Media call to drop Assange charges
THE New York Times and four leading European news organisations called on the US Justice Department to drop criminal charges against WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, warning in an open letter that the case could criminalise US journalists’ work exposing government secrets and potential wrongdoing.
The news organisations acknowledged they had been critical of Assange for releasing unredacted information in the past, and some were concerned by allegations in a federal indictment that Assange “attempted to aid in computer intrusion of a classified database”.
But much of Assange’s indictment focuses on his 2010 and 2011 disclosure of thousands of pages of classified military records and diplomatic cables about the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, which had been shared by former Army private Chelsea Manning.
The news organisations said they partnered with Assange more than a decade ago to reveal “corruption, diplomatic scandals and spy affairs on an international scale”, and that the trove of records he made available is still being mined by journalists and historians.
The letter was signed by Times publisher AG Sulzberger and the editors and publishers of the Guardian (Britain), Le Monde (France), Der Spiegel (Germany) and El Pais (Spain).
Assange, who is being detained in a London prison as he appeals an order from the British government extraditing him to the US, says he’s the target of a political prosecution and that the US prison system would not treat him humanely.
The Justice Department refrained from prosecuting Assange under president Barack Obama. After Donald Trump took office, the Justice Department asked federal prosecutors in Virginia to revisit the case. They ultimately obtained an 18-count indictment charging the WikiLeaks founder with a hacking conspiracy and disclosure of national defence information, which officials say put lives in danger.
The indictment has stirred controversy inside the Justice Department. Prosecutors filed some of the charges under the Espionage Act of 1917, a World War I-era law that had been used to charge spies or officials leaking information from inside the government, but never publishers or broadcasters.
Two federal prosecutors in Virginia who were involved in the Assange case argued against bringing charges under the Espionage Act, concerned that it posed risks to First Amendment protections.