Growing Authoritarianism, Social Inequalities Often a Prelude to Conflict

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Opinion

Margot Wallström is Foreign Minister of Sweden*

Swedish Foreign Minister Margot Wallström with UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres

STOCKHOLM, May 17 2019 (IPS) – I want to talk about peacebuilding and inclusive peace. My main point is that peace begins in the minds of people, and people, communities, societies must be allowed to participate in peace for it to be sustainable. Peace means a lot more than just the absence of war.

I want to highlight the need for this perspective in three aspects of peacebuilding – conflict prevention, crisis response and peace processes. But before going into those aspects, let me begin with the example of Colombia.

As you know, the war between FARC and the government had been going on since the 1960’s, with hundreds of thousands of victims.

The peace process that was initiated around 2012 was in a way unique. It included in different ways victims and local communities, the private sector, civil society, LGBT organisations. And of course, there was a strong presence of women.

The peace deal that was signed in 2016 (one of few good news that year) included agreements on much more than just the laying down of arms – it mentions land reform, political participation, guarantees for social movements, a strategy to tackle drug trafficking and much more.

We keep on being reminded that the implementation is often the most complicated part of a deal. But even that is part of the point I want to make. That – just as with democracy – peace is something you have to work on and conquer every day.

And even if there have been and are challenges related to the peace in Colombia, I maintain that this process was remarkable, because it put the Colombian people at center, and today both parties, the former guerilla FARC and the Colombian government are jointly working on sustainable peace in their country.

1) Going back to the three aspects of peacebuilding, let me start with conflict prevention. We seldom get the credit we deserve for the conflicts that didn’t happen.

And unfortunately, it is often easier to get support for interventions once there actually is a fire. But how many tears would not have been saved, if we had been able to prevent Rwanda? Bosnia? South Sudan?

My conviction is that societies that are democratic and inclusive, with gender and social equality, with a strong civil society have are strongly vaccinated against conflict.

This is one of the reasons why the global backslide of democracy that we experience right now is worrying me. Growing authoritarianism together with growing social inequalities has often been a prelude to conflict.

And this year, for the first time in decades, more people live in countries with growing authoritarian tendencies, than in countries that are making democratic progress.

There is still hope. I recently visited the Tunis Forum on Gender Equality, where I met with a lot of young civil society activists. And coming back to inclusive peacebuilding, I heard one interesting example of how women’s grassroots organisations took part in conflict early warning mechanisms.

They did so by reporting local peace and security risks and threats to the community, the government and international bodies.

2) Let me continue with a second aspect of peacebuilding, which is crisis response, including peacekeeping and stabilization.

Here, a security approach is often needed to save lives. But also, in interventions to stabilise we can help steer the course to a more inclusive process. Women in peacekeeping operations is an example.

When we plan for these interventions, we must think of inclusion and gender from the start. There is no conflict between the need for a quick end of violence, and the long-term aim of creating peaceful, just and inclusive societies. All interventions can be designed to contribute to this.

3) Thirdly, peace processes. Here, an inclusive approach means focusing more on women; less on men with weapons.

It is understandable that, at crunch time, a hasty deal between leaders of conflicting parties might seem attractive. But sometimes; easy come, easy go.

A peace where the voices of communities, of victims, of women have been heard – in preparations, in negotiations and implementation – will be more deeply rooted and has a greater chance of lasting longer.

Coming back to the example of Colombia – it was women that brought issues of land restitution and victims to the agenda; that ensured that confidence-building measures were implemented, that child soldiers were released.

There are other processes where women are less visible, but still make critical contributions. In Libya and Afghanistan, women, young people and local peacebuilders have done important work, with their local knowledge and commitment.

Conflicts are not linear. You can never draw a straight line from a beginning to an end. Their dynamics often look more like a child’s drawing, with strokes forward, backward, to the sides, in all possible directions.

As I said in the beginning, sustaining peace is an ongoing process, of constantly strengthening factors that underpin peace – such as confidence, reconciliation, institutions, equality, democracy.

And in a way, conflict, in a broader sense, is an inevitable part of life in a society. For a democracy, I would say, conflict is vital.

The challenge is to find ways to handle conflicts in a peaceful and constructive way. Strong, well-functioning institutions – be they national, or in the shape of multilateral cooperation, are the way of managing this.

