MAINSTREAM US REPORTERS SILENT ABOUT BEING SPIED ON BY APPARENT CIA
CONTRACTOR THAT TARGETED ASSANGE
MAX BLUMENTHALSEPTEMBER 18, 2020
JULIAN ASSANGE
Despite being spied on and having their privacy invaded by the UC Global
firm that targeted Assange, reporters from major US news outlets have said
nothing in protest. Meanwhile, new evidence of that firms CIA links has
emerged.
A Spanish security firm apparently contracted by US intelligence to carry
out a campaign of black operations against Julian Assange and his associates
spied on several US reporters including Ellen Nakashima, the top national
security reporter of the Washington Post, and Lowell Bergman, a New York
Times and PBS veteran.
To date, Nakashima and her employers at the Washington Post have said
nothing about the flagrant assault on their constitutional rights by UC
Global, the security company in charge of Ecuadorian embassy in London,
which seemingly operated under the watch of the CIAs then-director, Mike
Pompeo. PBS, the New York Times, and other mainstream US outlets have also
remained silent about the US government intrusion into reporters personal
devices and private records.
The Grayzone has learned that several correspondents from a major US
newspaper rebuffed appeals by Wikileaks to report on the illegal spying
campaign by UC Global, privately justifying the contractors actions on
national security grounds.
UC Global spied on numerous journalists with the aim of sending their
information to US intelligence through an FTP server placed at the company
headquarters and through hand-delivered hard drives.
Nearly all of those reporters have so far ignored or refused invitations to
join a criminal complaint to be filed in Spanish court by Stefania Maurizi,
an Italian journalist whose devices were invaded and compromised during a
visit to Assange.
Proof of UC Globals illegal spying campaign and the firms relationship
with the CIA emerged following the September 2019 arrest of the companys
CEO, David Morales. Spanish police had enacted a secret operation called
Operation Tabanco under a criminal case managed by the same National Court
that orchestrated the arrest of former Chilean military dictator Augusto
Pinochet years before.
Morales was charged in October 2019 by the Spanish court with violating the
privacy of Assange and abusing his attorney-client privileges, as well as
money laundering and bribery. A mercenary former Spanish special forces
officer, Morales also stood accused of illegal weapons possession after two
guns with the serial numbers filed off were found during a search of his
property.
The documents and testimony revealed in court have exposed shocking details
of UC Globals campaign against Assange, his lawyers, friends, and
reporters. Evidence of crimes ranging from spying to robberies to kidnapping
and even a proposed plot to eliminate Assange by poisoning has emerged from
the ongoing trial.
In an investigation for The Grayzone this May, this reporter detailed how
the Las Vegas Sands corporation of Trump mega-donor Sheldon Adelson
functioned as an apparent liaison between UC Global and Pompeos CIA,
presumably contracting the former on behalf of the latter. It was the second
time Adelsons company had been identified as a CIA asset. (The first was in
2010, when a private intelligence report sponsored by gambling competitors
alleged that his casino in Macau was sending footage of Chinese officials
gambling so they could be blackmailed into serving as CIA informants).
The story placed the Trump organization at the center of a global campaign
of surveillance and sabotage that ruthlessly targeted journalists, including
Assange and virtually every reporter he came into contact with since 2017.
For the past four years, the Washington press corps has howled about Trumps
angry browbeating of the White House press pool, treating his resentful
outbursts as a grave threat to press freedom. At the same time, it has
reacted with a collective shrug to revelations that a firm that was, by all
indications, contracted by the Trump administrations CIA to destroy Assange
had spied on prominent American national security reporters.
More revealingly, some of the reporters who had their personal information
and notes stolen by UC Global, the apparent CIA contractor, have not said a
word about it.
Maurizi, the Italian reporter who is filing a lawsuit against UC Global and
serving as a witness in the current case before the Spanish judge, told this
reporter she was stunned by the mainstream US medias passive attitude.
