what you get here

This is not a blog which opines on current events. It rather uses incidents, books (old and new), links and papers to muse about our social endeavours.
So old posts are as good as new! And lots of useful links!

The Bucegi mountains - the range I see from the front balcony of my mountain house - are almost 120 kms from Bucharest and cannot normally be seen from the capital but some extraordinary weather conditions allowed this pic to be taken from the top of the Intercontinental Hotel in late Feb 2020
Showing posts with label wikileaks. Show all posts
Showing posts with label wikileaks. Show all posts

Tuesday, August 21, 2012

Julian Assange - leaking in America and Sweden

The Assange story becomes more and more convoluted – with sex and lies making it difficult to focus on the real issues. So, in the true spirit of this blog,  let’s step back; get the story line; and then try to identify the issues.
Most recent writing on Assange focuses either on the sexual issues; on his wider political mission; or the diplomatic complications of his most recent refuge in the Ecuadorian Embassy in LondonWe need to pull all the issues together.
This post sets out some basic facts. The next one will focus on the ideological and political context in Sweden which has created such a maelstrom from an act which, in all countries other than Sweden it seems, would be regarded as a private misdemeanour.
  • Wikileaks was founded in 2006 by Assange "to bring important news and information to the public... One of our most important activities is to publish original source material alongside our news stories so readers and historians alike can see evidence of the truth." Another of the organisation's goals is to ensure that whistleblowers and journalists are not jailed for emailing sensitive or classified documents. An online "drop box" was designed to "provide an innovative, secure and anonymous way for sources to leak information to our journalists."
  • It has nothing to do with Wikipedia
  • Wikileaks’s main data bases are in Sweden.
  • in early 2010 Wikileaks began releasing cables which had been sent by 274 of the US consulates, embassies, and missions around the world. Dated between December 1966 and February 2010, the cables contain the diplomats' assessment of host countries and their officials. According to WikiLeaks, the 251,287 cables making Cablegate the world's largest release of classified material.  
  • The first document, the so-called Reykjavik 13 cable, was released by WikiLeaks on 18 February 2010, and was followed by the release of State Department profiles of Icelandic politicians a month later. 
  • WikiLeaks starts negotiations with media partners in Europe and the United States to publish the rest of the cables in redacted (edited) form, removing the names of sources and others in vulnerable positions.
  • April 2010. Julian Assange visits Sweden to discuss an offer of protective co-operation from the Pirate Party, a political movement devoted to maximum freedom on the Internet. After only a brief existence, the upstart party had surprisingly won a place in the European Union Parliament, and had suggested that WikiLeaks would be safer from repressive measures if it were sponsored by a parliamentary party. It is just weeks after WikiLeaks astounded the world and severely damaged the image of the United States by issuing “Collateral Murder”, a military video documenting an appalling war crime by the seemingly inhuman crew of a U.S. helicopter gun ship in Iraq.
  • In August 2010 Assange visited Sweden to formalise the deal with the Pilot Party. During this visit he spoke at a Conference arranged by the Social Democrats and had sex with two women one of whom was an SD supporter and who subsequently used a police friend to check what power they had to force Assange to take a medical test (since unprotected sex apparently took place).  The main instigator is horrified when the police say they will charge Assange with rape – and refuses to sign the interview sheet. A warrant for his arrest for rape is issued (but rescinded within a day by a higher authority on the basis that there is no case to answer) An SD politician fighting a difficult election gets the case opened up a few days later and leaks to the press (He has a legal partnership with an ex-Minister who allowed American rendition).  Assange waits in Sweden for 5 weeks for clarification; is told there are no charges against him; leaves the country on 27 September. That same day a warrant is issued for his arrest.
  • On 28 November 2010, the first 220 cables were published by El País (Spain), Der Spiegel (Germany),Le Monde (France), The Guardian (United Kingdom) and The New York Times (United States). WikiLeaks had planned to release the rest over several months, and as of 11 January 2011, 2,017 had been published.
  • The US government reacted angrily to these disclosures – and a Grand Jury is apparently in existence collecting information (with FBI help) for a prosecution.
  • On 30 November 2010 Swedish Prosecutor Ny (the third to be involved in the case) issues a European Arrest Warrant for Assange and authorises an Interpol Red Notice concerning him. This is reserved for terrorists – but even Gaddafi was given only an Orange notice
  • Assange uses every legal means to resist extradition to Swedenfearing that their close cooperation with the USA will lead to his extradition to the USA where he has become a hate figure – with some politicians openly calling for his assassination.
  • he spent almost 500 days in "protective custody" while fighting the case with the English legal system (this means with friends with an electronic tag on his ankle) 
  • when he finally lost the battle to be extradited to Sweden, he sought refuge in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London
Although I'm a fan of Scandinavian systems, the Swedish bureaucrats were exposed a decade ago for their eugenics programme which compulsorily sterilised more than 60,000 women from the 1940s through to the 1970s. In the late 1980s, I experienced personally the heavy-handed nature of their police when I tried to enter a night club with a Swedish Professor and his academic colleagues. More later.............................. 

