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Edward Snowden News

CITIZENFOUR wins Oscar for Best Documentary

The Courage Foundation is delighted that CITIZENFOUR has been awarded the Oscar for the Best Documentary Feature of 2014.

The film shows that after journalists left Edward Snowden in Hong Kong, awaiting the United States’ charges and extradition request, Snowden relied on WikiLeaks to secure him asylum. As Laura Poitras’ film depicts, Snowden is now safe, living comfortably with his girlfriend in Moscow, but the film demonstrates the dangerous gap in protections for whistleblowers. WikiLeaks’ rescue – and the need it demonstrated – was the inception of Courage, devoted to providing protections, defence and safety nets for whistleblowers in the highest-risk situations, when others can’t or won’t help.

Courage, which hosts Edward Snowden’s only official defence fund, is establishing international networks ready to provide future Snowdens with logistical and legal help, in addition to assisting journalistic sources at risk before the investigation stage. But we need your help. Fighting legal battles against the most powerful governments in the world is expensive, yet essential. Courage’s Acting Director Sarah Harrison said: “Governments are ramping up their efforts to persecute those who expose the truth, and we must do the same if we’re going to keep our truth-tellers safe. Donate to Courage to ensure we are there when we are needed most.”

Donate to Courage today to contribute to the frontline of defence for future Snowdens: https://staging.couragefound.org/donate
Further information: https://staging.couragefound.org

Update

Video of Laura Poitras accepting the Oscar for Best Documentary:

The ACLU has published Edward Snowden’s statement congratulating Laura Poitras for her award:

When Laura Poitras asked me if she could film our encounters, I was extremely reluctant. I’m grateful that I allowed her to persuade me. The result is a brave and brilliant film that deserves the honor and recognition it has received. My hope is that this award will encourage more people to see the film and be inspired by its message that ordinary citizens, working together, can change the world.

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Courage News Events News

Sarah Harrison and Grace North at the 31st Chaos Communication Congress

The 31st Chaos Communication Congress was in Hamburg, Germany, 27-30 December. On 28 December, Courage Acting Director Sarah Harrison and FreeJeremy.net manager Grace North gave a talk entitled Doing Right by Sources, Done Right, in which they discussed the “ethics, operational security and public protections of sources,” in addition to the need for expanding our understanding of the term “whistleblower.”

In addition to Courage’s work hosting the defence funds for Edward Snowden and Jeremy Hammond, Harrison spoke about our upcoming projects. These include providing detailed advice for journalists to operate securely, to protect their sources from first contact to post-publication aftercare. Another project is Courage’s forthcoming Network of specialised lawyers who will be prepared to provide future sources at risk with legal advice and logistical assistance, be that funding, physical extraction, or negotiating asylum.

Harrison, who is WikiLeaks’ investigations editor, also revealed a US search warrant to Google demanding all emails and metadata from a member of WikiLeaks, which Google complied with.

CCCscreencap

Visit the CCC’s YouTube channel for more videos from the Congress, and here for more information about other events.

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Courage News News

December newsletter: celebrities stand with Courage, Citizenfour and more

Enter your email at right to subscribe to Courage’s monthly newsletter, for updates on our work, our Advisory Board and what’s coming next.

Make a holiday donation in support of Courage

This holiday season, donate to Edward Snowden, Jeremy Hammond, and the only organisation fighting on the frontlines of whistleblower defense. Courage, already with two beneficiaries and the launch of our alleged sources under investigation protection fund: “Known Unknowns Fund”, we have more plans in store for 2015 for projects to provide even greater comprehensive protections for sources at greatest risk, but they require your help.

Please give what you can this year.

Celebrities stand with Edward Snowden and Courage

An international coalition of more than fifty actors, musicians and intellectuals have out their names to a statement affirming their support for Edward Snowden, WikiLeaks, whistleblowers and publishers. Publications including Rolling Stone, Liberation and the Guardian have printed the statement and the calls of Vivienne Westwood, Viggo Mortensen and others to support whistleblowers by donating to Courage.

Read the statement, along with a full list of signatories.

Courage at CIJ’s inaugural Logan symposium

This weekend, the Centre for Investigative Journalism’ s first annual Logan symposium – titled “Building an alliance against Secrecy, Surveillance and Censorship” – took place in London. Topics ranged from whistleblowing practices, to working with Snowden’s documents, to anonymous and secure journalism. Courage Acting Director Sarah Harrison, Courage Trustees Julian Assange and Gavin MacFadyen, Advisory Board members Daniel Ellsberg, Andy MĂźller-Maguhn and Annie Machon, Citizenfour director Laura Poitras, and many more gave presentations. Thousands worldwide watched the event livestream on couragefound.org, where we’ll be publishing video recordings of each speaker, as soon as they’re made available.

Sarah Harrison’s Logan symposium talk liveblogged by the Guardian here.

CitizenFour released to widespread acclaim

Laura Poitras’ documentary Citizenfour, which is structured around powerful footage of Edward Snowden’s first meetings with journalists in Hong Kong, has been short-listed for an Academy Award. We think it’s a film that everyone interested in Edward Snowden and his revelations should see.

To coincide with the film’s US release, Edward Snowden gave a few high-profile interviews, including a Q&A with Larry Lessig at Harvard University, which we livestreamed.

