WikiLeaks acted in public interest, says Pentagon Papers' leaker while defending Assange

Daniel Ellsberg, the man who leaked the Pentagon Papers about the Vietnam War, came to the defence of Julian Assange on September 16 and said that WikiLeaks had acted in the public interest. Assange is fighting to stop being sent to the US, where he is charged with conspiring to hack government computers and violating an espionage law over the release of confidential cables by WikiLeaks in 2010-2011. 

Ellsberg, while defending the 49-year-old WikiLeaks founder, warned that Assange would not get a fair trial in the United States and added that there are echoes of his experience in the way he is being treated by the US government. The 89-year-old told London’s Central Criminal Court via a video link that WikiLeak’s disclosures had shown Americans how they had been misled about US action in Iraq and Afghanistan. He went on to cite a US military video, which showed a 2007 attack by Apache helicopters in Baghdad and which was published back in 2010, and said that ‘torture had become normalised’. 

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In his written testimony, Ellsberg said, “The American public needed urgently to know what was being done routinely in their name, and there was no other way for them to learn it than by unauthorized disclosure”. 

He added, “I observe the closest of similarities to the position I faced, where the exposure of illegality and criminal acts institutionally and by individuals was intended to be crushed by the administration carrying out those illegalities”. 

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Even though Ellsberg was pressed repeatedly by James Lewis, a lawyer acting on behalf of US government, about the consequences of the leaking of unredacted documents, the 89-year-old said that there was ‘zero evidence’ that the actions of Assange and WikiLeaks had led to anyone being harmed. He also said that Assange took great care not to wilfully expose anyone to harm. Further, he told the court that the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq had made refugees of millions as well as to the death of over one million people. 

Charges against Assange

Assange has been charged with the Espionage Act in the United States, where he could receive a maximum prison term of 175 years if found guilty. The US authorities accuse Assange of publishing a series of confidential war-related cables allegedly provided by US Army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning, who was later court-martialed in 2013 over violations of the Espionage Act, Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, among other offences.

(Inputs and image: AP) 

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