WikiLeaks is to temporarily suspend its publishing operations and instead focus on raising funds to fight back what it described as an “unlawful” and “arbitrary” financial blockade imposed on it by the Bank of America, VISA, Mastercard, PayPal and Western Union as part of a “politically motivated” attack by American authorities.
Announcing the decision at a crowded press conference at the Frontline Club here on Monday, WikiLeaks chief Julian Assange said the financial blockade was an “existential” threat to the organisation and if it continued, WikiLeaks would not be able to carry on its work.
It had been able to survive on cash reserves for nearly a year but if it didn't find a way to remove the blockade it would not simply be able to continue by the turn of the year.
“In order to ensure our future survival, WikiLeaks is now forced to temporarily suspend its publishing operations and aggressively fundraise in order to fight back against this blockade and its proponents. We have commenced pre-litigation action against the blockade in Iceland, Denmark, the U.K., Brussels, the United States and Australia,” he said.
WikiLeaks had also lodged an anti-trust complaint at the European Commission and expected a decision by mid-November as to whether the European Competition Authority would open a full investigation into the “wrongdoing of VISA and Mastercard.”
Mr. Assange said the blockade, which had cost WikiLeaks “tens of millions of dollars” in lost donations, violated the rights of donors to economically engage with an organisation that was campaigning for free speech. According to a global survey, 75 per cent of the people around the world, including America, supported WikiLeaks' work and wanted to be associated with it.
“Yet a handful of U.S. companies have been able to block their support. These companies can't be allowed to arbitrarily decide how the world votes with its wallet,” he said.
Their “unprecedented” action under pressure from “senior right-wing politicians” was also in violation of the national sovereignty of other countries. In Europe, VISA and Mastercard together controlled 97 per cent of the money-processing market and were abusing their monopoly position.
“The blockade came into force within ten days of the launch of Cablegate as part of a concerted U.S.-based political attack that included vitriol by senior right-wing politicians, including assassination calls against WikiLeaks staff and myself personally,” Mr. Assange said.
The blockade was outside of any accountable public process and without democratic oversight or transparency, he added pointing out that the American Government itself found that there were “no lawful grounds” for it. No charges against WikiLeaks had been brought anywhere in the world and, yet, the blockade by “politicised” American finance companies continued.
Dangerous if unchallenged
Warning that it had long-term implications for other free speech campaigning organisations, Mr Assange said: “If this financial attack stands unchallenged, a dangerous, oppressive and undemocratic precedent will have been set, the implications of which go far beyond WikiLeaks and its work. Any organisation that falls foul of powerful finance companies or their political allies can expect similar extra-judicial action. Greenpeace, Amnesty International and other international NGOs that work to expose the wrongdoing of powerful players risk the same fate as WikiLeaks. If publishing the truth about war is enough to warrant such aggressive action by Washington insiders, all newspapers that have published WikiLeaks' materials are on the verge of having their readers and advertisers blocked from paying their subscriptions.”
Mr. Assange announced the launch of an alternative system of transferring funds to WikiLeaks to beat the blockade. Its details are available on its website www.wikileaks.org/support.
“Our battles will be costly. We need your support,” he said launching the “WikiLeaks Needs You” campaign. WikiLeaks would need $3.5 million next year in order to survive.
Mr. Assange said WikiLeaks was working on a more secure submissions system as its previous system had been infiltrated by intelligence agencies as part of the wider attack on its structures. Details would be announced next month.
Keywords: WikiLeaks, U.S. Embassy cables, cable gate, Julian Assange, whistle-blower website, WikiLeaks fundraising, WikiLeaks cash crunch
Do you know why it took three and a half years for America to deem Wikileaks a threat? Not because the American government's diplomatic cables were being released for public scrutiny. Wikileaks was doing it for more than two years but the American Govt. didn't pay much attention. But the moment Wikileaks started releasing personal abuse of power by prominent leaders did it face the American Govt.'s wrath. Personal stuff like Mayawati sending a jet from Lucknow to Mumbai and back just to pick up a pair of sandals that she forgot in Mumbai! The moment Wikileaks went after the affairs of top US Govt. officials, the US started taking actions.
For me this approach of all these govts is a proof enough that US
govt indeed poised the controversial spiritual guru of 20th century,
OSHO. OSHO repeatedly stressed that he was poised by the then Ronald
Regan's govt which the US govt rejected then. But seeing their
behaviour now w.r.t WikiLeaks chief all such doubts can be clearly
put aside.
