July 28, 2010 by Alexei M
WikiLeaks, the controversial website which acts as a multi-jurisdictional public service designed to protect whistleblowers, has hit the news again following the publication of a document about the war in Afghanistan.
The site is designed to support journalists and activists who have sensitive materials to communicate to the public. Since 2007, it has obtained, published and defended such materials and championed the integrity of our common historical record and the rights of all peoples to create new history.
This week, almost 100 thousand records involving incidents relating to the war in Afghanistan have been published. The reports, compiled by the US military, shows intelligence collated from the war. This publication marks the latest activity by the site to make government intelligence available to the public.
Previous exposes include the video which WikiLeaks broadcast showing an Apache helicopter killing twelve people in Baghdad, which led to members of the US military being put on trial for leaking the material. Another leak involved the publication of the names and addresses of BNP party members, in 2009. WikiLeaks have also posted up details of Camp Delta in Guantanamo Bay’s operating procedures. The site now features over one million documents.
Mr. Assange, spokesperson for WikiLeaks, stated: “To keep our sources safe, we have had to spread assets, encrypt everything, and move telecommunications and people around the world to activate protective laws in different national jurisdictions. We’ve become good at it, and never lost a case, or a source, but we can’t expect everyone to go through the extraordinary efforts that we do.”
“The site has recently undergone enormous growth, and has received an extraordinary amount of material. It exceeds our ability to get it out to [the] public at the moment. As a result, the site is changing and we hope to set up a number of independent chapters around the world as well as to act as a middle-man between sources and newspapers.”
“We take care of the source and act as a neutral intermediary and then we also take care of the publication of the material whilst the journalist that has been communicated with takes care of the verification. It provides a natural connection between a journalist and a source with us in the middle performing the function that we perform best.”
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