Imagine if Putin had done anything like this. Just imagine what a scandal
this would be, she remarked to the Grayzone. It would be a giant scandal
all around the world. But instead, [US media] is saying nothing.
Randy Credico, a comedian, social justice activist, and longtime advocate
for Assanges freedom, also attempted to generate media interest in the
spying scandal when he learned that UC Global had snooped on him in the
embassy. I went to everybody, I went to MSNBC, to the Wall Street Journal,
CNN, to journalists I knew, and I couldnt get anyone interested, Credico
complained to The Grayzone.
The agency of the stars and stripes wants to see us
In his first public address as CIA director, Mike Pompeo branded Assanges
Wikileaks as a non-state hostile intelligence service often abetted by
state actors like Russia and outlined a long term campaign of
counter-measures against the crusading media organization. At the time,
Assange was trapped in the Ecuadorian embassy in London and hosting regular
visits there from his legal team, friends, and an array of reporters.
Throughout 2017, UC Globals Morales traveled frequently from Spain to the
US to orchestrate the campaign against Assange. At several points, he issued
spying directives from inside the Venetian hotel belonging to Adelsons
Sands. He boasted to his employees that he was working for the dark side,
and referred to the forces that had contracted his services as his American
friends.
Sometimes, when I insistently asked him who his American friends were, on
some occasions David Morales answered that they were the US intelligence,'
a former UC Global business partner testified before the Spanish court.
During a January 2017 visit to Adelsons Las Vegas-based Venetian hotel,
Morales and an employee exchanged several texts on Telegram about an
important trial run for UC Globals new client. I want you to be alert
because according to what they tell me they may be controlling us so that
everything that is confidential so make it encrypted, Morales said.
Everything is related to the London issue
he continued, making reference
to the Ecuadorian embassy that housed Assange. Those who control [it] are
the friends of the USA.
In May 2017, Telegram messages by Morales show him making further references
to his apparent work for the US government: I am on a subject in which I
foresee that they are going to start monitoring us
he remarked to an
employee. How are we protected for that? After his worker outlined UC
Globals systems, Morales replied that he did not expect any problems for
those who want to see us.
We can do that if the agency of the stars and stripes wants to see us, the
UC Global CEO continued.
I imagined I was going to go there, the employee replied.
That July, Morales was in Miami, on a mission to provide the agency of the
stars and stripes with a budget for the hidden microphones UC Global
planned to place inside the CCTV system at the Ecuadorian embassy in London.
In his Telegram chats, Morales responded with Trump badges to several
messages from a UC Global employee a seeming reference to the US
administration that had contracted his services.As this reporter revealed in
May, Morales not only oversaw the secret installation of microphones in the
embassys CCTV system and hidden microphones under a fire extinguisher in
its conference room, he attempted to establish a feed to a separate,
exterior storage server managed from the US, doing his best to keep the
operation hidden from Ecuadors intelligence services. He referred to the
entity on the receiving end of the CCTV footage and audio as the American
client.
In a December 2017 email sent from Adelsons Venetian hotel, Morales ordered
his employees at the embassy to inform him if any visitors carry mobile
phones, pen drives, computers, or any electronic equipment, and to make
sure the protocol is maintained and they leave their electronics at the
entrance.
By this point, UC Globals spying dragnet had ensnared practicaly everyone
who entered the embassy to visit Assange. Among the most prominent victims
was then-US Rep. Dana Rohrabacher, who was allegedly dispatched by Trump in
August 2017 to offer a presidential pardon in exchange for Assange providing
concrete evidence the Russian government did not hack the DNCs email
server. Assange, who has never revealed a source, refused the offer.
Pamela Anderson, the Canadian-American actress and close friend of Assange,
had her email hacked into by UC Global when a guard took advantage of a
moment when she left the room to photograph a Gmail password she had written
on a notepad. UC Global not only spied on Assanges legal team, violating
attorney-client privilege, it hounded Stella Morris, a member of the
Wikileaks legal team who became Assanges romantic partner, hatching a
failed plot to steal her infant sons diapers from a trash bin in a bid to
obtain his DNA and prove his genetic link to Assange.
