Investigative journalist Stefania Maurizi has been partnering with WikiLeaks for greater than 12 years.
She has labored for a few of Italy’s high publications and is at present on the Il Fatto Quotidiano newspaper.
Years in the past, she helped expose Rome’s position in america and NATO-led so-called “warfare on terror”, sifting by means of hundreds of labeled United States authorities paperwork leaked by the whistleblowing organisation from 2010 onwards.
Right now, the 51-year-old Australian founding father of the group, Julian Assange, is held in a most safety jail in the UK, as his attorneys proceed their battle to keep away from his extradition to the US, the place he may resist 175 years in jail.
Assange and WikiLeaks have been charged by the US authorities for hacking web sites and leaking labeled paperwork associated to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, in addition to US diplomatic cables.
Maurizi’s new e book, Secret Energy: WikiLeaks and its Enemies, printed by Pluto Press, examines the authorized circumstances in opposition to Assange, the state of journalism, and the necessity for official transparency.
Al Jazeera: If Assange is extradited to the US, what does this imply for journalists?
Maurizi: If Julian Assange will get extradited to the US, it is going to have a devastating impact on press freedom, and never simply press freedom. This isn’t only a case about journalists. It’s a case about the appropriate of the folks to know what our governments are doing in darkish corners the place there are not any witnesses.
In case you are not capable of reveal state criminality on the highest stage, you can not say that you’re dwelling in a democracy. You might be dwelling in a state which could not be fully authoritarian, like dictatorships, however continues to be authoritarian sufficient that you simply can’t know what they’re doing.
What can we do? I actually do consider now we have an obligation to reveal how critical this monstrous injustice is. Now we have an obligation to tell the general public. Now we have an obligation to reveal the cruelty of his [Assange] therapy. They’re killing him slowly.
His father [John Shipton] was in Italy not too long ago. He obtained an honourary card by the Order of Italian Skilled Journalists in Rome on behalf of Assange … I spoke to him and he was devastated. He instructed me Julian is dangerously skinny.
Al Jazeera: Have you ever met Assange since his imprisonment?
Maurizi: I wouldn’t have any entry to him, and to this point, the visits are solely allowed for the authorized staff, for his members of the family, however not for me and different journalists.
The final time I met him was November 2018, 5 months earlier than he was arrested. I discovered him in a really critical situation. He was closely burdened … he had misplaced perhaps 15 kg (33lb). However he was nonetheless lucid. He instructed me he can be arrested and extradited.
Al Jazeera: At one level in your e book, you recall worrying when travelling from Berlin to Rome having simply labored with WikiLeaks. You had with you a small part of the Afghan warfare logs. Have you ever ever felt fearful about your involvement?
Maurizi: I by no means feared for my life. For those who take my nation Italy, for instance, now we have dozens of journalists who reside beneath safety as a consequence of Mafia threats. They kill journalists as a result of they don’t have any different instruments aside from violence.
In my case, I don’t consider a threat is there as a result of [government officials] have a number of instruments. They don’t have simply violence as a software. They use issues like political and diplomatic strain. Many journalists stopped engaged on WikiLeaks as a result of they thought it was damaging for his or her careers. They may lose entry to state officers. They may have their careers broken.
However sure … I’ve been adopted aggressively, and it’s not a pleasant factor to expertise, particularly if you find yourself overseas and alone. I’ve been bodily attacked (Editors’s word: Maurizi writes in her e book that she was as soon as robbed in Rome) and have had crucial paperwork stolen which by no means surfaced once more.
I can guarantee you that this work hasn’t gained me any highly effective buddies or allies. It set me on a collision course with my former newspaper, la Repubblica, from which I resigned after 14 years in order that I may maintain doing my investigative work on WikiLeaks. I resigned, and my earnings collapsed, however I’d do it once more. In comparison with the hardships Assange has gone by means of, my troubles are nothing.
Al Jazeera: You declare that WikiLeaks has “radically remodeled journalism”? How so?
Maurizi: Initially, they made these paperwork accessible and supplied a fairly safe platform for whistleblowers who wished to leak, as a result of one of many issues is that in conventional media, folks nonetheless use old school applied sciences like cell phones and emails, that are completely susceptible.
Additionally, they made these paperwork out there to billions.
They [WikiLeaks] don’t simply publish revelations, like nationwide safety journalists, they make the precise documentation out there to everybody, in order that anybody could make up their very own thoughts.
Everybody can verify whether or not a journalist has distorted or censored something. That is about democratising info, democratising entry to info. It’s about making the connection between readers and journalists much less uneven.
This isn’t only a revolution in journalism, however a revolution within the entry out there for [everyday citizens] to vital info. You may have to have the ability to entry this info with a purpose to have correct democratic participation in public life.
Al Jazeera: Assange’s critics are vocal. They name him a “hacktivist” and say the work of WikiLeaks is much from journalism. What do you make of those characterisations?
Maurizi: It’s fully false. He’s clearly a journalist, and we can’t permit the state to determine who’s and who just isn’t a journalist.
In fact, the US authorities has tried to undermine these journalistic protections, as a result of they know that so long as he has journalistic protections, it will likely be very onerous for them to cost him. And that’s why the US authorities is urgent the argument that he’s not a journalist, however perhaps a hacker or activist.
Now we have seen within the final three years all main information organisations have characterised him as a journalist, even the Worldwide Federation of Journalists.
So what america is doing is utilizing a worry tactic. They’re simply attempting to bypass the press safety. That is certainly what [Benito] Mussolini did in Italy. Mussolini created the system during which the state determined who’s a journalist and who just isn’t, with a purpose to management the press.
Al Jazeera: The US authorities and a few observers accuse Assange of recklessness, claiming leaks may result in assaults.
Maurizi: These paperwork have been printed in 2010. Twelve years later, the US authorities can’t title a single one who has been killed, who has been injured, who has been put in jail consequently.
Instantly after Julian Assange began and WikiLeaks began publishing the Afghan warfare logs, the state division, the Pentagon, the CIA, created this large activity power to verify whether or not anybody had been injured, to verify the names which have been printed, and after 12 years, they haven’t been capable of present a single instance.
Think about if that they had discovered a single instance, they might have disseminated it worldwide.
Al Jazeera: The whistleblower Chelsea Manning, who leaked the Iraq and Afghan warfare logs, confronted jailed time. What does this imply for the way forward for whistleblowing?
Maurizi: The aggressive persecution and prosecution of individuals like Assange and Manning ship a message to whistleblowers and journalists that it’s a must to be very cautious as a result of when you go forward with this … your life shall be destroyed.
Alternatively, it’s fairly encouraging that after Chelsea Manning, we had Edward Snowden. And after him, we had whistleblowers like Actuality Winner and Daniel Hale.
So, we nonetheless have individuals who take heed to their conscience and go forward, so I’m nonetheless optimistic. That’s why I completely need Assange to win his case. I’m satisfied that if he does, this shall be an enormous step in the direction of a society in which you’ll be able to reveal state criminality on the highest stage and be free and protected.
This interview was edited for readability and brevity.