Citizenfour highlights the dire need for better source protection — before truthtellers are under investigation. Courage hosts the Known Unknowns Fund, the only fund designed to help alleged journalistic sources before the government comes knocking on their door. Support these sources here.

  • Here’s our Citizenfour review
  • Citizenfour reviewed by Courage Advisory Board member Ray McGovern
  • Another Citizenfour review from Courage Trustee Gavin MacFadyen
  • Information on screenings worldwide is available on the film website
  • Our report on Edward Snowden’s appearance at Harvard University

Jeremy Hammond in solitary for two weeks, in prison for a thousand days

Courage beneficiary Jeremy Hammond, who recently passed the 1000 days in prison mark, was placed in solitary confinement for a fortnight in the middle of October. The prison claimed this was punishment for stealing clothes from the laundry room, where Jeremy works. Solitary confinement is widely condemned as psychological and physical torture, with the CCR writing, “prolonged solitary confinement causes prisoners significant mental harm and places them at grave risk of even more devastating future psychological harm.”

Jeremy needs funds in these types of situations to maintain his commissary, which he uses to purchase items in prison. In solitary, inmates are afforded no possessions, and just one book at a time.

Read more here.

“Monument to courage” being crowdfunded

Courage advisory board member Vaughan Smith has launched a crowdfunding campaign for a public artwork which will travel the world highlighting the importance of truthtellers. Italian sculptor Davide Dormino’s work Anything To Say? will feature life-size bronze statues of Edward Snowden, Chelsea Manning and Julian Assange standing on chairs, with an empty chair next to them, so that members of the public can interact with the artwork. The project is close to 20% funded with 23 days to go.

Contribute to the campaign here.

Courage in the news

Courage is excited to welcome Nadezhda Tolokonnikova and Maria Alyokhina, members of the Russian punk rock collective Pussy Riot, who made international news when they were jailed for two years for an anti-Putin protest ahead of Russian presidential elections. Speaking to the Guardian about joining Courage, Nadezhda and Maria said they had many things in common with Courage trustee Julian Assange, namely interest in Chelsea Manning, which they called “one of the most important cases in today’s world.”

The release of CitizenFour has helped put the focus on Berlin as a centre for anti-surveillance activism. Courage was mentioned in a special edition of Berlin magazine the ExBerliner and in an Observer feature by Carole Cadwalladr.

Advisory Board member Eben Moglen condemns new GCHQ head Robert Hannigan’s “assault on privacy” in a new piece for the Guardian. Hannigan, Moglen writes, is “deploying the most inflammatory and misleading language available, to publicly blackmail companies into abandoning the rule of law, to bludgeon them into providing assistance for the illegal surveillance of their customers.”

Read the full article here.

How you can help Courage

Donate

Donating is the easiest, fastest and most tangible way you can support Courage now. We’re establishing a defence fund that will serve long-term as a safety net for whistleblowers in peril, present and future. We need to finance legal teams, as persecuted sources often can’t afford to pay their own court costs and legal defence against state prosecutions can amount to many hundreds of thousands of dollars. We also need resources to provide websites and campaign teams to campaign publicly for the protection of our beneficiaries, publicise the issues whistleblowers have disclosed, advocating across global media and building support networks around the world.

  • Donate to Courage generally, to sustain our work defending these whistleblowers and fighting for your right to know
  • Donate specifically to Edward Snowden’s defence fund
  • Donate specifically to Jeremy Hammond’s defence fund
  • Donate specifically to the Known Unknowns Fund, which helps truthtellers at risk, before the investigation stage
  • You can also contribute by purchasing merchandise at the Courage shop

Volunteer

We’re always looking for volunteers to help us reach as wide an audience as possible. Translating our websites is an important ongoing task and new designs for our shop would be very welcome.
To get in touch please email: courage.contact@couragefound.org

Categories
Edward Snowden News

Citizenfour: why we need truthtellers, and why they need us

Citizenfour, the new documentary from acclaimed filmmaker Laura Poitras, director of The Oath and My Country, My Country, has incredible access to NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden, produced as it is by a central protagonist in his story. It is no small achievement to show the human cost of blowing the whistle as vividly as Poitras’ film does without obscuring the importance of the message. No viewer is likely to come away from Citizenfour unconvinced of the gravity of mass surveillance, or that systems of support for truthtellers are so sorely needed – and that, despite enormous risks, conscientious individuals will continue to come forward to inform the public.

The centerpiece of Citizenfour is a sequence that takes up half its running time, shot in the Hong Kong hotel room where Edward Snowden first met the journalists who would bring his revelations to world attention. In a small room at the Mira, Edward Snowden explains in calm and lucid terms why he decided to risk his life and liberty to expose international mass surveillance, unambiguously in the interests of the public. In a matter of days, he and the three journalists in the room – Laura Poitras, Glenn Greenwald and Ewen MacAskill – pull together the initial reports that dominated headlines in the summer of 2013: the Verizon court order that demonstrated the existence of domestic bulk collection, the NSA’s PRISM access to online service providers’ data, GCHQ’s extraordinarily broad TEMPORA data collection and, of course, finally the identity of the whistleblower himself.