In December 2017, UC Global learned that Assange and his legal team were
formulating a plan for him to exit the embassy under the protections granted
to diplomats under the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations. Morales
ordered his employees to act aggressively to sabotage it, demanding copies
of all video recordings, presumably for delivery to US intelligence.
Ellen Nakashima, a national security reporter for the Washington Post,
visited the Ecuadorian embassy to interview Assange on December 15.
According to notes by a UC Global guard named Jose Antonio Torre, Nakashima
arrived with Souad Mekhennet, a colleague at the Post who was not allowed
inside because she did not have her passport. The two reporters were working
on a profile of Andy Müller-Maguhn, a German cyber expert and one of
Assanges closest confidants, who escorted them to London. (UC Global
employees photographed the contents of Müller-Maguhns backpack and the
secret number inside his encrypted phone.)
When Nakashima entered the meeting with Assange, Torre held her voice
recorder and cellphone. He recounted in notes to Morales how he removed the
battery from the phone, then photographed her device.
Those notes contained a remarkable admission: as Nakashima left the embassy,
Torre said, I tried to keep her tape recorder but the woman remembered it
at the exit.
Notes by UC Global employee Jose Antonio detailing Ellen Nakashimas visit
and his attempt to steal the Washington Post reporters voice recorder
In her January 17, 2018 report on her visit to the embassy, Nakashima made
reference to a warning by Assange about spy cameras and his use of a white
noise machine to foil hidden surveillance devices like the hidden microphone
that was later revealed under the fire extinguisher in the room. The
Washington Post reporter made no mention, however, of the UC Global guards
attempt to pocket her voice recorder.
Nakashima did not respond to a request for comment sent to her publicly
listed Washington Post email by The Grayzone.
She was not the only reporter illegally snooped on by UC Global spies posing
as embassy guards. Lowell Bergman, the award-winning investigative reporter
and New York Times and PBS veteran, had his phone opened and SIM card
removed without his permission by a UC Global employee when he met with
Assange on October 6, 2017.
Journalist Lowell Bergmans phone (above) was opened and photographed by a
UC Global employee without his permission.
The Grayzone obtained footage and audio of Bergmans meeting with Assange
that was captured by UC Globals spy cameras and likely delivered to the
CIA.
Left: A UC Global spy pats Lowell Bergman down at the entrance to Ecuadors
embassy in London. Right: Footage secretly recorded by UC Global of
Bergmans meeting with Assange.
Intercept senior correspondent Glenn Greenwald and his husband, David
Miranda, were secretly videotaped by UC Global spies, during a September 16,
2017 meeting with Assange.
While Greenwald was in the conference room with Assange, a UC Global
employee opened his passport and photographed a visa showing he had visited
Russia, a flagrant violation of his privacy carried out under orders from
Morales. (The Grayzone has viewed a UC Global photograph taken of
Greenwalds visa that was sent to company headquarters).
UC Global footage of Greenwald and Mirandas meeting with Assange, who is
seen in the upper right-hand corner activating a white noise machine.
Over two years later, when Greenwald learned of the violation of his
constitutional rights, he protested on Twitter, This is the US
Government/CIA spying on its own citizens, including our phones, with no
warrants.
Unlike Greenwald, Bergman has said nothing in public about being spied on by
an alleged CIA contractor. However, he has agreed to serve as a witness in
the trial of UC Globals Morales, according to a member of Wikileaks legal
team. He did not respond to an emailed request for comment.
US reporters justify CIA spying on Assange
Throughout 2019 and during the first several months of this year, Wikileaks
and its allies worked phone lines and raced across timezones to generate
media interest in the CIA spying scandal they had uncovered through the
Spanish prosecution of UC Globals Morales.
Correspondents from a major US newspaper were presented with detailed
evidence of UC Global spying on Assange and his associates, and
documentation of the firms relationship with the CIA and Sheldon Adelson, a
Wikileaks source told The Grayzone.
