WikiLeaks about to hit the fan

"Fast and Furious" being a trivial example.

Fraser urges protection of Assange
December 19, 2011/the AGE

FORMER prime minister Malcolm Fraser and dozens of other public figures have called on Foreign Minister Kevin Rudd to make sure WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange is protected from ''rendition'' to the United States. ....

An open letter to Foreign Minister Kevin Rudd
December 19, 2011

Dear Minister

We write to express our concern about the plight of Julian Assange.

To date, no charges have been laid against Mr Assange by Swedish authorities. Nonetheless, we understand that should he be sent to Sweden, he will be held on remand, incommunicado. We note your comments last year about the need for Mr Assange to receive appropriate consular support. We trust that this consular support is being provided and will continue.


We are concerned that should Mr Assange be placed in Swedish custody, he will be subject to the process of "temporary surrender", enabling his removal to the United States without the appropriate legal processes that accompany normal extradition cases. We urge you to convey to the Swedish government Australia's expectation that Mr Assange will be provided with the same rights of appeal and review that any standard extradition request would entail.

Any prosecution of Mr Assange in the United States will be on the basis of his activities as a journalist and editor (Mr Assange's status as such has been recently confirmed by the High Court in England). Such a prosecution will be a serious assault on freedom of speech and the need for an unfettered, independent media.

Further, the chances of Mr Assange receiving a fair trial in the United States appear remote. A number of prominent political figures have called for him to be assassinated, and the Vice-President has called him a "high-tech terrorist". Given the atmosphere of hostility in relation to Mr Assange, we hold serious concerns about his safety once in US custody. We note that Mr Assange is an Australian citizen, whose journalistic activities were undertaken entirely outside of US territory.

Mr Assange is entitled to the best endeavours of his government to ensure he is treated fairly. He is entitled to expect that his government will not remain silent while his liberty and safety are placed at risk by a government embarrassed by his journalism. Australians also expect that their government will speak out against efforts to silence the media and intimidate those who wish to hold governments to account.

We ask that you convey clearly to the United States government Australia's concerns about any effort to manufacture charges against Mr Assange, or to use an unrelated criminal investigation as the basis for what may effectively be rendition. We also urge the government to publicly affirm that Mr Assange is welcome to return to Australia once proceedings against him in Sweden are concluded, and that the government will fully protect his rights as an Australian citizen once here.

We have copied this letter to your colleague, the Attorney-General.

Yours sincerely

The undersigned

Phillip Adams AO
Adam Bandt MP
Wendy Bacon
Greg Barns
Susan Benn
Senator Bob Brown
Dr Scott Burchill
Julian Burnside QC
Dr Leslie Cannold
Mike Carlton
Professor Noam Chomsky
David Collins
Lieutenant Colonel (ret) Lance Collins, Australian Intelligence Corps
Eva Cox
Sophie Cunningham
Roy David
Andrew Denton
Senator Richard Di Natale
Peter Fitzsimons
Rt Hon Malcolm Fraser AC CH
Anna Funder
Professor Raimond Gaita
David Gilmour and Polly Samson
Kara Greiner
Senator Sarah Hanson-Young
Liz Humphrys
Professor Sarah Joseph
Bernard Keane
Professor John Keane
Stephen Keim SC
Steve Killelea
Andrew Knight
Mary Kostakidis
Professor Theo van Leeuwen
Ken Loach
Antony Loewenstein
Senator Scott Ludlam
David Lyle
Associate Professor Jake Lynch
Dr Ken Macnab
Professor Robert Manne
Alex Miller
Senator Christine Milne
Alex Mitchell
Reg Mombassa
Gordon Morris
Jane Morris
Julian Morrow
The Hon Alastair Nicholson AO RFD QC
Nicolé Nolan
Rebecca O’Brien
Elizabeth O’Shea
Michael Pearce SC
John Pilger
Justin Randle
Senator Lee Rhiannon
Guy Rundle
Angus Sampson
Senator Rachel Siewert
Marius Smith
Jeff Sparrow
Professor Stuart Rees AM
Rob Stary
Stephen Thompson
Dr Tad Tietze
Mike Unger
Dale Vince
Brian Walters SC
Rachel Ward
Senator Larissa Waters
Tracy Worcester, Marchioness of Worcester
Senator Penny Wright
Spencer Zifcak

To what extent is the prosecution trying to di stract attention from being caught with its pants down and having such lax security regarding what it is now saying are vital state secrets.

Suppose a terrorist infiltrator had got the stuff. A sleeper. Everybody of significance named in the leaks would now be dead. At least this way they got warned.

But relations with the USA have priority over petitions Olga and I gather that 2 or 3 thousand American troops have been, or will be, deployed in your country.

