Last
week, rallies in support of Julian Assange were held around the
world. We participated in two #AssangeUnity events seeking to
#FreeAssange in Washington, DC. This is the beginning of a new phase
of the campaign to stop the persecution of Julian Assange and allow
him to leave the Ecuadorian Embassy in London without the threat of
being arrested in the UK or facing prosecution by the United States.
by
Kevin Zeese - Margaret Flowers
Part
2 - The Astounding Impact of WikiLeaks’ Reporting
The list
of WikiLeaks’ revelations has become astounding. The release of
emails from Hillary Clinton, her presidential campaign, and the
Democratic National Committee had a major impact on the election.
People saw the truth of Clinton’s connections to Wall Street, her
two-faced politics of having a public view and a private view as well
as the DNC’s efforts to undermine the campaign of Sen. Bernie
Sanders. People saw the truth and the truth hurt Hillary Clinton and
the Democrats.
Among
the most famous documents published were those provided by Chelsea
Manning on Iraq, Afghanistan, the Guantanamo Prison and the US State
Department. The Collateral Murder video among the Manning Iraq war
documents shows US soldiers in an Apache helicopter gunning down a
group of innocent men, including two Reuters employees, a
photojournalist, and his driver, killing 16 and wounding two
children. Millions have viewed the video showing that when a van
pulled up to evacuate the wounded, the soldiers again opened fire. A
soldier says, “Oh yeah, look at those dead bastards.”
Another
massive leak came from Edward Snowden, the NSA whistleblower who
exposed massive NSA spying in the United States and around the world.
This was followed by Vault 7, a series of leaks on the Central
Intelligence Agency’s activities, and Vault 8, which included
source code on CIA malware activities.
WikiLeaks
has also published documents on other countries, e.g. WikiLeaks
published a series of documents on Russian spying. WikiLeaks has
been credited by many with helping to spark the Tunisian Revolution
which led to the Arab Spring, e.g., showing the widespread corruption
of the 23-year rule of the Ben Ali. Foreign Policy reported that “the
candor of the cables released by WikiLeaks did more for Arab
democracy than decades of backstage U.S. diplomacy.” WikiLeaks’
publications provided democracy activists in Egypt with information
needed to spark protests and provided background that explained the
Egyptian uprising. Traditional media publications like the New York
Times relied on WikiLeaks to analyze the causes of the uprising.
WikiLeaks
informed the Bahrain public about their government’s cozy
relationship with the US, describing a $5 billion joint-venture with
Occidental Petroleum and $300 million in U.S. military sales and how
the U.S. Navy is the foundation of Bahrain’s national security.
John
Pilger describes WikiLeaks’ documents, writing, “No
investigative journalism in my lifetime can equal the importance of
what WikiLeaks has done in calling rapacious power to account.”
Source,
links:
Related:
Urgent
message to Bernie and Jeremy: the time has come to support Julian
Assange clearly and openly!
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