Assange: hero or villain?
BRIDGET BRENNAN: Now Julian Assange's lawyer said he was far from well. The judge adjourned the case until mid June and said it may be possible to hold the next hearing in Belmarsh Prison's Magistrates Court if Julian Assange is still too unwell.
- ABC News, 31 May, 2019
Hello, I’m Paul Barry, welcome to Media Watch.
And the future is looking bleak for Julian Assange, the Australian founder of WikiLeaks.
Two sets of prosecutors are now trying to extradite him from Britain to Sweden and to the USA, where:
ZOE DANIEL: … Assange now faces 17 new charges under the US Espionage Act, in what’s said to be unprecedented use of that law.
- ABC News, 24 May, 2019
Assange was originally facing just one minor charge in America — of conspiring with Chelsea Manning to hack into US Department of Defence computers.
But the espionage charges could see him locked up for life and many in the world’s media are outraged:
Julian Assange’s Indictment Aims at the Heart of the First Amendment
- The New York Times, 23 May, 2019
US efforts to jail Assange for espionage are a grave threat to a free media
- The Guardian, 26 May, 2019
The indictment of Assange is a blueprint for making journalists into felons
- The Washington Post, 28 May, 2019
Assange was arrested in London in April, after being booted out of the Ecuadorian embassy, where he sought asylum almost seven years ago:
PHILIP WILLIAMS: He'd long dreamt of leaving the embassy, but not like this. Yelling ‘the UK must resist’, Julian Assange was dragged from his diplomatic bolt hole.
- ABC News Channel, 12 April, 2019
He’s now in a British jail, serving a 50-week sentence for dodging bail back in 2012. And he’s said by his supporters to be seriously ill.
Last week he was moved to the hospital wing of London’s Belmarsh Prison and was too sick to appear in court.
So, why the shock and alarm at his plight and the lack of faith in British and American justice?
First, because the prospect of him being extradited is now very real.
And second because, in more than 100 years, he is the first person to be charged under the US Espionage Act for merely receiving and publishing classified information, as opposed to stealing it or leaking it.
And this is a huge concern for journalists, as the man who famously leaked the Pentagon Papers to The Washington Post 48 years ago, told Democracy Now:
DANIEL ELLSBERG: Yesterday is a day that will be, live in the history of journalism, of law in this country and of civil liberties in this country, because it was a direct attack on the First Amendment …
- Democracy Now, 24 May, 2019
The US First Amendment protects journalists from prosecution by ensuring freedom of speech and freedom of the press.
But the US government argues that Assange should not have such protection, because he is not a journalist. And several in the US media agree:
CHUCK TODD: … Julian Assange is a hacker, not a journalist.
- MTP Daily, MSNBC, 25 May, 2019
HOWARD KURTZ: Julian Assange is a destructive anti-American force and I will be screaming for the top of my lungs if a real journalist or reporter is ever hit with these kinds of charges.
- Media Buzz, Fox News, 28 May, 2019
The claim that Assange is not a real journalist rests on the charge that WikiLeaks was reckless in dumping large amounts of secret information without knowing what it contained or who might be harmed.
But he and WikiLeaks have certainly shone a light on things we had a right to know about.
Such as this video:
MILITARY: Come on, fire!
- WikiLeaks: Collateral Murder video, 5 April, 2010
Which shows a US helicopter crew opening fire on unarmed Iraqi civilians and killing a dozen people, an incident that America later lied about and covered up.
That video, and other revelations about the Iraq and Afghan wars, were published in 2010 in partnership with media organisations all over the world, including The Guardian and New York Times, and they brought Assange a Walkley, a top Australian journalistic award:
JULIAN ASSANGE: We, journalists, are at our best when we share with activists and lawyers the goal of exposing illegality and wrongdoing …
- YouTube, SBS Raw, 27 November, 2011
But Assange has not always been on the side of the angels.
WikiLeaks stands accused of helping Russia interfere with the US election and he’s fallen out with many if not most of the people he’s worked with.
The British judge who found him guilty of breaching bail also labelled him a “narcissist” who “cannot get past his own selfish interests”.
But as former Guardian editor Alan Rusbridger wrote last month, there is much more than personality at stake here:
I found the WikiLeaks co-founder a troubling figure when I worked with him, but America’s case would criminalise journalistic inquiry
- The Guardian, 26 May, 2019
And Rusbridger — who is one of many to have fallen out with the WikiLeaks founder — went on to say:
… the attempt to lock him up under the Espionage Act is a deeply troubling move that should serve as a wake-up call to all journalists. You may not like Assange, but you’re next.
- The Guardian. 26 May, 2019
We agree.
Criminalising those who publish classified information as well as those who leak it threatens the very foundations of a free press and, indeed, a free society.
CORRECTION: The original story stated Julian Assange was facing extradition to Sweden on “rape charges”. Assange has never been charged by Swedish authorities; it is an investigation of allegations only. We apologise for the error.