Thanks The Hindu for publishing this report. Truth is being exposed to World. I support Wikileaks.
USA once again has shown its dirty and nasty face to the world. Thanks wikileak for exposing such a face. the bright face of Ms Clinton gets smudged with the dirt and grime as a result of the decision to block funds for wikileaks. this amounts to gross violation of human rights by USA>
Rajat..you're missing the point. With the current state of the world, when you don't have all the incriminating evidence, don't publish it at all. What W/L has done has been to present a lopsided view of the truth. We haven't seen the truth with our own eyes. We are shaping our criticism on the basis of what some diplomats said. No-one knows if that is the whole truth. Mr Assange's extradition and sexual assault charges ARE being debated in a court of law. His website is the one that has been targeted by the Govt, not him.
KG..I agree completely. But consider what would happen if we DID decide on the basis of W/L. We decided to bring down the USA. It fell. Make no mistake, China will rise. We don't have that capacity to rise. Suppose that does happen. Would you like a repeat of history as when China attacked right after Nehru proclaimed "Hindi-Chini bhai bhai"? At least with the current world order we know what we are dealing with. Moral principles must be maintained, but when the stake is our stability and safety we should think twice. There has to be a balance between morals and outcomes. As Lord Palmerston said, in matters of foreign policy, friends and enemies do not matter, interests do. It doesn't matter who made the world what it is today. What matters is that we strive to make the best out of it.
That lies in preserving the status quo. We should usher in change only when we are strong enough to be at the crest of the redeeming wave.
@Bal and Aritra: Laws are made for the people and not vice versa. It is a well established principle in jurisprudence that law as a tool of social engineering has to meet the prevailing standards of social expectations ("mores" as called by roscoe Pound). So says common sense too. When "democracy" forms the bed-rock of every discourse on politics today, the wikileaks phenomenon cannot be approached otherwise. The signing of executive orders by the US President approving actions to "take out" a life, does not stand the democratic test. Further, it is beyond the purview of judicial review if happens with respect to a non-US citizen. The declassified documents in the Church Committee Report in 1978 exposed the mafia-media-CIA nexus in Cuban operations. Such exposures has since then been stifled through the changed composition of the congressional committees at the behest of various pressure groups since the dawn of Raegan era. People need to know before they decide to decide.
To Aritra "if you break the law, you deserve to be prosecuted" That prosecution is suppose to take place in a court of law, not according to whims and fancies of the government. What would you say if government arrested Anna on grounds of blackmailing? and refused to give any information in response to RTI applications citing national security. FYI ISI Mr. Assange does not go out bribing people to get classified info. Wikileaks only publishes the document made available to them by volunteers.
Wikileaks doesn't deserve a single tear in its plight. We live in an ordered society with laws that, in order to protect us, place strategic blocks on our freedoms. Nothing gives us the right to dissolve the order of society to fulfill our whims and devolve society into chaos.
In breaking espionage laws and publishing secret documents without the required legal authority, Wikileaks has committed a criminal act. Just because its story has captured our hearts doesn't mean it is above the law. The moment it disclosed the diplomatic cables, it became an espionage agent with its own agenda. If an ISI agent comes into India and tries to destabilize the country, we feel it best that the agent is apprehended and executed. His good looks or his capturing of youthful fancies and whims don't make Mr Assange any different from that ISI saboteur.
Bottomline - if you break the law, you deserve to be prosecuted.
There is something called the "exigency of the situation". If someone is releasing secret documents, he has to be stopped, by extrajudicial means if necessary. Also I see that people have already made up their minds that Mr Assange is not guilty of the sex crimes he has been accused of. Well, I charge those people of being biased in their judgement.
The foreign policies of any superpower are formulated behind closed doors and inevitably contain certain unpalatable elements. China is a superpower, so is Russia. This very mentality, that the US is the International Satan, and that China (with its constant suppression of human rights and illegal occupation of Tibet) and Russia (with an official Govt policy of preserving the sanctity of the White Race) are innocent angels, is the outcome of activities like those of Mr.Assange.
Wikileaks is the epitome of journalism.It is an eye-opener for those journalists engaged in paid news cases. It excavates truth at its own peril and publishes it free of cost for all the citizens without any prejudice.Rather than forcing it into economic deficits, I opine that monetary help and infrastructure should be provided to update its budget and allow it to serve the entire humanity.
people say it is dangerous to leak foreign policy statements and
wikileaks just focuses on u.s. cables.my question is isn't the u.s
not only to blame for all this ? they are meddling in affairs of
other country's trying to dominate them . disturbing the whole world
to get's it own house in order . it's not wikileaks which are
dangerous but the policy of u.s. practiced behind closed doors is
dangerous .