And this is another reason why today’s backsliding of democracy and questioning of international cooperation is such a worrying threat, To conclude, let me get back to the main point about peace beginning in the minds of people.

You might recognize the source of this: the first words of the constitution of UNESCO, which I want to return to, since they so well summarize what peacebuilding is about:

“Since wars begin in in the minds of men, it is in the minds of men that the defences of peace must be constructed”.

In other words – putting people at the center of our thinking.

I’m glad that we are doing that today and tomorrow, and I hope that we can keep on doing it in our daily work for peace and development.

*Excerpted from an address to the SIPRI Forum on Peace and Development

 

Rise of Right-wing Nationalism Undermines Human Rights Worldwide

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UNITED NATIONS, May 10 2019 (IPS) – The rise of right-wing nationalism and the proliferation of authoritarian governments have undermined human rights in several countries in Europe, Asia, Africa, the Middle East and Latin America.

As a result, some of the international human rights experts – designated as UN Rapporteurs – have either been politically ostracized, denied permission to visit countries on “fact-finding missions” or threatened with expulsion, along with the suspension of work permits.

The Philippines government, a vociferously authoritarian regime, has renewed allegations against Victoria Tauli-Corpuz, the UN Special Rapporteurs on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.

The Deputy Chief of Staff for Civil-Military Operations, Brigadier General Antonio Parlade, told reporters that the United Nations had been infiltrated by the Communist Party of the Philippines through Tauli-Corpuz.

But a group of UN human rights experts denounced the politically-inspired charges against a longstanding UN envoy on human rights.

“The new accusations levelled against Ms. Tauli-Corpuz are clearly in retaliation for her invaluable work defending the human rights of indigenous peoples worldwide, and in the Philippines,” the experts said

Anna-Karin Holmlund, Senior UN Advocate at Amnesty International, told IPS “We have witnessed several deeply worrying personal attacks by UN Member States against the independent experts, including personal attacks, threats of prosecution, public agitation and physical violence in the past year”.

“It is clear they are targeted for simply doing their job,” she added.

On occasion, she noted, these have been carried out by members of the UN Human Rights Council that are expressly required to uphold the highest standards in the promotion and protection of human rights.

“Such attacks are part of a disturbing trend of a shrinking space for human rights work more broadly in many places around the world,” declared Holmlund.

Meanwhile, the Government of Burundi has closed down the UN Human Rights Office triggering a protest from Michelle Bachelet, the UN Human Rights Commissioner in Geneva.

And under the Trump administration, the US has ceased to cooperate with some of the UN Rapporteurs, and specifically an investigation on the plight of migrants on the Mexican border where some of them have been sexually assaulted—abuses which have remained unreported and unprosecuted.

The government of Myanmar has barred a UN expert from visiting the country to probe the status of Rohingya refugees.

In March, the UN Special Rapporteur on the Independence of Judges and Lawyers, Diego García-Sayán, postponed an official visit to Morocco because the government “has not been able to ensure a programme of work in accordance with the needs of the mandate and the terms of reference for country visits by special procedures.”

He was scheduled to visit the country from 20 to 26 March “to examine the impact of measures aimed at ensuring the independence and impartiality of the judiciary and prosecutors, and the independent exercise of the legal profession.”

“It is most regrettable that the suggestions of places to visit and schedule of work were not fully taken into consideration by the Government. It is an essential precondition for the exercise of the mandate of Special Rapporteur that I am able to freely determine my priorities, including places to visit,” he said.

Referring to the situation in Colombia, Robert Colville, Spokesperson for the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, said May 10: “We are alarmed by the strikingly high number of human rights defenders being killed, harassed and threatened in Colombia, and by the fact that this terrible trend seems to be worsening”

“We call on the authorities to make a significant effort to confront the pattern of harassment and attacks aimed at civil society representatives and to take all necessary measures to tackle the endemic impunity around such cases.”

In just the first four months of this year, he pointed out, a total of 51 alleged killings of human rights defenders and activists have been reported by civil society actors and State institutions, as well as the national human rights institution.

The UN Human Rights Office in Colombia is closely following up on these allegations. This staggering number continues a negative trend that intensified during 2018, when our staff documented the killings of 115 human rights defenders.

And last month, Israel revoked the work permit for Omar Shakir, the Israel and Palestine Director of Human Rights Watch, prompting a protest from the United Nations.