....there is very good reason (for Geoffry Robertson's concern) about the Australian government's likely support, or not, in Julian Assange's case. There is a long & sycophantic relationship between Australian governments (of whichever political hue) & US governments. Basically when the US says "jump" Australian governments jump, particularly regarding political issues which matter to the US. (eg 2 Australians, Mamdouh Habib and David Hicks who were held in Guantanamo Bay, did not receive anything like appropriate Australian government support, as did detainees from the UK, etc ..... One (Habib) was tortured in Egypt (extraordinary rendition), now an established fact, after years of government denials. He was recently compensated by the Australian government. The other (Hicks) was released only after the Australian government finally intervened (& a show trial) , after 5 years (!) during an federal election campaign in which his ongoing detention became an issue, as a result of a very spirited public campaign for his release.)

Sorry to go on about past events, but I think it gives you some idea of the nature of our governments' relationship with US administrations. Our governments do not exactly have a terrific history of supporting Australian citizens' rights when it comes to pleasing their US masters in matters political! And it would surely be in the US government's interest to see Assange locked up, or even worse, extradited from Sweden to the US. ......

On the other hand the US government is not about to permit serious damage to be done to their relations with Australia over what will be, by the time any big decisions are made, pretty cold porrige.

I imagine that your government is already giving Mr Assange "appropriate support" and is jealous of its duty to protect its citizens. What I can't imagine is that the points made in the petition are not being fully considered at the highest level. I daresay Ms Gillard tosses and turns in her bed wrestling with these opposing forces.

She looks quite capable to me to get Uncle Sam to blink first as Mrs Thatcher is supposed to have done.

Quote:

It seems that what our foreign minister (Kevin Rudd) is saying (about appropriate support being provided to Julian Assange) can not exactly be supported by these freedom of information details (published in a major, respectable newspaper.) It seems that our government is not exactly being truthful to its citizens about this issue.:

Australia did not object to US pursuit of Assange
Philip Dorling
December 3, 2011/the AGE

WIKILEAKS is the target of an ''unprecedented'' US government criminal investigation, Australian diplomatic cables obtained by The Saturday Age reveal.

The declassified cables also show the Australian government wants to been forewarned about any moves to extradite Julian Assange to the United States, but that Australian diplomats have raised no concerns about the Australian journalist being pursued by US prosecutors on charges of espionage and conspiracy. ...

The cables, released under freedom of information to The Saturday Age this week, reveal that Australian diplomats have been talking to the US Justice Department for more than a year about US criminal investigations of WikiLeaks and Assange. While the Justice Department has been reluctant to disclose details of the WikiLeaks probe, the Australian embassy in Washington reported in December 2010 that the investigation was ''unprecedented both in its scale and nature'' and that media reports that a secret grand jury had been convened in Alexandria, Virginia, were ''likely true''.

Last week Foreign Minister Kevin Rudd told Federal Parliament that the Australian government is ''not aware of any current extradition request [for Assange] by US authorities'' and has ''no formal advice'' concerning a US grand jury investigation directed at WikiLeaks. ....

....The Foreign Minister avoided a direct answer to a question about whether Assange could be subject to a ''temporary surrender'' mechanism that could allow him to be extradited from Sweden to the United States. ....<cont>

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2011-12-03/greens-ask-for-any-secret-assange-documents/3710668

I know it doesn't reduce BM's guilt. But he was probably nutty at the time and what can anybody say about that? He had already been busted to Private. What's a bloke like him doing at a computer terminal like that?

A forensic investigator who examined Bradley Manning's army computers following his arrest discovered thousands of US embassy cables and Guantánamo detainee reports that matched exactly the documents published by WikiLeaks, the soldier's pretrial hearing was told on Sunday.

David Shaver, an agent with the Computer Crime Investigative Unit, provided testimony to the court that is likely to prove central to any court martial of the 24-year-old soldier that might ensue.

He testified that he found evidence that the soldier had been using specialist technology designed to speed up the downloading of files from databases when he explored Manning's user profile on his two army computers. Shaver also found thousands of complete embassy cables, and hundreds of unique files related to Guantánamo detainees.

When he compared the files with the documents on Guantánamo published by WikiLeaks, they matched. ...

....David Coombs, Manning's defence lawyer, will cross-examine Shaver at the Maryland military base on Monday.

US close to resting case against Manning
(DAVID DISHNEAU, Associated Press, December 20, 2011)

The U.S. government neared the end of its case Tuesday against the Army intelligence analyst blamed for the biggest leak of national secrets in American history.

The prosecution was expected to call its final six witnesses in the case against alleged WikiLeaks source Pfc. Bradley Manning, followed by defense calling witnesses and closing arguments. Then a military officer will decide whether to recommend that the 24-year-old be court-martialed on 22 charges, including aiding the enemy. If convicted, he could face life in prison.

Manning is accused of illegally leaking a trove of secret information to WikiLeaks, a breach that rattled U.S. foreign relations and, according to the government, imperiled valuable military and diplomatic sources.