Info shared by wikileaks with indian journalism world must be logically analysed and used effectively to expose and decimate the nexes between current lot of politicians and corporate world. We must not restrict sources of info by drawing imagined ethical boundaries.What is important is as to how this info is placed on public domain with it's intended use. Source should always be subservient to info. Subsequent use of this info has relevancy to social envoirnment and not the source.
The imperialism known for its penchant of stifling the voice of expression, is again in display. The shocking revelations of impropriety,and witch hunt, made by Assange, first of its kind in the whole world have opened a can of worms for the involved nations to get exposed much to their chagrin. Journalism was seen reborn with more vigour and purpose with Wikileaks, now is made to face music through draining of resources through U.S, Bank of America and EU. To let the putative whistleblower gasp for resources is a gross misfortune not for Assange, but for the whole seekers of truth.
How can VISA, MasterCard, PayPal etc could be relied upon by its customers. Their action of blocking the transactions to WikiLeaks amounts to breach of the trust bestowed upon by their customers. May be we have to boycot using them too.
Thanks 'The Hindu' for publishing this piece.
When you took on the might of America, you knew the consequences. Now do not cry if you are kicked in the derriere. You knew what you were getting into.
One wonders how sincere many supposedly democratic western regimes are
when it comes to freedom of information, seeing their concerted efforts
to stifle wikileaks. It is clear they have skeletons in their cupboard
and want to continue with their underhand policies. Every support must
be extended to Assange in continuing to expose skulduggery in whatever
guise.
Well, to reply to Mr.Kumar's request. OK, so you say that Julian is
corrupt himself? In that case, let the law take its own course if he
is.. But the concern now is, why do financial giants want to block
wikileaks in all possible ways?? Had Wikileaks released forged
documents, they would have been shut down by now.. But the thing is
that the information revealed is legitimate and real... So pls, for
god's sake stop mixing individuals with the cause behind them.. I'm
not here to say that Julian is a saint, i don't know and i don't
care.. But i believe the cause that he works for is one that should be
supported... Even if you are not supportive of the cause, the
organization still has the right to get support from the people who
believe in it.. Denying this right looks too odd and high handed
I place on record my sincere appreciation to THE HINDU for publishing many articles based on the information provided by wikileaks. Now the readers should join in hand to bring back the stability of the wikileaks along with our HINDU.
Do not favour supporting this person who has questionable moral standing and thrives on stolen information using technology. This is a corrupt form of journalism which our society should distance itself and not lean upon; truth will emerge victorious, truly not in this fashion. It is the moral responsibility of the society to fight evil with good. For instance once the apetite on Govt. docs get over there are good chances of his next prey being private organisations, individuals, banks, etc., which can have catastrophic consequenses. All basically done for attention grabbing and cheap popularity.
From the Nobel Prize website:
Are the nominations made public?
The statutes of the Nobel Foundation restrict disclosure of information about the nominations, whether publicly or privately, for 50 years. The restriction concerns the nominees and nominators, as well as investigations and opinions related to the award of a prize.
Nomination for the 2011 prize cannot be officially verified.
Remember that the USA is country that proclaims itself to be the
beacon of free speech, democracy and transparency! Ironical an
outlandish that claim!
Civilastion has come this far and what we need is not secrecy but
light just light on all activities of governments. There is dearth of
trust, breach of trust and wrong doing galore that public, the
ordinary bloke on the street must be made aware of what his elected representatives do. If the USA hounds Wikileaks for its manifesto then
the simple reason is the USA is no different from the regimes in Saudi
Arabia or any tinpot, genocidal looter in power in Africa.
Hear Mr Obama?
2nd millennium is ending slowly as we figure it it has not ended it will take some time. Wiki must have patience. It is divine ordained to expose this crooks . Roosevelt did started the financial collapse in 1930s Bin laden ended it by collapsing the WTO towers killing the 3000 finacial wizzards.Witch craft has ended around the globe . Now is the 3 rd millanium, things will take time to settle . Wiki mission and vision is time and space created one , Asange is only tool tool here in the larger dynamism of the earth. When shifts , switches and changes are grand and great deep and heavy this will hit all . Only to get to root soon .