“This ruling threatens advocacy, research, and free expression for all and reflects a troubling resistance to open debate,” a group of UN experts said. “It is a setback for the rights of human rights defenders in Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territory.

Dr Palitha Kohona, a former chairman of the Israeli Practices Committee, mandated to monitor human rights violations in Israeli-occupied Palestinian territories, told IPS that official visits to the West Bank were barred by Israel (“and not for want of trying”) but not to Gaza, which they could not.

He said several approaches were made through the Israeli Missions in New York and Geneva to seek approval to interview persons on the ground in the West Bank, but to no avail.

“In 2011, we waited an extra day in Amman hoping to get approval which was never forthcoming. A ministerial visit by delegates from the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) to the West Bank was stopped at the Allenby Bridge by Israel”.

The Rafah crossing was controlled by Egypt and the Gaza authorities. Entry to Gaza for the Committee was through Sinai following a long bus ride from Cairo across the Sinai desert, said Dr Kohona, a former Permanent Representative of Sri Lanka to the United Nations.

“I visited Gaza twice in 2010 and 2011 with the Committee. I believe that these were the only two occasions that the Committee was able to visit Gaza.”

Egypt itself seemed to make the entry uncomfortable for the Committee, perhaps to keep Israel happy, he said.

In 2011, the Committee was held up for over four hours at the Rafah Crossing to Sinai. “Eventually I had to contact the Sri Lanka embassy in Cairo by phone to get us across”.

According to a report in the New York Times March 10, Leilana Farha, the UN Special Envoy for Housing was “shocked” to discover that some of the Egyptians she interviewed in Cairo’s poor areas “had suffered reprisals for talking to her.”

“Some were flung from their homes by officials, their belongings strewn in the streets. Others were harassed by the security services or barred from leaving Egypt,” said the report from New York Times correspondent Declan Walsh in Cairo.

“The foreign ministry accused Farha of fabricating stories and implied that she was a terrorist sympathizer, bent on smearing Egypt”.

The Times said “such defensive, conspiratorial talk is standard fare on Egypt’s television stations, which are heavily influenced by (Egyptian President) el-Sisi’s government. And it has seeped down into the street.

The United Nations currently has 38 Rapporteurs or independent experts appointed by the Human Rights Council in Geneva to investigate violations of the legitimate political, economic and legal rights of individuals and minorities worldwide going as far back as 1982.

These fact-finding missions, undertaken by UN Rapporteurs, cover a wide range of issues, including investigations into torture, extra-judicial killings, arbitrary executions, involuntary disappearances, racism, xenophobia, modern day slavery and the abuse of the rights of migrants and indigenous peoples.

Urmila Bhoola of South Africa, Special Rapporteur on Contemporary Forms of Slavery, told IPS she has visited Niger, Belgium, Nigeria, El Salvador, Mauritania, Paraguay and, lastly Italy, in October 2018.

She pointed out that “country visits are only conducted upon invitation from governments”.

“I have issued requests for country-visits to many countries but due to the mandate’s name and focus, member states are often reluctant to invite the mandate on contemporary forms of slavery, to conduct a visit”.

In this sense, she pointed out, member states may not openly refuse a visit but may not reply to country visit requests.

According to the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, member states generally cooperate with the independent human rights experts in the Special Procedures of the Human Rights Council.

The number of States that have never received a visit by a mandate holder has diminished to 22. And the number of States that have issued a ‘standing invitation’ to Special Procedures has now reached 120 Member States and 1 non-Member Observer State.

Some States receive more than one visit per year. Each year, on average, Special Procedures conduct around 80 visits to different States.

At this time, said a spokesperson, “ we have not been notified of any changes concerning cooperation with Special Procedures by the United States’ Permanent Mission here in Geneva. Indeed, they have been in contact with several mandate holders recently”.

In December, 2017 the Government of Myanmar informed the Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Myanmar that all access to the country has been denied and cooperation withdrawn for the duration of her tenure.

The writer can be contacted at thalifdeen@ips.org

 

US Takes Back Signature on Arms Trade Treaty

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UNITED NATIONS, Apr 29 2019 (IPS) – The United States dropped a political bombshell when President Donald Trump announced his administration would withdraw from the historic Arms Trade Treaty (ATT) which the former Obama administration signed in September 2013.

“We are taking our signature back”, said Trump April 26, addressing a meeting of the National Rifle Association (NRA), one of the most powerful gun lobbies in the US.