Not only were the reporters initially uninterested in the spying scandal,
the Wikileaks source said one correspondent justified the CIAs surveillance
on national security grounds. He said, well, thats what an intelligence
service is supposed to, the source recalled, describing the experience as
crazy.
In December 2019, the New York Times covered the CIA operation against
Assange in a single article by Raphael Minder. Framing the case in terms of
conflicting interpretations, Minder claimed it remains unclear whether it
was the Americans who were behind bugging the embassy.
Omitted in Minders article were all the obvious signs of UC Globals
collaboration with US intelligence, from Morales comment that the agency
of the stars and stripes will see us to witness testimony that explicitly
stated the company had been contracted by the CIA.
The New York Times was basically saying there was no evidence that US
intelligence was involved, Maurizi commented to The Grayzone. What do they
want? A text message from the CIA saying, we did it?'
One reporters lonely fight for justice
Maurizi was among the reporters who produced the most critical coverage of
the political persecution of Assange and Wikileaks over the years. While
reporting for Italys La RepuBblica, Maurizi visited Assange frequently at
the Ecuadorian embassy. When she met him there in December 2017, UC Global
guards invaded her personal devices after seizing them at the entrance of
the diplomatic facility.
They took my two telephones, one which was encrypted; my iPod, and many USB
sticks, Maurizi told The Grayzone this May. There was no way to get my
backpack back. The guard told me, Dont worry, everything will be fine, no
one will access your materials or open your backpack. I was very
suspicious. I wasnt even allowed to bring a pen inside to take notes.
The reporter learned later that UC Global employees photographed the unique
International Mobile Equipment Identity number and the SIM card number
inside the her phone. This seemed to be what they needed to hack into the
device.
Maurizi later found that calls, emails, and texts from her editors, then at
the Italian daily La Repubblica, were failing to go through. No one could
explain this disruption, Maurizi said. I wonder if it had anything to do
with these espionage activities. To this day I cannot say.
Stefania Maurizi UC Global
UC Global photo of journalist Stefania Maurizis mobile phone
Maurizi plans to file a criminal complaint against UC Global in Spains
National Court this October on behalf of journalists victimized by the
security firm. So far, she has been unable to find any reporters willing to
sign on to her complaint.
She said she asked the Washington Posts Nakashima to join, but never
received a reply. Bergman, for his part, told her he was not interested in
participating.
I couldnt get anybody interested in the CIA spying on US journalists
Like Maurizi, Randy Credico was spied on by UC Global during a visit to
Assange at the Ecuadorian embassy. When he learned his meeting had been
secretly videotaped, he embarked on a frenetic campaign to generate media
coverage of the violation of his constitutional rights by the CIA.
Credico is a comedian, award-winning criminal justice reformer, and advocate
for Assanges freedom who emerged as a player in the Russiagate saga when
Robert Muellers investigative team called him as a witness.
After being falsely accused of serving as a backchannel between Wikileaks
and former Trump advisor Roger Stone, Credico made numerous high-profile
appearances on MSNBC and CNN, and rubbed shoulders with Beltway media
honchos as a guest at the White House Press Correspondents Dinner.
Credico told The Grayzone he attempted to convince his contacts in
mainstream media to cover the UC Global-CIA spying scandal. But in every
instance, he was met with a cold shoulder.
I went to everybody, he recalled. I went to MSNBC, to the Wall Street
Journal, CNN, to journalists I knew, and I couldnt get anyone interested. I
mean, all these reporters hate Trump, and here you had Pompeo and Sheldon
Adelson, the guy who finances Trump, breaking the law. You would think this
would be a big deal to these lean forward progressives. And they havent
said shit. Its appalling that they havent come forward and said something
about this.
To be sure, CNN Español published a lengthy December 2019 report on the UC
Global spying ring. But it relied heavily on the perspective of the firms
disgraced former CEO, Morales. No, I am not a double agent and it is absurd
[to say] that I traveled to the US to personally hand over information to
the CIA, Morales claimed to CNN.
