Some see him as a crusader protecting the right of people to information, while others view him as a threat to national security.
But Wikileaks founder Julian Assange might actually be both, depending on which side of the problem we situate ourselves.
Last week, its whistle-blowing website started releasing over 200,000 cables of US embassies around the world, causing a 9 degree earthquake in international diplomacy. The purpose for the leaks was people’s right to know the information that is in the public interest, says Assange.
But there’s a difference between the two cases: while the Iraq war is over, diplomacy is a continuous process based on mutual trust between states. Now the trust is shattered and this indeed will affect the diplomatic relationships of many states.
And in the end, diplomacy is a secret area, a land of negotiations and compromise, of “you give me this and I give you that”, of smiling to everyone and keeping the appearances. So the leaked “deals” between states do not surprise me at all. But the consequences of publishing such secret information as the ones contained by the cables can cause a lot of damage to the already unstable political landscape.
Still I think that in a world where the media seems to gradually estrange itself from the its role as the state’s fourth power, where the laws tend to gradually limit the freedom of either print or broadcast media organisations, a website present in a medium not affected by censorship is probably the only way of making secret information public.
Kenya, or when it made a difference
So Wikileaks is probably making history by casting light onto the secrets of the world’s superpowers, be it US or the already announced to be in focus, Russia and China.
But despite the possible dangerous repercussions the leaks might have, I want to present two cases in which freedom of information equaled leaks equaled important change.
As Julian Assange says during a TED conference in July 2010, Wikileaks’ information on Kenya’s Kroll report shifted the outcome of presidential elections in the country.
To put it in a nutshell, Daniel Arap Moi was Kenya’s president for a total of 24 years, until Mwai Kibaki came to power in 2003, playing his card against Moi’s corruption activities.
Kibabi ordered a report into the former regime, which shed light into the high levels of corruptions in the country during Moi’s mandate. However, Kibabi soon decided to team up with the former leader and hide the result of the report, confident that Moi’s endorsement could ensure his election.
Three days before the December 2004 elections in Kenya, the Kroll report was leaked and it was soon covered by all the African media. According to Assange, Kenyan television reports stated that the leaks shifted the outcome of the vote by 10 percent.
Iceland and the way to a free press
Another example that Assange mentions regards Iceland, a country that struggled with a serious economic crisis in 2009.
Wikileaks had an important role when a national TV channel was blocked from revealing a list of creditors related to the country’s banking system. Instead, the broadcaster showed the website of Wikileaks for the amount of time the story was aired.
This brought a huge fame of the website in Iceland, where it was invited to help the MPs launch the Icelandic Modern Media Initiative, whose goal is to turn the country into a global haven for investigative journalism. In June this year, the proposal was voted unanimously by the Parliament.
And probably that’s what all countries should do: promote freedom of information, ensure a safe environment for journalists to commit to their work. But maybe this only happens in countries that don’t have much to hide.
And the very small number of states that support real investigative journalism is something to be worried about.
One last thought…the accusations
I somehow feel like in a silly typical Romanian trial, where a person is accused just for the fun of it.
It is so obvious that the only reason for the rape and sexual harassment accusations are to shut his mouth, that reading stories about it seems to me a waste of time and a serious threat to my intelligence.
What I disagree with is the way he responded to the accusations: refusing to talk about them, walking out of interviews whenever he was asked about the trial. And his denial to say a word about it is why journalists keep pushing.