In the lead-up to the sequence in Hong Kong, we see just how much our understanding of the NSA’s activities owes to whistleblowers. Poitras shows William Binney’s attempts to first build privacy protections into the ThinThread collection programme, and then to make its civil liberties infringements known. We also see arguments in the EFF’s long running anti-surveillance legal action, Jewel v NSA, launched back in 2008 as a consequence of AT&T whistleblower, Mark Klein’s disclosures. This sequence shows the limits of legal activism in the face of state secrets privilege and the other maneouvres the government can employ when facts are not in the public domain. By providing the documents that enable such actions to continue, Edward Snowden has in a very real sense built on the contributions of previous whistleblowers.

Just as Mark Klein’s disclosures made the initial stages of Jewel v NSA possible, the film indicates the range of consequences of Snowden’s revelations. The revelations have produced more real-world impact than could fit in any two hour documentary, but we see scenes from the EU and Brazilian investigations into mass surveillance. Bill Binney comes back into frame, this time to testify to the ongoing Bundestag investigation into surveillance. The film conveys the feeling that there’s going to be a lot more to come – and Courage’s official Edward Snowden support site will continue to track those developments here.

One of the most important messages of the film is left implicit: as viewers, we are made very aware of the risks Edward Snowden took. Poitras’ camera captures Snowden’s reaction to truly extraordinary circumstances. Even as we see his bravery in contemplating his own likely apprehension and imprisonment – he is surprisingly calm throughout – Edward Snowden is still visibly unnerved when he learns that his girlfriend Lindsay Mills has had to deal with a visit from the authorities. The Edward Snowden in Poitras’ film is a remarkable individual, but also very human one with very human fears about what might happen to him. When we see assistance begin to arrive – some days into his stay in Hong Kong, Edward Snowden is shown speaking to local lawyers over the telephone – we see how those efforts had to be improvised in the midst of international press attention and with US agents on their heels. The actions that actually saved Edward Snowden and brought him to safety of asylum in Russia happen off-screen, but a short shot of Julian Assange nods to this parallel narrative being planned simultaneously to the action Laura Poitras was able to film. Overall, the film serves as a striking reminder of the vital importance of reliable whistleblower protection and the risks involved in providing it.

Citizenfour concludes on two notes of optimism: first, we see that here is life after blowing the whistle and that Edward Snowden is leading an ordinary life in Russia with Lindsay Mills, free to continue to participate in the international debate he kick-started. We also see that others are coming forward. Greenwald is shown meeting Edward Snowden in another hotel room, this time in Moscow, telling him about a new source who was inspired by Snowden to blow the whistle.

Laura Poitras’ film shows us that that it is possible for truthtellers to escape prosecution under unjust laws and and an unconscionably long prison sentence. The US government tried to set an example of Chelsea Manning with an extremely long prison sentence as a deterrent; by protecting Snowden before he was discovered, those who helped him have set an example of their own to stand up for whistleblowers no matter the cost. But the film should also remind us of the need to ensure that systems and support networks are in place for future Snowdens to avoid prison. That’s spurred in part by Edward Snowden, and partly by what’s happened to his forerunners, like Bill Binney, or like Courage Advisory Board member Thomas Drake, another NSA truthteller. Drake worked for the NSA until 2006, when he blew the whistle on warrantless wiretapping. The US government charged him with espionage, threatening decades in prison, and ran him bankrupt fighting the case before dropping the major charges just before trial, leaving him out of work, out of money, and out of a reputation he spent his life building. Drake, like Snowden, could’ve used a well-resourced and well-prepared support system ready to defend him on every front. That’s what Courage is doing: both by crowdsourcing the legal defence for named truthtellers like Edward Snowden and by intervening as early as we can with a new fund for sources who find themselves under investigation and unable to go public, along with other plans as we grow to offer assistance and protection to truthtellers.

That Edward Snowden was protected even in such an extreme situation underscores how important it is for organisations like Courage to be prepared well earlier: to have lawyers and activists prepared to drop everything and protect a source before the government comes knocking on their door. The next Snowdens should have the kind of security they need waiting for them, so all they need to do is blow the whistle.

Categories
Edward Snowden News

Press release: Top musicians, actors and Nobel laureates show support for Edward Snowden, publishers and whistleblowers

  • Russell Brand, M.I.A., Tom Morello and More Involved in Effort
  • Vivienne Westwood, Viggo Mortensen, Others Promote Courage Foundation’s Whistleblower Defense Efforts

An international coalition of more than fifty actors, musicians and intellectuals have announced their support for Edward Snowden, WikiLeaks, whistleblowers and publishers. Some are also encouraging donations to the Courage Foundation —which runs the official legal defense fund for Edward Snowden and other whistleblowers, as well as fights for whistleblower protections worldwide – with tweets and social media posts.

“The courage that Edward Snowden and other whistleblowers and truthtellers have shown and continue to show is truly extraordinary and necessary in helping the public have access to their historical record through media,” said Sarah Harrison, WikiLeaks Investigations Editor and Director of the Courage Foundation. WikiLeaks and Harrison ensured Edward Snowden’s safe exit from Hong Kong and secured his asylum. “We cannot thank these cultural icons enough for showing their support.”

The announcement coincides with the expanded theatrical release of Laura Poitras’ critically acclaimed documentary CitizenFour — providing a first-hand account of Edward Snowden’s disclosure of the NSA’s mass surveillance program.