The US, in effect, joins three other “rogue states” – North Korea, Iran and Syria – who voted against the treaty at the UN General Assembly back in April 2013, along with 23 countries that abstained on the voting, including China, Russia, India, Indonesia and Saudi Arabia.

Jayantha Dhanapala, a former UN Under-Secretary-General for Disarmament Affairs and ex-President of the Pugwash, told IPS that President Trump “continues to create mayhem in the field of disarmament by wrecking the legal regime created by the international community at the behest of vested interests in the gun lobby sacrificing the humanitarian norms of the world to which the US has contributed.”

The US, which has increasingly shown virtual contempt for multilateralism, has already scuttled the 2015 multilateral nuclear agreement with Iran, refused to participate in the global migration compact, pulled out of the 2015 Paris climate change agreement, abandoned the 12-nation Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) agreement, and revoked the 1987 Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty with Russia.

Dr. Natalie J. Goldring, a Senior Fellow and Adjunct Full Professor with the Security Studies Program in the Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University, told IPS President Trump is pandering to the National Rifle Association yet again.

She said his announcement that the United States is “un-signing” the Arms Trade Treaty is yet another example of this administration’s abdication of responsibility in the arms control sphere.

In the fact sheet announcing this decision, the Trump Administration stated, “The ATT is simply not needed for the United States to engage in responsible arms trade.”

“The Trump Administration has not been engaged in responsible arms trade in any way, shape, or form. There is indisputable evidence that Saudi Arabia, for example, consistently violates international human rights and humanitarian law”.

“But the Trump Administration continues to pursue arms sales agreements with the Saudi regime,” said Dr Goldring, who is also a Visiting Professor of the Practice in the Duke University Washington DC program.

She pointed out that the United States is the world’s largest arms dealer. It’s long past time for the United States to show leadership on the global arms trade, rather than merely treating arms sales as economic transactions, she added.

The ATT, which was adopted by the United Nations in April 2013 and entered into force in December 2014, was initiated by the UK, a NATO ally of the US.

As of last week, the Treaty has 101 state parties with ratifications, and 45 countries which have signed but not ratified.

Responding to questions at a press briefing April 26, UN spokesperson Stephane Dujarric told reporters that the Arms Trade Treaty is the only global instrument aimed at improving transparency and accountability in the international arms trade.

“It is a landmark achievement in the efforts to ensure responsibility in international arms transfers. This is particularly important in present times, when we witness growing international tensions and renewed interest in expanding and modernizing arsenals,” he added.

Credit: Sarah Myers

Rachel Stohl, Managing Director at the Stimson Center and a consultant who helped draft the text of the treaty, said that President Trump has “once again walked away from America’s leadership role in the world and undermined international efforts to reduce human suffering caused by irresponsible and illegal arms transfers”.

In statement released here, Stohl said “Un-signing the Arms Trade Treaty will undermine international peace and security, increase irresponsible and illegal sales of conventional weapons, and harm the American economy”.

A transparent, responsible arms trade fundamentally serves U.S. national security, promotes U.S. foreign policy objectives, and supports American values.

The ATT facilitates transparency and accountability in a global arms trade worth nearly $90 billion a year, building confidence among governments and ending decades of impunity, she declared.

Dr Goldring said the US government regularly claims to have the strongest global standards for arms transfers. Yet it seeks to abandon the only legally binding treaty that addresses these issues.

“This may seem like a symbolic step, because the Trump Administration had already made clear its lack of support for the treaty,” she added.

But this act has substantive implications as well.

It’s in the US interest to be part of the ATT and to work with other countries to increase their standards for importing and exporting weapons, she noted.

‘Unsigning’ the ATT decreases our leverage with these countries. ‘Do as I say, not as I do’ is a cynical and unpersuasive policy approach,” said Dr Goldring who also represents the Acronym Institute at the United Nations on conventional weapons and arms trade issues.

Abby Maxman, President of Oxfam America, said Trump’s decision to un-sign the Arms Trade Treaty “is a reckless, self-inflicted wound that continues to demonstrate the Administration’s desire to turn its back on global norms, standards and US leadership. It is one more misguided step to dismantle the international partnerships that keep us all safe.”

Just last week, the Administration held hostage a UN Security Council resolution to address sexual violence in conflict– until language about the need for sexual & reproductive health services was removed.