This is natural. Every person who fights against vice has to face a lot
of problems..we have seen this with every leader. Assange, Hazare are 2
such leaders..they will face a lot of criticism..but we should always
stand by them
these types of financial blocking and creating problems is common from the ages, but this time the hostage access to masses is easy and effective which would bring out the change in the system ruled by few players.
The point here is not whether WikiLeaks is right or wrong in publishing these documents. The point is that there is a legal system which is empowered to deal with the situation. However, instead of depending on this system, the powers that are arrayed against Assange have opted to use extra judicial means to punish and silence both him and his organization. This is a terrifying precedent. If they can take this action against one organization then what is to stop them taking similar actions against any organization that they oppose. This is essentially the birth of a financial police state which threatens the liberty of all.
A blackmailer? A dangerous zealot? Had Assange done like things 'only' with regard to some Islamic state and/or any organization considered by the US as antagonistic towards "free'm and 'moxy" i guess Assange would have received the Nobel Prize prior to Obama. For the first time, the bigotry and inhuman policies of western "liberal" states have been bought to the fore with such zest and regularity. Surely it was bound to ruffle some feathers at Oval Office, Whitehall and elsewhere. Does the public benefit from it? The counter logic is the leakage of such information is not in the public interest. It is high time that the public be allowed to decide what is actually in public interest. How does the uncovering of torture at Guantanamo and Iraq jeopardize public interest? How does the publishing of the names of the Indian politicians having their ill gotten cashes stashed in Swiss banks harm public interest? Time and again we have been tought that sunlight is the best disinfectant.
Mr Assange has not been charged with any offence! He has been held under house arrest for 322 days now, because a female Swedish prosecutor is seeking to extradite Mr Assange to Sweden, where a man can be imprisoned for questioning merely on the allegation of indecent assault by a woman. The US Government has convened a Grand Jury that will seek to extradite Mr Assange if he is forced into Swedish custody.
Without Wikileaks we would never have heard of all the cases of extrajudicial killing, corruption and abuses of power that the US State department knew about and did nothing to stop.
Talking about the Watergate scandal, the story was leaked to the Washington Post by the Deputy Director of the FBI. This is no different to the way Wikileaks has operated.
Julian Assange is not the messiah, but he is not the devil either. I think he is just a very naughty boy who runs a media organisation whose function is vital to a just democracy. Visa, MasterCard, PayPal should be ashamed.
Masses can impose economic embargo on ruling classes by STOP PAYING TAXES & INDEFINITE GHERAO OF PARLIAMENT, FOOD EMBARGO on RESIDENCES OF RULING CLASSES until they enter submission. That power & benefits of governance are confined to select few families of ruling classes holds good for dictatorships like Libya as well as pseudo-democracy like India, hence the approaches cannot be different.
I agree with the comments of the Editor-in-Chief of the Hindu that "singling out out Wikileaks for aggressive and unprecedented attacks smacks of wholesale hypocrisy and arbitrariness". Truely it is unlawful and definitely an "unprecendented attack on supporters' freedom of expression and a direct interference into people's ability to affect change". It is good news that Wikileaks is legally challenging the blockade in different jurisdictions. Enlighten citizens of the world should not allow hypocrisy and arbitrariness to cloud transparency as far as freedom of expression is concerned.If it is clouded then it can be simply said that democracy is dead.
So much for the western world's rhetoric on free speech. How are the US and European Governments different from the Communist regimes they had once railed against for gagging the press.
Please, please let us not make this guy as some kind of pioneer for truth or something like that. He has been arrested for sexual crimes, not for standing up for the truth, however one may try to make it look like. He is not someone who is trying to hunt out a scandal, with true journalism, like the Watergate scandal or even the Bofors scandar, he is primarily some kind of blackmailer, who collects information from some rebellious workers in government, and publishes them to get notoriety. So lets get real, and try not to make him as some kind of martyr. We are doing injustice to real seekers of truth like Mahatma gandhi and Martin Luther King, or even the reporters who ferreted out the Watergate scandal.
By making wikileaks stop, we are as a society making a huge mistake, mistake which might not seem big today but in future it will come and hunt us. Wikileaks might not have followed the right path to publish the sensitive data, but the intentions were never wrong. When the entire nation came in support of Anna, for cause that he took up, then India as a nation should denounce anything that stops people from saying or publishing what is right, no matter how bad or ugly it might be. Hope good sense will prevail and wikileaks will be restored to its old self.
I understand how much constrained he is . His predicament has been predictable. This is what they do in the end, to destroy the atmosphere of your existence. Let us help him.