“As Albert Camus once put it, governments, by definition, do not have consciences; they have policies and nothing more. Therefore, it is up to all of us as free-thinking citizens to demand truly transparent democracy and high, unbiased moral standards from those who govern us,” said Viggo Mortensen. “I hope everyone can chip in to support Snowden and those patriotic whistleblowers that come after him.”

Signed by Susan Sarandon, Russell Brand, Peter Sarsgaard, M.I.A., Thurston Moore, David Berman, Vivienne Westwood, Alfonso Cuaròn and several other artists and intellectuals, the statement praises the work of whistleblowers such as Snowden, highlighting the need to support these individuals as they face social and legal persecution for their revelations to the public.

The statement reads:

We stand in support of those fearless whistleblowers and publishers who risk their lives and careers to stand up for truth and justice. Thanks to the courage of sources like Daniel Ellsberg, Chelsea Manning, Jeremy Hammond, and Edward Snowden, the public can finally see for themselves the war crimes, corruption, mass surveillance, and abuses of power of the U.S. government and other governments around the world. WikiLeaks is essential for its fearless dedication in defending these sources and publishing their truths. These bold and courageous acts spark accountability, can transform governments, and ultimately make the world a better place.

In addition to urging the public to stand in solidarity with Snowden and other whistleblowers, many of the artists are calling on fans to watch CitizenFour, and are raising awareness of the Courage Foundation’s whistleblower defense efforts, which fundraises for the legal and public defense of whistleblowers and campaigns for the protection of truthtellers and the public’s right to know generally.

Said Grammy Award-winning guitarist, Tom Morello:

Those courageous enough to expose the crimes of government and unmask corruption embody the spirit of democracy and justice. Rather than being celebrated as the truth-tellers and champions of accountability that they are, they are persecuted and find themselves the target of a draconian legal system that punishes them for the act of exposing crimes.

Said Vivienne Westwood:

I didn’t ask Edward Snowden to stick his neck out for me. But now that he did I ask myself where would we be without him? The more that the public watches CitizenFour, which documents Edward Snowden’s bravery in revealing the NSA’s massive web of surveillance of the American people, opposition to the government’s assault on civil liberties will grow. I hope that audiences will turn their outrage into action and donate to the Courage Foundation’s Legal Defense Fund to provide legal representation to Snowden and other whistleblowers to counter the government’s unprecedented attack against these brave men and women.

FULL LIST OF SIGNATORIES:

Udi Aloni
Pamela Anderson
Anthony Arnove
Etienne Balibar
Alexander Bard
John Perry Barlow
Radovan Baros
David Berman
Russell Brand
Victoria Brittain
Susan Buck-Morss
Eduardo L. Cadava
Calle 13
Alex Callinicos
Robbie Charter
Noam Chomsky
Scott Cleverdon
Ben Cohen
Sadie Coles
Alfonso Cuaròn
John Deathridge
Costas Douzinas
Roddy Doyle
Bella Freud
Leopold Froehlich
Terry Gilliam
Charlie Glass
Boris Groys
Michael Hardt
P J Harvey
Wang Hui
Fredric Jameson
Brewster Kahle
Hanif Kureishi
Engin Kurtay
Alex Taek-Gwang Lee
Nadir Lahiji
Kathy Lette
Ken Loach
Maria Dolores GalĂĄn LĂłpez
Sarah Lucas
Mairead Maguire
Tobias Menzies
M.I.A.
W. J. T. Mitchell
Moby
Thurston Moore
Tom Morello
Viggo Mortensen
Jean-Luc Nancy
Bob Nastanovich
Antonio Negri
Brett Netson
Rebecca O’Brien
Joshua Oppenheimer
John Pilger
Alexander Roesler
Avital Ronell
Pier Aldo Rovatti
Susan Sarandon
Peter Sarsgaard
Assumpta Serna
Vaughan Smith
Ahdaf Soueif
Oliver Stone
Cenk Uygur
Yanis Varoufakis
Peter Weibel
Vivienne Westwood
Tracy Worcester
Slavoj Zizek

___

For more information, or for interview with the Courage Foundation, please contact Yasmina Dardari at yasmina@fitzgibbonmedia.com

 

Categories
Edward Snowden News

Citizenfour’s Escape to Freedom in Russia

By Ray McGovern, Courage Foundation Advisory Board

In early September in Russia, National Security Agency whistleblower Edward Snowden told me about a documentary entitled Citizenfour, named after the alias he used when he asked filmmaker Laura Poitras to help him warn Americans about how deeply the NSA had carved away their freedoms.

When we spoke, Snowden seemed more accustomed to his current reality, i.e., still being alive albeit far from home, than he did in October 2013 when I met with him along with fellow whistleblowers Tom Drake, Coleen Rowley and Jesselyn Radack, as we presented him with the Sam Adams Award for Integrity in Intelligence.

A year ago, the four of us spent a long, relaxing evening with Snowden – and sensed his lingering wonderment at the irony-suffused skein of events that landed him in Russia, out of reach from the U.S. government’s long arm of “justice.”

Six days before we gave Snowden the award, former NSA and CIA director Michael Hayden and House Intelligence Committee chair Mike Rogers had openly expressed their view that Snowden deserved to be on the “list,” meaning the “capture or kill” list that could have made Snowden the target of a drone strike. When I asked him if he were aware of that recent indignity, he nodded yes – with a winsome wince of incredulity.

