So now Julian Assange, an Australian citizen, is declared to be a non
journalist and charged with 17 counts of Espionage. And we think that
this isn't "1984"?
That once proud Fourth Estate has turned out to be nothing but a
toothless paper Tiger. Year by year the All White Male American
Oligarchy has been reeling in its Working Class. We almost made a
break for it, but the Empire still owns the Pentagon, Congress,
Supreme Court, Federal Judges and now a confused and broken Media.
We, those of us opposed to this murderous, ruthless, gang of greed
driven traitors to our freedom, are in for some hard times. But
remember, never in history has a corrupt ruling class endured.
Eventually the Masses rise up and vent their wrath on their former
Masters.
It's a long proven formula for self destruction. Greed breeds
contempt. Contempt breeds indifference. Indifference breeds abuse.
And abuse breeds rebellion, overthrow and revenge.
Carl Jarvis
*** Julian Assange Indicted Under Espionage Act on 17 New Counts
May 23, 2019
WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange was indicted on Thursday under the
Espionage Act, the first time a journalist has been charged under the Act
for possessing and disseminating classified information.
By Joe Lauria
Special to Consortium News
A journalist was indicted under the Espionage Act for the first time in
U.S.
history on Thursday when the Department of Justice charged WikiLeaks
founder
Julian Assange with 17 counts of violating the Act in a move that opens the
way for anyone who publishes classified information to prosecution.
The 37-page indictment charges Assange under four sections of the Act,
including Section E for possessing and disseminating classified matter. It
charged him with acts common to any investigative journalist:
"(i)circumvent(ing) legal safeguards on information; (ii) provid(ing) that
protected information to WikiLeaks for public dissemination; and (iii)
continu(ing) the pattern of illegally procuring and providing
protectedinformation to WikiLeaks for distribution to the public."
Assange is serving a 50-week sentence in London's Belmarsh prison for
skipping bail and seeking asylum in Ecuador's embassy in 2012 because he
feared onward extradition from Sweden to the United States and prosecution
under the Espionage Act. He was arrested on April 11 when Ecuador illegally
lifted his asylum and let British police onto Ecuadorian territory to carry
Assange from the embassy.
John Demers, head of the DOJ's National Security Division, told reporters:
"Some say that Assange is a journalist and that he should be immune for
prosecution for these actions. The department takes seriously the role of
journalists in our democracy and we thank you for it. It is not and has
never been the department's policy to target them for reporting."
Demers said Assange wasn't a journalist. "No responsible actor, journalist
or otherwise, would purposefully publish the names of individuals he or she
knew to be confidential human sources in a war zone, exposing them to the
gravest of dangers," he said.
Assange's attorney in the U.S., Barry Pollack, said:
"Today the government charged Julian Assange under the Espionage Act for
encouraging sources to provide him truthful information and for publishing
that information. The fig leaf that this is merely about alleged computer
hacking has been removed. These unprecedented charges demonstrate the
gravity of the threat the criminal prosecution of Julian Assange poses to
all journalists in their endeavor to inform the public about actions that
have taken by the U.S. government."
The Espionage Act carries a potential death penalty if the publication of
classified information takes place during wartime. Some of WikiLeak's most
prominent releases related to the U.S. wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, in
which prima facie evidence of U.S. war crimes was revealed.
A key part of the indictment is that Assange published the unredacted
names
of informants and other persons putting their lives at risk. According to
a
WikiLeaks source, Assange was forced to reveal certain names to actually
help them escape when two Guardian journalists published a password to
material containing their names that only intelligence agencies could
access. Assange has repeatedly said that there is no known case of harm
coming to anyone whose names were revealed.
Press Freedom at Risk
The indictment under the Espionage Act demolishes a democratic pretense of
freedom of the press in the U.S. and makes all news organizations-indeed
any
citizen-liable for prosecution for disseminating classified information.
"Notably, The New York Times, among many other news organizations, obtained
precisely the same archives of documents from WikiLeaks, without
authorization from the government - the act that most of the charges
addressed," the Times reported.
"Though he is not a conventional journalist, much of what Mr. Assange does
at WikiLeaks is difficult to distinguish in a legally meaningful way from
what traditional news organizations like The New York Times do: seek and
publish information that officials want to be secret, including classified
national security matters, and take steps to protect the confidentiality of
sources," the Times report on the indictment said.
In a tweet WikiLeaks called the indictment "madness."
WikiLeaks Editor-in-Chief Kristin Hrafnsson said he took "satisfaction" in
having correctly warned of the Espionage Act prosecution of Assange.
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Tags: Julian Assange WikiLeaks