The article was co-authored by Arturo Torres, a right-wing Ecuadorian
journalist who was hostile to both Assange and his countrys leftist former
president, Raphael Correa. His work has been sponsored by Transparency
International, a supposed anti-corruption NGO funded by the US State
Department and British government.
Months earlier, in June 2019, CNNs Torres used material illegally gathered
by UC Global to publish a malicious attack on Assange asserting that there
was no doubt that there is evidence that Assange had ties to Russian
intelligence agencies.
The article provided no such evidence, however, while falsely claiming that
UC Globals surveillance reports were compiled for the Ecuadorian
government not the CIA.
In reality, UC Globals Morales was desperate to elude Ecuadors SENAIN
intelligence agency, instructing his employees in an email from Adelsons
Venetian hotel, Nobody can know about my trips, mainly my trips to the USA,
because SENAIN is onto us.
Washington Post owners look forward to a successful relationship with the
CIA
The hysteria triggered by Trumps victory in 2016 goes a long way toward
explaining US mainstream medias hostility towards Assange. Immediately
after conceding defeat, Hillary Clinton blamed Russian Wikileaks,
deepening the hostility among partisan Democrats toward a dissident
journalist then-Vice President Joseph Biden had already branded as a
high-tech terrorist. Mainstream US media followed in lockstep.
On April 11, 2019, the day Assange was arrested by British police in the
Ecuadorian embassy, the New York Times editorial board celebrated with two
cheers: The [Trump] administration has begun well by charging Mr. Assange
with an indisputable crime.
The Washington Post editorial board was more enthused by the publishers
arrest, proclaiming, Mr. Assanges case could conclude as a victory for the
rule of law, not the defeat for civil liberties of which his defenders
mistakenly warn. The Post even demanded Assanges extradition to the US,
hoping that he could be coerced into becoming a cooperating witness and
potentially provide information about Russian intelligences efforts to
undermine democracy in the West.
While the loathing of Assange in Trump-era Washington helps explain
mainstream medias shunning of the jailed journalist, the increasingly cozy
relationship papers like the New York Times and Washington Post enjoy with
the US intelligence apparatus offers a more substantial basis for
understanding the medias silence on the UC Global scandal.
Throughout the Trump-Russia investigation and the various intrigues that
comprised Russiagate, the legacy publications of US media fed audiences with
an endless stream of stories based on high confidence assessments and
often dubious narratives furnished by anonymous US intelligence agents. In
the Trump era, the corporate news media became a de facto bulletin board for
the intelligence apparatus. The New York Times even admitted it sent a June
2019 story on US cyber-attacks against Russias electric grid to the
government for approval before publishing.
The Washington Post, where Nakashima covers national security issues, is
owned by the big tech corporation, Amazon. In 2014, Amazon signed a $600
million contract with the CIA to host its cloud server. We look forward to
a successful relationship with the CIA, Amazon declared in an official
statement. Four years later, Amazon was awarded a $10 billion contract from
the Pentagon to oversee its Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure program.
Notably, when Nakashima sought a meeting inside the Ecuadorian embassy in
2017, her request form listed her company not as the Washington Post, but as
Amazon.
While Assanges lawyers fought his extradition in a London courtroom this
September 15, Nakashima was live-tweeting coverage of ThreatCon 2020, a
conference of top US intelligence officials and private spies gathered on a
private island off the coast of Georgia. Her colleague, Washington Post
assistant editor David Ignatius, and New York Times national security
correspondent David Sanger, participated directly in the exclusive
spook-fest. Among the sponsors of the conference was InQTel, the
CIA-sponsored research and development firm.
This September, the US Department of Justice issued a letter to the Spanish
judge overseeing the UC Global trial that obstructed any possibility of
cooperation. Like much of the US media, the government in Washington wants
nothing to do with the devastating evidence tumbling out of a courtroom in
Madrid.
