Ramifications #stategate #cablegate
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WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has circulated across the internet an encrypted “poison pill” cache of uncensored documents suspected to include files on BP and Guantanamo Bay. One of the files identified this weekend by The (London) Sunday Times — called the “insurance” file -- has been downloaded from the WikiLeaks website by tens of thousands of supporters, from America to Australia.
WikiLeaks founder Assange has encrypted Guantanamo documents, will release them if arrested - NYPOST.com
BBC News - Wikileaks founder Julian Assange refused bail
Julian Assange (left) appeared in court with John Pilger and others offering sureties The founder of whistle-blowing website Wikileaks, Julian Assange, has been refused bail by a court in London but vowed to fight extradition to Sweden. He claimed the charges were "politically motivated" and said the judge was keen to see the evidence against Mr Assange, an Australian citizen. Prosecutors in Sweden have insisted the extradition request is a matter of criminal law and they "have not been put under any kind of pressure, political or otherwise". Five people, including journalist John Pilger, film director Ken Loach and Jemima Khan, the sister of Conservative MP Zac Goldsmith, offered to put up sureties.Will WikiLeaks Hobble U.S. Diplomacy? - Council on Foreign Relations
Authors: Daniel Markey , Senior Fellow for India, Pakistan, and South Asia, Council on Foreign Relations Max Boot , Jeane J. Kirkpatrick Senior Fellow for National Security Studies, Council on Foreign Relations John Campbell , Ralph Bunche Senior Fellow for Africa Policy Studies Robert M.
I am an aid worker, the kind who rants about transparency, open governments and reforming the United Nations. But, I used to be a diplomat and I used to write secret cables, like the ones being released by WikiLeaks. And I said some very frank and nasty things in those cables.
WikiLeaks just made the world more repressive - The Globe and Mail
The cables and the damage done
For people who value freedom and truth, what's not to applaud about WikiLeaks? Certainly in Australia, the cablegate saga – and its local offshoot – has unlocked a tide of libertarian righteousness. Throughout the media and much of civil society, there's a thrill of surprise at the unsaintly ways and words of diplomacy, a frisson of satisfaction at seeing the powerful humbled and exposed, and a current of outrage on behalf of Julian Assange.
Having just published Stephen Collins' reply to Rory's post , I'm going to pile on and offer my own critique. But first let me point out that we have already received a number of emails from the bureaucracy and diplomatic community in support of Rory's position. Unfortunately, these were marked 'not for publication', so I want to encourage those readers in Canberra who feel constrained by saying that we are prepared to put aside this site's usual reluctance to publish anonymous comment. So, to business, and I want to start by agreeing with Stephen Collins' introduction, and to put the case more explicitly: I think Rory is showing status quo bias. He is absolutely right to say that 'most of the world's problems demand cooperative responses', and that a certain level of secrecy is required to make this workable. But what level, exactly?
WikiLeaks: The secrecy presumption
the-wikileaks-double-standard
You don't need to share Julian Assange's politics or his objectives to think that he's the victim of at least one double standard. If he's guilty of betraying secrets and endangering lives and making diplomacy more difficult and everything else then so are the publishers of the New York Times , the Guardian , Le Monde and every other media outlet worldwide that publishes, or republishes, anythnig to do with the leaked American diplomatic cables. A few weeks ago I suggested that Assange really is a newsman. Even if you dispute that, however, it's hard to see how anyone can deny that he's a news publisher . So the State Department's PJ Crowley made a fool of himself last week by claiming :
The leaking of American diplomatic cables will only make governments more secretive. These are nervous times for our boys and girls in pinstripes. As newspapers around the world publish salacious extracts from American diplomatic cables posted on the WikiLeaks website, our diplomats are scouring their brains, trying to remember whether their gossip or candid observations to American counterparts about Kevin Rudd, Julia Gillard or Stephen Smith may have been deemed amusing or useful enough to have been cabled back to the State Department. As North Korea and South Korea square off and Europe teeters on the brink of financial chaos, one wonders how many of our officials are spending time scrolling through WikiLeaks with hearts in mouths.
A victory for the culture of paranoia
gary's choices - WikiLeaks: America the indispensable
Despite all the headlines and breathless analysis, the WikiLeaks dump of U.S. State Department cables has thus far had surprisingly little effect on U.S. policy or diplomacy. The limited sample released to date – reportedly only about one percent of the total archive – can be divided into three broad categories:Les diplomates américains gênés dans leur travail par WikiLeaks, actualité Monde : Le Point
Depuis une semaine, des diplomates américains en poste à l'étranger ont du mal à effectuer leur travail, victimes temporaires des révélations issues des notes du département d'État obtenues par WikiLeaks. Le déluge de télégrammes américains analysés et publiés par cinq journaux a eu pour effet immédiat de rafraîchir les relations entre les ambassades américaines et leurs contacts, témoignent des diplomates, encore en poste ou retirés des affaires. "À court terme, nous sommes presque en cessation d'activité", confirme un diplomate de haut rang sous le couvert de l'anonymat. "En toute honnêteté, personne ne veut nous parler", ajoute-t-il.
As a journalist covering international affairs, I have long wondered: Are U.S. diplomats ignorant or lying? I have talked to countless numbers of them in dozens of countries in "on background" interviews, that staple of foreign reportage. Readers recognize a background interview by its citation of "a Western diplomat," and theoretically that anonymity frees the diplomat to talk frankly.