This September, there was no drone of Damocles hanging over the relaxed lunch that the two of us shared. There were, rather, happier things to discuss. For example, I asked if he were aware that one of his co-workers in Hawaii had volunteered to Andy Greenberg of Forbes Magazine that Snowden was admired by his peers as a man of principle, as well as a highly gifted geek.

The co-worker told Greenberg: “NSA is full of smart people, but Ed … was in a class of his own. … I’ve never seen anything like it. … He was given virtually unlimited access to NSA data [because] he could do things nobody else could.”

Equally important, the former colleague pointed out that Snowden kept on his desk a copy of the U. S. Constitution to cite when arguing with co-workers against NSA activities that he thought might be in violation of America’s founding document. Greenberg’s source conceded that he or she had slowly come to understand that Snowden was trying to do the right thing and that this was very much in character, adding, “I won’t call him a hero, but he’s sure as hell no traitor.”

Snowden spoke of his former co-workers with respect and affection, noting that most of them had family responsibilities, mortgages, etc. – burdens he lacked. He told me he was very aware that these realities would make it immeasurably more difficult for them to blow the whistle on NSA’s counter-Constitutional activities, even if they were to decide they should. “But somebody had to do it,” said Snowden in a decidedly non-heroic tone, “So I guess that would be me.”

Following the intelligence world’s axiom of “need-to-know,” Snowden had been careful to protect his family and Lindsay Mills, his girlfriend, by telling no one of his plans. I found myself thinking long and hard at how difficult that must have been – to simply get out of Dodge without a word to those you love.

Perhaps he felt Mills would eventually understand when he explained why it was absolutely necessary in order to achieve his mission and have some chance of staying alive and out of prison. But, not having discussed with her his plans, how could he be sure of that?

And so, learning recently of the interim “happy-ending” arrival of Mills in Russia was like a shot in the arm for me. I thought to myself, it is possible to do the right thing, survive and not end up having to live the life of a hermit. Equally important, that reality is now out there for the world to see. What an encouragement to future whistleblowers – and to current ones, as well, for that matter.

Snowden was delighted when I told him that Bill Binney, the long-time and highly respected former NSA technical director, had just accepted the Sam Adams Award, which will be presented in 2015. It was Snowden’s own revelations that finally freed up Binney and other courageous NSA alumni to let the American public know what they had been trying, through official channels, to tell the overly timid representatives in Washington.

Seeing Citizenfour

Snowden was happy to tell me about the documentary, Citizenfour, explaining that during his sessions in Hong Kong with Laura Poitras, Glenn Greenwald, and The Guardian’s Ewen MacAskill, Poitras seemed to have the camera always rolling during the eight days they shared in Hong Kong – including during the grand escape from the hotel. With a broad smile, Snowden said, “Ray, when people see my makeshift disguise, well, it is going to be really hard to argue that this thing was pre-planned!”

All I have seen so far is the trailer, but I have tickets for a showing Friday night when Citizenfour opens in Washington and other cities. With Snowden, I figured I could wait to witness the grand escape until I saw the film itself, so I avoided asking him for additional detail. Like: ”Don’t spoil it for me, Ed.”

I was encouraged to read, in one of the movie reviews, that the documentary does allude to the key role played by Julian Assange and WikiLeaks in enabling Snowden’s escape. I had long since concluded that WikiLeaks’s role – and that of Sarah Harrison, in particular, was the sine qua non for success. I hope Citizenfour gives this key part of the story the prominence it deserves.

I feel it is an equal honor to spend time with Julian Assange in the Ecuadorian embassy whenever I’m in London. In early September, Assange was a welcoming host and we had a long chat over dinner while I was en route to Russia via London and Berlin. (I had been invited to present at the U.S.-Russia Forum in Moscow later last month and stayed there an extra day in order to visit with Snowden.)

I had been unaware of Citizenfour before visiting Assange. The film came up spontaneously when I volunteered to him that the safe extrication of Snowden from Hong Kong sits atop my gratitude list of the many things he has accomplished. That drew a very broad smile and some words about the world’s most powerful country and intelligence service, “and we still got him out!”

Assange shared how important it was not only to rescue Snowden himself but, in so doing, to provide for potential whistleblowers some real-life proof that it is possible to do the right thing and avoid spending decades in prison where WikiLeaks’ most famous source Chelsea Manning now sits. This was among the main reasons why WikiLeaks cashed in so many chips in its successful effort to bring Snowden to safety. It was surely not because Assange expected Snowden to share reportable information with WikiLeaks. He gave none.

Assange was in good spirits and hoping for some break in the Kafkaesque situation in which he has found himself for several years now (receiving asylum in Ecuador’s Embassy to avoid arrest in Great Britain and extradition to Sweden for questioning regarding alleged sexual offenses).

A Stop in Berlin

I also planned to spend a few days in Berlin to coincide with the NATO summit in Wales (Sept. 4-5). On Aug. 30, the Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity sent a Memorandum to German Chancellor Angela Merkel, warning her about the dubious “intelligence” adduced to blame Russia for the troubles in Ukraine. Our memo had some resonance in German and other European media, but I was saddened to find the media in the UK and Germany as co-opted and Putin-bashing as the U.S. media.

