example of that for a freakin’ decade.
Thanks for the excellent summary David. I already visit regularly most of the sites you mention, and the “Question More” news service is a daily staple. Some issues with the satellite recently but these have now been sorted. Just watched Peter Lavelle’s latest CrossTalk on the Assange show trial. Guests are Joe Lauria (Consortium), Taylor Husak and Alex Mercouris (Duran). Best discussion of the Assange show trial I’ve seen so far. Touches on many of the same points as Guy did.
Yes, MoA, Saker, Orlov, Grayzone etc all part of my perusing. I highly recommend John Helmer, another brilliant Aussie expat who found his bolt-hole in “that place” from which he does extraordinary in-depth analyses on diverse subjects. His essays on Skripal and MH17 comprehensibly demolish the western mainstream official narratives. He’s just published a book on the former, and I don’t doubt will at some point on the latter when the time is right. He occasionally appears as a guest on Gorilla Radio in Vancouver.
I see my old sparring mate Oldie has injected a couple of his damp fartlets below. Says nothing as usual.
In Solidarity!
I might add kudos to SBS for having shown the Putin Interviews. Twice. Somebody there has their head screwed on right. I wish they would also show Oliver Stone’s “Ukraine on Fire”. To counteract some of the Yank propaganda docos they run, presumably for “balance”.
Guys, you forgot to mention Breitbart, FoxNews, 8chan and many more who share your ideals.
tldr, you lost me at the point you took Putin at face value about Snowden. Just because the manipulative western media don’t like Putin, doesn’t mean he’s a good person. He’s no better than the rest of them, but more less fairly treated by western media.
Actually, you started to lose me at Dmitry Orlov, who long ago lost his marbles and became a ranting Russophile, misogynist conspiracy theorist – a great pity because some of the stuff he did before that happened was truly fantastic. His moronic, racist take on Ukraine (and Ukrainians) is of particular note.
Thanks GR. Strong points, well made. The daily treatment in gaol of Assange is cruel and unusual punishment and the magistrate seems to be channelling Judge Jeffreys at the Bloody Assizes.
Shaun Macallef last night uncomfortably attempted to make fun of Julian Assange,Pamela Anderson and his case for a fair trial. It fell flat.He does not usually miss his targets so disastrously.The ABC is can do better than that.
Cazza
Spot on, Cazza. That was gawd awful, and embarrassing, in the extreme.
Right from the kick off, and the ‘sex crimes dodger’ premise (complete with ‘Roman Polanski’ comparator) it was a ‘triumph’ of pig ignorant ‘research’.
Slide many a rung, last night, did Micallef and Co. Now, just back in the pack.
Agree, woeful and pointless, literally. Shouldn’t have got past first run in the writing room.
misdirected And not funny
I’m a Micallef fan from way back, so I’m glad I missed it. Doubly appalling when you consider Micallef’s a lawyer and must know how lawless this all is.