Monday, November 29, 2010

The naked Emperor


I started the morning reading a couple of the “peak oil” blogs – those who not only accept that the sort of lives modern capitalism has created for us is unsustainable but have adopted a minimal and more traditional way of life. The title of the first blog is a bit discouraging - the arch druid report - but the content is very good!
I then wasted an hour trying to get Amazon to bring back the 22 objects in my basket – most of which have vanished (with my wishlist). I could not understand what the first guy was saying – he and his accent were both so thick – and he eventually just left me hanging. The woman who came next was also awful and almost refused to help me because I could not immediately give her the postal code on top of the rest of the address. Her only advice was to contact my server company. I hung up on her – but realise that I should have been more sympathetic. They are treated like shit – so why should they behave otherwise. On the other hand, I have been very impressed with the patience and skills of those on the helpline at Vodaphone here when I needed help!
Then onto The Guardian’s initial coverage of the 250 US Embassy cables given recently to WikiLeaks – of which we will hear a great deal more this week. Simon Jenkins’post seems to me to strike the right note -
Anything said or done in the name of a democracy is, prima facie, of public interest. When that democracy purports to be "world policeman" that interest is global. Nonetheless, the Guardian had to consider two things in abetting disclosure, irrespective of what is anyway published by WikiLeaks. It could not be party to putting the lives of individuals or sources at risk, nor reveal material that might compromise ongoing military operations or the location of special forces.
In this light, two backup checks were applied. The US government was told in advance the areas or themes covered, and "representations" were invited in return. These were considered. Details of "redactions" were then shared with the other four media recipients of the material and sent to WikiLeaks itself, to establish, albeit voluntarily, some common standard.
The state department knew of the leak several months ago and had ample time to alert staff in sensitive locations. Its pre-emptive scaremongering over the weekend stupidly contrived to hint at material not in fact being published. Nor is the material classified top secret, being at a level that more than 3 million US government employees are cleared to see, and available on the defence department's internal Siprnet. Such dissemination of "secrets" might be thought reckless.
The revelations do not have the startling, coldblooded immediacy of the WikiLeaks war logs from Iraq and Afghanistan, with their astonishing insight into the minds of fighting men seemingly detached from the ethics of war. These disclosures are largely of analysis and high-grade gossip. Insofar as they are sensational, it is in showing the corruption and mendacity of those in power, and the mismatch between what they claim and what they do.
Few will be surprised to know that Vladimir Putin runs the world's most sensational kleptocracy, that the Saudis wanted the Americans to bomb Iran, or that Pakistan's ISI is hopelessly involved with Taliban groups of fiendish complexity.
We now know that Washington knows too.
The full extent of American dealings with Yemen might upset that country's government, but is hardly surprising. If it is true that the Pentagon targeted refugee camps for bombing, it should be of general concern. American congressmen might also be interested in the sums of money given to certain foreign generals supposedly to pay for military equipment.
The job of the media is not to protect power from embarrassment. If American spies are breaking United Nations rules by seeking the DNA biometrics of the UN director general, he is entitled to hear of it. British voters should know what Afghan leaders thought of British troops. American (and British) taxpayers might question, too, how most of the billions of dollars going in aid to Afghanistan simply exits the country at Kabul airport.
No harm is done by high-class chatter about President Nicolas Sarkozy's vulgarity and lack of house-training, or about the British royal family. What the American embassy in London thinks about the coalition suggests not an alliance at risk but an embassy with a talent problem.
The money wasting is staggering. Aid payments are never followed, never audited, never evaluated. The impression is of the world's superpower roaming helpless in a world in which nobody behaves as bidden. Iran, Russia, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Yemen, the United Nations, are all perpetually off script. Washington reacts like a wounded bear, its instincts imperial but its power projection unproductive. America's foreign policy is revealed as a slave to rightwing drift, terrified of a bomb exploding abroad or of a pro-Israeli congressman at home
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Note the key sentence - Insofar as they are sensational, it is in showing the corruption and mendacity of those in power, and the mismatch between what they claim and what they do. Which takes us back to the questions which have been worrying me these last few months – (a) the apparently inherent incapacity of our modern “democratic systems”; (b) the implications of this for the so-called discipline of public management; and (c) for the work of instition-building in transition countries.
A google book I encountered on the first theme is The Climate Change Challenge and the failure of democracy (2007)
The sketch is a Mark Behar (BG 1950s) I have hanging in my bathroom!