It was 25 years after the fall of the Berlin Wall. What I said in my various talks and interviews on NATO’s reneging on its promise to Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev not to move NATO one inch eastward, once Germany was reunited, seemed to come as a major revelation to most listeners.

“Really?” was the predominant reaction when I explained that 25 years ago there was a unique, realistic chance for a Europe “whole and free” (in words then used by President George H. W. Bush and Gorbachev) from Portugal to the Urals. Instead, even after the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, Russia was excluded. NATO crept steadily east toward Russia’s border.

And last February, the U.S. and EU orchestrated a coup d’état in Kiev to foster Ukraine’s “European aspirations” to cast its lot with the West and dislodge itself from Russia’s sphere of influence. [See Consortiumnews.com’s “The Whys Behind the Ukraine Crisis.”]

The squandering of a historic chance for lasting peace in Europe remains atop the list of severe disappointments encountered during my professional life. The fact that, to this day, so few seem aware of what happened, and who was – and is – to blame, is also a major frustration.

In Berlin, consolation and affirmation came in renewing friendships there and getting to know others – many of them expatriates. First and foremost among the latter is Sarah Harrison, the main figure in executing WikiLeaks’s plan to get Snowden out of Hong Kong and onward to Latin American via Moscow, where his planned journey has so far stalled.

Because the U.S. Justice Department charged Snowden with espionage and the U.S. State Department revoked his passport, his stay in Moscow ended up being quite a long one. But Harrison stayed on for as long as seemed necessary to accompany and support Snowden, as well as to be able to testify to the fact that the Russians were not using anything like “enhanced interrogation techniques” on him.

I had last seen Harrison in Moscow at the Sam Adams Award presentation to Snowden; it was great to have a chance to chat with her over a long lunch.

Flying home from Moscow, having had lunch there with Edward Snowden, lunch in Berlin with Sarah Harrison, and dinner with Julian Assange in that little piece of Ecuadorian territory in London, what came first to mind was Polonius’s advice to Laertes: “Those friends thou hast, and their adoption tried, grapple them to thy soul with hoops of steel.”

But then, above the din of the jet engines, came a more familiar and more insistent voice. It was that of Jane Fahey, my Irish grandmother, who for some reason seemed 33,000 feet closer than usual: “Show me your company, and I’ll tell you who you are!” she would say, often – very often. I think my grandmother would be as pleased with my “company” as I am – and as grateful.

This piece first appeared at ConsortiumNews.com.

Categories
News Whistleblowing

Obama: “If you blow the whistle, you should be thanked”

“If you blow the whistle, you should be thanked. You should be protected for doing the right thing. You shouldn’t be ignored and you certainly shouldn’t be punished.”

These were the surprising words of President Obama on 7 August 2014, as he signed a $16 billion bill to improve veterans’ access to medical care. The bill followed a report from the Department for Veterans’ Affairs, which confirmed many of the complaints whistleblowers had been making – waiting lists were indeed being manipulated to hide how long veterans were having to wait for medical appointments.

The White House again praised whistleblowers this week, responding to a letter sent by the Society of Professional Journalists and 37 other journalism and open government groups urging the Obama Administration to be more transparent. The letter from White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest claims that the Administration has “made important progress” in “protecting whistleblowers” and “disclosing previously classified information.” Earnest cites the 2012 Whistleblower Protection Enhancement Act as evidence that the Administration has “fought for and won better protections for whistleblowers.”

obama-meme

But the Whistleblower Protection Enhancement Act that the White House claims offers better protections for whistleblowers is limited. While the Act was recognised as a step forward by whistleblower organisations like the Government Accountability Project (GAP) and the National Whistleblowers Centre, GAP also recognised its limitations. Blowing the whistle within official channels does not guarantee public disclosure of the information and does little to facilitate what Yochai Benkler has called “accountability leaks… that challenge systemic practices.”

At any rate, it is not the Whistleblower Protection Enhancement Act for which this Presidency is likely to be remembered but the intelligence whistleblowers who have faced severe reprisals on its watch. The Obama Administration, famously, has initiated eight prosecutions under the Espionage Act –  more uses of the 1917 Act than all previous US presidents combined. Former NSA employees Thomas Drake and Edward Snowden, who blew the whistle on mass surveillance; former US Army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning, who blew the whistle on US torture and war crimes in Iraq and Afghanistan; and former CIA official John Kiriakou, who blew the whistle on US torture, are among the intelligence whistleblowers who have been charged with the Espionage Act during Obama’s Administration.

Ray McGovern, a former CIA senior analyst, founder of whistleblower group Sam Adams Associates for Integrity in Intelligence and co-founder of Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS), responded to Obama’s comments saying, “President Obama is giving hypocrisy a bad name.”

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McGovern, who is also a member of Courage’s advisory board, said:

Obama’s record speaks for itself; he has prosecuted more than twice as many whistleblowers – for espionage, no less – than all former presidents combined. As for those whose crimes have been whistle-blown upon, like those who did the torture, Obama continues to call them ‘patriots’. Former CIA operative John Kiriakou, who opposed torture, sits in a Pennsylvania prison because he revealed the name of one of the torturers.

Too bad Kafka is dead.

