Six Big Leaks from Julian Assange’s WikiLeaks over the Years
WHISTLEBLOWING - SURVEILLANCE, 15 Apr 2019
12 Apr 2019 – Julian Assange, who was arrested Thursday [11 Apr] in London, built a reputation as the renegade founder of WikiLeaks, known for rattling governments by leaking sensitive and confidential information.
Some consider him a champion of government transparency and freedom of the press, while others have condemned him as a dangerous rogue who has undermined national security.
Here is a look at some of the biggest leaks Assange and his organization have been behind since its founding in 2006:
US Army manual for Guantanamo prison camp
Date: November 2007
The Leak: One of Assange and WikiLeaks first big releases was of a 238-page Army manual from 2003 on “standard operating procedures” for the Camp Delta prison in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.
The Revelations: The manual showed the Army had a policy of keeping some prisoners from Red Cross inspectors and holding new prisoners in isolation for two weeks to make them more compliant for interrogators.
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570,000 messages sent on 9/11
Date: November 2009
The Leak: WikiLeaks published more than half a million pager messages sent within a 24-hour period around the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks that killed nearly 3,000 people.
The Revelations: The messages included exchanges from “Pentagon, FBI, FEMA and New York Police Department” officials. “We hope that its entrance into the historical record will lead to a nuanced understanding of how this event led to death, opportunism and war,” WikiLeaks said of the release.
Video of US helicopter fire killing civilians in Iraq
Date: April 2010
The Leak: WikiLeaks published video footage from a 2007 U.S. Apache helicopter attack in Baghdad, Iraq, that killed at least nine men, including a Reuters news photographer and his driver.
The Revelations: Army soldier Bradley Manning, a transgender woman who later became known as Chelsea Manning, was later arrested for the release of the video and other classified material about the conduct of the war and civilian deaths.
Assange’s legal past: WikiLeaks founder had a litany of legal issues before London arrest
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Iraq and Afghanistan war documents
Date: July and October 2010
The Leaks: In 2010, WikiLeaks published a trove of classified documents about U.S. military action. It released more than 90,000 documents related to Afghanistan and later published more than 400,000 documents from the war in Iraq.
The Revelations: The documents included information about civilian deaths, the hunt for al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden and Iran’s backing of militants in Iraq.
State Department cables
Date: November 2010 to September 2011
The Leaks: More than 250,000 unredacted U.S. diplomatic cables dating from December 1966 to February 2010 were released in the what was referred to as “Cablegate.”
The Revelations: Then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton called the release “an attack on the international community.” The documents included verification that the U.S. had conducted secret drone strikes in Yemen, details of U.S. efforts to get information on United Nations representatives, a push by Saudi Arabia’s royal family to have the U.S. strike Iran and a description of Russia under Vladimir Putin as a “virtual mafia state.”
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Stolen 2016 emails
Date: July and October 2016
The Leaks: On July 22, 2016, WikiLeaks released nearly 20,000 Democratic National Committee emails and on Oct. 7, 2016, it released another 2,000 emails from Clinton campaign manager John Podesta.
The Revelations: The emails, which U.S. intelligence later determined had been stolen by hackers working for the Russian government, appeared to show that the DNC had favored Clinton over her rival, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders. Among the damaging information in Podesta’s emails was the news that then-acting DNC Chairwoman Donna Brazile had given the Clinton campaign debate questions in advance.
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Contributing: Eliza Collins, USA TODAY; The Associated Press
Tags: Activism, Big Brother, Democracy, Journalism, Media, Military, NATO, Nonviolence, Surveillance, Violence, War, Whistleblowing
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