By: Chris Burke
I sometimes joke that I have a love/hate relationship with Wikileaks founder, Julian Assange. In our early “relationship”, in 2009, I deeply criticised Julian for publishing a court ordered protected document leaked by the UK government in Turks and Caicos Islands [TCI]. I asserted that Julian’s leak of the protected document, and particularly his editorial introduction that accompanied it, blatantly helped to cover up UK's plot to recolonize Turks and Caicos. I said that Julian was reckless in failing to learn the origin of the leak as well as improperly characterising the document’s meaning. The UK targeted several individuals in the Turks and Caicos for corruption as part of a pretext to take control of the island’s government. A judge in the islands at the time ordered the names be sealed pending a further investigation and due process. The document was nonetheless leaked and Wikileaks was happy to publish it. The British governor in TCI apologised for his “error” in failing to keep the document’s content safe but never took responsibility for leaking it in order to bolster UK's position in TCI.
Thereafter, Julian redeemed himself in my eyes. He got it right by publishing evidence of a loan to TCI arranged by the UK whereby members of a local UK-appointed advisory committee were named as makers of the loan without their knowledge. The loan terms were not transparent until it was finally published by Wikileaks. This gave more evidence of UK’s abuse of power in the TCI and showed me that Julian was fair and not supporting a particular agenda. My feelings for Julian shifted away from "hate" and I let Julian know. I then termed him my “frienemy” (friend/enemy).
Then came Wikileak’s 2010 Collateral Murder video showing footage of the US Army in Iraq erroneously shooting civilians. The leak of the video was perfectly reasonable in my opinion. But again, I took exception to his running editorial subtitles, which in my opinion did more to interpret the event from his perspective instead of translate it.
At some point in my back-and-forth feelings for Julian, I came to accept the good with the bad because the good far outweighed the bad. He has put all governments on notice that citizens can and should hold their governments to account. Demanding government transparency is more than words, it comes with accountability and consequences.
It takes a muckraker like Julian to put a spotlight on governments and empower those governments' citizens with the same tools. Even if he gets it wrong a percentage of the time, his mere presence in the world is enough to deter governments from human rights and democracy abuses. Julian is responsible for empowering citizens to revolt against their dictatorship governments, a feat unheard of until this new age of anonymous whistle-blowing.
As the UK shelters Julian from rape charges in Sweden, I wondered how Julian would handle exposing UK abuses now that he is seemingly beholden to that government for his freedom. Is he following UK colonial and democracy abuses in UK-occupied Turks and Caicos or would he protect the UK government in his time of vulnerability.
I think I got my answer. Julian, just this week, criticised the UK government, opining that the UK refuses to keep documents purposefully to keep secrets. He also accused the UK of appealing to their mid-brow squeamish culture by “its risk-adverse approach” against assisting countries to achieve freedom from dictatorship regimes or gain democracy. He said, "[UK] would rather destroy an entire revolution, and keep a country in dictatorship, than risk being blamed for the tiniest thing."
My conclusion is that Julian Assange is the real deal. He has revolutionised a new world culture of confidence to expose the truth as always being the right thing. It for sure has changed the way that governments around the world view accountability to their citizens. The UK seems to have chosen an interesting approach, prevent leaks by simply not keeping records.
My message to the UK is that they can’t keep everyone quiet. It will leak, one way or another. Julian has create the climate, atmosphere and culture to make sure of it.
Well done, my “friend” (it has been decided).