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Legislation News Whistleblowing

Yochai Benkler outlines public accountability defence for whistleblowers

Harvard Law Professor Yochai Benkler has published ‘A Public Accountability Defence for National Security Leakers and Whistleblowers,’ highlighting the value that leaks of national security information bring to American democracy and emphasizing the need for a legally permissible defence for those who bring this information to light. He outlines such a defence for what he calls “accountability leaks”, acknowledging that current law defines the term “whistleblower” too narrowly. If Benkler’s proposed defence were practiced today, Chelsea Manning might have avoided such a harsh prison term, and Edward Snowden might feel safe to return home.

Benkler has previously explained how WikiLeaks, as a legitimate journalistic outlet, helped other media outlets perform a vital check on government in ‘A Free Irresponsible Press: WikiLeaks and the Battle for the Soul of the Networked Fourth Estate.’ He expanded on that article while testifying at Chelsea Manning’s trial.

In his new piece, Benkler argues that rather than technological change, a legitimacy crisis has spurred the last decade’s spate of national security leaks documenting systemic abuse:

The post-9/11 War on Terror and its attendant torture, rendition, indefinite detention, civilian collateral damage, and illegal domestic spying created a crisis of conscience for some insiders in the national security establishment. A consideration of the actual cases of
the past decade suggests that it is this loss of legitimacy of decisions that likely underlies the increase in these kinds of systemic leaks.

Although “[c]riminal liability for leaking and publishing classified materials is usually discussed in terms of a conflict between high-level values: security and democracy”, Benkler proposes “that the high-level abstraction obscures the fact that “national security” is, first and foremost, a system of organizations and institutions, subject to all the imperfections and failures of all other organizations.” Therefore, “it would be naïve beyond credulity to believe that the CIA, NSA, FBI, and Pentagon are immune to the failure dynamics that pervade every other large organization.”

Benkler explains how secrecy precludes accountability, rendering whistleblowing essentially inevitable — and necessary to keep massive organizations in check.

Secrecy insulates self-reinforcing internal organizational dynamics from external correction. … Some leaks, however, provide a critical mechanism for piercing the national security system’s echo-chamber, countering self-reinforcing information cascades, groupthink, and cognitive biases that necessarily pervade any closed communications system. It is this type of leak, which exposes and challenges core systemic behaviors, that has increased in this past decade, as it did in the early 1970s. These leaks are primarily driven by conscience, and demand accountability for systemic error, incompetence, or malfeasance. Their critical checking function derives from the fact that conscience is uncorrelated with well-behaved organizational processes. Like an electric fuse, accountability leaks, as we might call them, blow when the internal dynamics of the system reach the breaking point of an individual with knowledge, but without authority. They are therefore hard to predict, and function like surprise inspections that keep a system honest. By doing so, these leaks serve both democracy and security.

Rather than embrace these disclosures as vital and valuable, the government has cracked down harder than ever before on leakers and, to some extent, journalists who publish secret information. Benkler encourages countering this crackdown with a defence that whistleblowers could use in court:

To address this threat, I propose that Congress adopt a new Public Accountability defence as a general criminal defence, on the model of the necessity defence. The defence would be available to individuals who violate a law on the reasonable belief that by doing so they will expose to public scrutiny substantial violations of law or substantial systemic error, incompetence, or malfeasance even where it falls short of formal illegality. It is most important to the leakers themselves, but would also be available to journalists and others who participate in disseminating the leaked information.

He details what this defence would require:

(a) reasonable belief that exposure discloses a substantial violation of law or substantial systemic error, incompetence, or malfeasance,
(b)mitigation to avoid causing imminent, articulable, substantial harm that outweighs the benefit of disclosure, and
(c) communication to a channel likely to result in actual exposure to the public

Perhaps recognizing how the Espionage Act has been interpreted in the US to allow potential for harm to monopolize courtroom debate to the exclusion of discussion of the documents’ value, Benkler notes: “The significance of the disclosed violations is the most important factor, and could dominate the outcome even where other elements, in particular harm mitigation, are weaker.”

Benkler realises that such a defence is just one part of a range of necessary support measures: “full whistleblower protection would require more robust protections to avoid “punishment by process,” most importantly a private right of action against abusive prosecutors and an attenuation of the prosecutors’ qualified immunity.”

In the full article, Benkler explains in more detail how valuable national security leaks are, using bulk data collection since 11 September 2001 as an example. He further details his proposed whistleblower defence, and, finally, recounts 22 instances of leak prosecutions since World War II.

Categories
Legislation News Whistleblowing

British MPs say “whistleblowing is crucial” but fail to protect intelligence whistleblowers

One of the UK’s most important parliamentary committees, the cross-party Public Accounts Committee, published a report on 1 August 2014, that found whistleblowers are a “crucial source of intelligence to help government identify wrongdoing.” While identifying the retaliation that UK government whistleblowers face, the Committee failed to mention one significant category of truthtellers altogether.

The Public Accounts Committee investigation was prompted by a separate report, Making a Whistleblowing Policy Work published by the UK’s National Audit Office in March 2014. Since the Public Accounts Committee scrutinises the efficiency of public spending, their hearing on 24 March and this month’s report focused on whistleblowing in the public sector and extended to discuss private and voluntary sectors where public services are outsourced.