The military has released a text file, purportedly discovered on a data card owned by Manning, boldly stating the importance of data that would make its way to the secrets-spilling website WikiLeaks.

"This is possibly one of the more significant documents of our time, removing the fog of war and revealing the true nature of 21st century asymmetric warfare. Have a good day," Manning wrote, according to digital-crimes investigator David Shaver.

Almost 500,000 classified battlefield reports were also on the card, Shaver said.

Until Monday, the defense largely focused on painting Manning as an emotionally troubled gay man serving during the Army's "don't ask, don't tell" era, and arguing that the classified material proved harmless in the open. Manning's lawyers have yet to acknowledge or deny his responsibility for leaking of hundreds of thousands of U.S. war and diplomatic cables and a classified military video of an American helicopter attack in Iraq that killed 11 men.

His lawyers argue the troubled young private should never have had access to classified material and that workplace security was inexplicably lax.

The prosecution said evidence showed that Manning communicated directly with WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange and bragged to someone else about leaking video of a 2007 helicopter attack to WikiLeaks.

Investigators pointed to one May 2010 exchange between Manning and a mathematician named Eric Schmiedl.

"Are you familiar with WikiLeaks?" Manning allegedly asked.

"Yes, I am," Schmiedl wrote.

"I was the source of the July 12, 2007, video from the Apache Weapons Team which killed the two journalists and injured two kids," Manning wrote, according to the prosecution.

Manning seemed to take in Monday's proceedings calmly.

Paul Almanza, the presiding officer, twice removed spectators and reporters from the hearing Monday for sessions dealing with classified information. By ruling the leaked diplomatic and military information should somehow remain secret, even though it has been published by media around the world, Almanza undermined the defense argument that no harm was done.

Manning supporters fumed. His defense also challenged thousands of cables found on Manning's workplace computers, arguing that some didn't match those published by WikiLeaks and that others couldn't be matched to the young private's user profile.

Bradley Manning hearing – Tuesday 20 December 2011 as it happened

• Read a summary of the day's main events

• Fifth day of pre-trial military hearing in Maryland

• Blogger Adrian Lamo called by prosecution

• Prosecutors say evidence links Manning to Julian Assange

Defense rests case in WikiLeaks military hearing
(DAVID DISHNEAU, Associated Press, December 21, 2011)

FORT MEADE, Md. — Lawyers for the Army intelligence analyst blamed for the biggest national security leak in American history briskly presented evidence in his defense Wednesday, a year-and-half after the young private allegedly handed a trove of classified data to WikiLeaks.

Pfc. Bradley Manning's defense rested its case after calling only two witnesses: a sergeant who witnessed one of Manning's fits of rage in Baghdad and a captain whom the 24-year-old Oklahoma native served under in Iraq.

The hearing was recessed until closing arguments Thursday.

Defense lawyers painted Manning as a troubled young man who shouldn't have had access to classified material, let alone served in Iraq. Their witnesses corroborated that he was prone to emotional outbursts and that military computer security was lax at Manning's Baghdad office.

Manning is accused of illegally downloading hundreds of thousands of U.S. war and diplomatic cables and a classified military video of an American helicopter attack in Iraq that killed 11 men. The government argues he then sent the data to the WikiLeaks anti-secrecy website in a breach that rattled U.S. foreign relations and imperiled valuable military and diplomatic sources.

The government rested its case against Manning on Tuesday after calling 21 witnesses over five days of proceedings at a military base outside Washington. It wants Manning court-martialed on charges including aiding the enemy. If convicted, he could face life in prison.

Prosecution witnesses said Manning was well trained in rules prohibiting release of classified information. Forensic computer experts testified that they had retraced his keyboard strokes as he downloaded secret State Department diplomatic cables and raw battlefield reports from Iraq and Afghanistan.

Adrian Lamo, a convicted hacker, said Manning confided to him in May 2010 that he was the leaker. Lamo informed authorities.

After closing arguments, presiding officer Lt. Col. Paul Almanza will give his opinion of whether Manning should be court-martialed. Then, a senior military officer will make the final decision. The process could take several weeks.

During the proceedings, Manning remained outwardly composed as witness after witness talked about his emotional problems, his homosexuality and his violent and crazed-sounding outbursts while still in the United States and during his tour of duty in Iraq from late 2009 to mid-2010.

A half-dozen buttoned-down, mostly young men and women favoring charcoal-colored suits have come and gone from gallery seats behind the prosecutor's table, declining to identify themselves to journalists but apparently representing the Justice Department, the CIA or other government agencies.

Across the room are Manning's supporters, including a long-haired young man from the Occupy Wall Street movement and a pony-tailed, elderly military veteran wearing a "Free Bradley Manning" T-shirt.

Attorneys representing WikiLeaks and its founder Julian Assange also observed, as did an Amnesty International representative. A handful of journalists were also present while dozens of others watched from a separate building on closed-circuit TV.