Hello, and welcome to another edition of the Inside The Newsroom podcast! Today’s guest is James Ball, journalist at the Bureau of Investigative Journalism, and author of the book WikiLeaks. James shot to fame in 2010 when he was hired by Julian Assange to work for WikiLeaks, where he helped publish thousands of classified documents on the U.S. military’s activity in Iraq and Afghanistan. He then joined the Guardian to work on the Edward Snowden leaks and has since written five books about varying aspects of truth-telling and bullshit-spotting. Below is a post-game analysis of everything we talked about, so make sure you listen to the podcast for more!
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Julian Assange: A Timeline
Before we get started, it’s worth taking a look at how Assange became a top target for the U.S. government. Since Wikileaks released the Afghan war logs in 2010, Assange has become the most prominent free-speech activist/shoddy journalist in the world, depending on how you view him. Regardless of your opinion, his impact on world privacy is undeniable.
Liam Stack, Nick Cumming-Bruce and Madeleine Kruhly, New York Times
What Kind of Man is Julian Assange?
In our podcast, James described the times he private messaged Assange about his progress on the Afghan war logs into the early hours of the morning, and how he could never really trust the man at the centre of everything. They eventually fell out and James went onto write an entire book about his time at Wikileaks, and is thus one of only a few journalists that knows the inner workings of Assange’s mind.
A Spanish Security Firm Spied on Assange
It’s sad that I’m not shocked one bit to learn that Assange was himself spied on 24 hours a day during his seven-year stay at the Ecuadorian embassy in London. Per Spanish newspaper El País “a Spanish private defense and security firm named Undercover Global S. L., which was tasked with protecting the diplomatic building between 2012 and 2018, instructed its men to collect all possible information about the cyberactivist, particularly regarding his lawyers and collaborators.”
The surveillance recorded plans by Assange’s team to whisk him out of the embassy in disguise and flee to Russia or Cuba, but the escape was never carried out due to Assange’s refusal to admit “defeat”.
Did Assange Meddle in the U.S. Election?
Rafael Correa, the former President of Ecuador, said yesterday that Assange did in fact interfere with the 2016 election that saw Donald Trump win in minority fashion. Per CNN, “We did notice that he was interfering in the elections and we do not allow that because we have principles, very clear values, as we would not like anyone to interfere in our elections," he said. "We are not going to allow that to happen with a foreign country and friend like the US.”
Marshall Cohen and Kay Guerrero, CNN
Delay, Delay, Delay
While all eyes will be on the U.S. extradition case next year, Assange and his team will be working to delay any sentence or extradition as long as possible. That’s because the opposition in the U.S. and the UK have publicly been a lot more forgiving of Assange’s past actions and freedom of the press in general.
Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, who demanded a general election once Theresa May steps down as British Prime Minister in the coming days, said Assange should not be extradited “for exposing evidence of atrocities in Iraq and Afghanistan”. Democratic 2020 frontrunners Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren also came out against any indictment against the Wikileaks founder. If Assange can somehow find a way to outlast Trump, he might well walk away with a helluva reduced punishment.
So What’s Next For Julian Assange?
Mr. Assange will face a five-day U.S. extradition hearing in the UK next February. The Wikileaks founder faces an 18-count indictment by the U.S. Department of Justice, that includes charges under the Espionage Act for “soliciting and publishing classified information and conspiring to hack into a government computer.” He’s not done there. Swedish prosecutors have also reopened an investigation into rape allegations dating back to 2010.
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