The Committee found that the treatment of whistleblowers is often “shocking” and “appalling” and recommended that legal and counselling services be offered. The report acknowledges the bullying, harassment and victimisation many whistleblowers endure, and recognised that it takes “remarkable courage” for employees to come forward and raise concerns.

Furthermore, the report found there had been a “startling disconnect” between policies within government purporting to encourage whistleblowers and what happens in practice, where victimisation of whistleblowers is rarely punished. The Chair of the Committee, Margaret Hodge MP, noted that in a survey of Ministry of Defence employees, “only 40 per cent of respondents felt they would not suffer reprisals if they raised a concern.”

However, the disconnect between whistleblower protections in theory and reality goes even further than the Public Accounts Committee admits as their report overlooks the specific problems with intelligence whistleblowing. As such, its recommendations do little to protect some the most prominent and threatened whistleblowers today.

What protections do whistleblowers have in the UK?

In the UK, employees may blow the whistle outside the workplace and to a prescribed official body if their employer does not have a whistleblowing procedure; if they feel their employer would cover up their disclosure; if they expect unfair retaliation; or if the employer has not taken action after a disclosure has already been made.

The Public Interest Disclosure Act (PIDA, 1998) is designed to protect workers from employer retaliation when an employee blows the whistle in the public interest. However, it does not commit employers to respond effectively to whistleblowers’ disclosures and it does not prevent employers from “blacklisting” the whistleblower, harming future employment prospects. Moreover, this Act does not apply to those who are self-employed or volunteers, or to individuals who work under the Official Secrets Act (1989) in the government, military and intelligence communities.

In the UK, the Official Secrets Act protects official information and state secrets from public disclosure. The Act was revised in 1989 to remove whistleblowers’ right to a public interest defence for unauthorised disclosures. That is, any unauthorised disclosure of information is now automatically a punishable criminal act with no defence – even if the information released is deemed to be of significant public value.

In 2002, former MI5 officer and whistleblower, David Shayler, was prosecuted for informing media of the misconduct and several alleged crimes of the security services, including evidence of complicity in an illegal plot to assassinate Colonel Gaddafi, which failed but resulted in the death of innocent civilians. While it was acknowledged in court that Mr Shayler had no viable ‘official’ avenues to pursue his concerns, that his disclosures were made in the public interest and had put no lives at risk, he was found guilty and imprisoned nonetheless.

As a result of the 1989 Act, there are effectively no whistleblowing protections for employees of the UK’s security services. At present, they even lack freedom of speech within parliament. The parliamentary committee charged with oversight of the intelligence services – the Intelligence and Security Committee (ISC) – exempts witnesses from the ‘absolute privilege’ of being able to give evidence in parliament without incrimination that applies to other parliamentary committees.

“The public interest defence should be reintroduced”

Annie Machon, a former intelligence officer who helped her ex-partner Mr Shayler in blowing the whistle on MI5, and a member of the Courage advisory board, told Courage the report was “welcome, if belated.”

Machon said:

The report doesn’t help whistleblowers who emerge from the military, central government or the intelligence services. These are the very people who are most likely to witness the most heinous state crimes, yet these are also the very people who are automatically criminalised under the draconian terms of the OSA 1989. The Official Secrets Act (1989) in the UK is drafted to stifle whistleblowers rather than protect real secrets.

At the very least the public interest defence should be reintroduced to British secrecy legislation. That is not ideal, as the whistleblower would still have to prove their case in court.

Ideally, there would be a powerful body that such whistleblowers could address their concerns to, in which they had a well-founded expectation that disclosures of criminality would be properly investigated, crimes punished and meaningful reform instituted.”

Categories
Courage News Edward Snowden News

Press release: Courage welcomes Russia’s continued protection of Edward Snowden

Courage, which runs Edward Snowden’s official defence fund and his associated asylum campaign, welcomes today’s announcement that Russia will continue its protection of Edward Snowden.

Courage’s Acting Director Sarah Harrison, who facilitated Edward Snowden’s exit from Hong Kong and spent four months in Russia, including 40 days in Moscow’s Sheremetyevo airport, securing his initial asylum said:

I’m relieved to hear that Edward Snowden will continue to be protected, keeping him safe from American prosecution. Courage congratulates the Russian people and the dedicated international team of lawyers, campaigners and supporters who have made this happen. Although the US government has lost this round, let us not forget the stakes – last year whistleblower Chelsea Manning was sentenced to 35 years in a US military prison and the Grand Jury against both WikiLeaks and Edward Snowden continues. By hosting Edward Snowden’s defence fund and keeping the public aware of his case, Courage has helped keep Edward Snowden safe for the past year, but his fund will need continued public support to ensure he stays protected for years to come.

Courage originally began in August 2013 as The Journalistic Source Protection Defence Fund and has run Edward Snowden’s defence fund since that time. Courage’s official Edward Snowden support site is located at http://edwardsnowden.com and the related twitter account at @CourageSnowden.

Last month Edward Snowden applied for an extension to his one year temporary asylum that ended on July 31st 2014. Courage has been campaigning for that application to be accepted; hand delivering letters calling for his protection and asylum application not to be blocked to the UK, US and German governments, writing to the Russian embassy in Washington, DC last week asking for his application to be accepted and launching an ad campaign that has been seen by over a million users of Russian social network Vkontakte.