I would suggest that 'hundis' be placed in strategic locations in India for the said purpose and people could donate towards the cause. No payment gateway is needed for such monetary transactions. Additionally, Amnesty International and similar such human rights groups could decide to donate a part of their donations to wikileaks and could advertise thus. It is to be understood that technology based sanctions could be broken by non-technology based simplistic solutions.
The throttling of Wikileaks by stopping the money flow to it is illegal. It would be in fitness of things if The Hindu accepted contributions from the Indian public for the cause and remitted the amount to Wikileaks.
It's a funny world. Deadly terrorist organizations across the world have no sanctions imposed on them by these countries or their powerful financial institutions whereas whistle blower organizations like wikileaks are targeted like hard core criminals. What's the world coming to?
WikiLeaks is leaking and ready to drown. There is no excuse for stealing the documents of the governments, commercial establishments, banks, credit card companies and individuals. WikiLeaks have to spend millions of dollars to defend the legal problems facing Assange and the WikiLeaks in England and rest of the world. Other hackers have started attacking WikiLeaks the same way Assange attacked the data bases of the governments, financial companies and individuals. Assange will declare bankcrupcy even before he is extradited from England to Sweden for sexual attack of a minor. The morality and criminal acts will overwhelm Assange and his flagship WikiLeaks will end up in the bottom of the abyss.
Dictators, Despots, Monarchies and Democratically elected Governments do not want the truth to be placed in the public domain. It is embarassing and highlights their scheming mindset and/or the stupidity of their thinking. One can understand their grouse against Wikileaks. Imagine the level of arm twisting done by the US Adminstration for Visa and Mastercard to refuse to process payments to Wikileaks. And the Americans accuse North Korea, China, Libya and other countries for stiffling free speech. Wake up America, practice what you preach!
The works WikiLeaks has been carrying out since its launch, specially the ones relating to extremely illegal acts the US has done in Afghan and Iraq and shocking diplomatic cables between the state department in Washington and various embassies and consulates across the globe has already penned a golden lesson in the history of global media. It is the common man who benefits and get informed by the revelations WikiLeaks bravely carry out and it is the anti-people and pro-corporate governments that find WikiLeaks dangerous on their vested interests. It seems that it is now for the international community to decide whether or not WikiLeaks should continue to exist. I hope the international community (not the governments) would extend its valuable and desperately needed supportive hands to the Whistle bowler to make it remain in action.
The bulk of his leaks are diplomatic cables of US diplomats. Why not do the same for Chinese diplomats? Or even those of Russia? Greenpeace and Amnesty International do not "expose" the truth. They take whatever is available in the public domain and wage a constant war with those materials that are available. Wikileaks isn't comparable to either of those two organizations. Mr Assange must realize that he is holding a very dangerous weapon in these diplomatic cables. Power must be accompanied by responsibility. To publish reports of toxic dumps in a country is one thing, to attack a world power's foreign policy is another, particularly in the present scenario. I see no merit in the accusations that he has been blocked unfairly. What he was doing was dangerous. He had to be stopped.
What next - refuse financial transactions from and to the media including social media? Shame on these Banks in ganging up against openness. All the more reason to support the occupy Wall street movt.
I support WikiLeaks
Thank you The Hindu for publishing this report on Wikileaks financial blockade by big financiers. Next before using a VISA/Master Card/Paypal, I will think twice. Thank you Wikileaks and The Hindu.
Maybe we should suspend using VISA and MASTERCARD as well as Paypal to protest?
Wikileaks must be given all sort of support including moral financial and legal to continue the sacred job of exposing power players of tho world. The sinister designs and policicies of the power players after all affects the life of people world over. Therefore the people shuld know as to how their future and fate is being shaped by the planners. At the same time the hidden faces of these players must be unveiled. I can only requet financial operators to cooperate and not create obstacle in the way of wikileaks as it is serving the cause of pure and sacred human society. The power players mst have some sort of brake.Wikileaks is a break on inhuman activities of these power players and corruption of vested interests.
I can foresee that the Western Financial Systems are already collapsing and the US Government /Europe Authority is dwindling. The excesses done by US Federal agencies CIA, Homeland inland Security, etc. exceeds the acts of Hitler, both for their citizens and outsiders. Same way the Indian Politicians are exposed totally. The exposures made sure that The future is bright - the equitable world is just starting up. E-Democracy will be great alternative as proper governance as I have been saying for the last 9 years.
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