And, it’s no coincidence that this comes on the heels of President Trump’s veto of the Yemen War Powers Resolution and continued military support for Saudi Arabia in the war in Yemen, said Maxman.

President Trump is sending a clear message to civilians caught in the crossfire: “we don’t care.”

The United States will now lock arms with Iran, North Korea and Syria as non-signatories to this historic treaty whose sole purpose is to protect innocent people from deadly weapons.

“The Arms Trade Treaty was developed and signed by the US and others to keep deadly weapons out of the hands of those who may use them to commit genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes. The treaty has the power to save millions from death, rape, assault and displacement. Each year an estimated 500,000 people are killed as a result of the unregulated and under-regulated arms trade,” said Maxman.

“The Treaty does not infringe on Americans’ right to bear arms or hamper the country’s ability to defend itself or its allies, despite what groups like the NRA, and the Trump Administration may claim.”

Last week’s announcement, he said, “is an empty play to pander to those who resisted this Treaty from the beginning.”

Meanwhile, in a report released April 29, the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) said total world military expenditure rose to $1,822 billion in 2018, representing an increase of 2.6 per cent from 2017.

The five biggest spenders in 2018 were the United States, China, Saudi Arabia, India and France, which together accounted for 60 per cent of global military spending.

Military spending by the US increased for the first time since 2010, while spending by China grew for the 24th consecutive year. The comprehensive annual update of the SIPRI Military Expenditure Database is accessible from at www.sipri.org.

The report also said that US military spending grew—for the first time since 2010—by 4.6 per cent, to reach $649 billion in 2018.

The US remained by far the largest spender in the world, and spent almost as much on its military in 2018 as the next eight largest-spending countries combined.

‘The increase in US spending was driven by the implementation from 2017 of new arms procurement programmes under the Trump administration,’ said Dr Aude Fleurant, the director of the SIPRI AMEX programme.

Link to ATT Secretariat data on ratification:
https://thearmstradetreaty.org/hyper-images/file/List%20of%20ATT%20States%20Parties%20(alphabetical%20order)(10%20April%202019)/List%20of%20ATT%20States%20Parties%20(alphabetical%20order)(10%20April%202019).pdf

The writer can be contacted at thalifdeen@ips.org

 

Nicaraguans “Will Not Be Silenced”

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A year since Nicaragua spiralled into a socio-political crisis, human rights leaders have called on the country to refrain from violence and uphold the human rights of its citizens. Credit: Eddy López/IPS

UNITED NATIONS, Apr 17 2019 (IPS) – A year since Nicaragua spiralled into a socio-political crisis, human rights leaders have called on the country to refrain from violence and uphold the human rights of its citizens.

In light of blatant, persistent human rights violations, United Nations agencies and human rights groups have urged the Nicaraguan government to halt its brutal crackdown on its citizens.

“Throughout the last year, the government of President Ortega has brutally and repeatedly repressed anyone who dares to stand up to his administration. The Nicaraguan authorities continue to violate the rights to justice, truth and reparation of hundreds of victims, while also preventing civil society organisations and international human rights monitors from working freely in the country,” said Amnesty International’s Americas Director Erika Guevara-Rosas.

“This has got to stop,” she added.

“Violations…coupled with the lack of accountability for unlawful excesses by members of the security forces, have stoked rather than reduced the tensions in the country,” said High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet.

After thousands took to the streets to protest controversial social security reforms in April 2018, demonstrations were quickly met with violence by state security forces and pro-pro-government armed groups.

According to the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, over 300 people have been killed, more than 2,000 injured, and 2,000 arrested.

The Central American country has also since banned all protest and censored media in order to prevent any government criticism.

In December, Nicaraguan police raided TV station 100% Noticias and arrested station director Miguel Mora and news director Lucia Pineda Ubau, both of whom are being held on charges of “inciting hate and violence.”

At least 300 others, including human rights defenders, face charges of terrorism.

The High Commissioner particularly expressed concern over reports of torture and ill-treatment of detainees, including recent reports of authorities beating and using dogs and tear gas on detained protestors in La Modelo prison.

Government police and shock troops besiege a protest by medical students trying to organise on Sept. 12 in the city of León, 90 km west of Managua. Credit: Eddy López/IPS

As major protests are expected to mark the anniversary of the start of the crisis later this week, many fear another violent reaction.

The targeting of dissidents and protestors have prompted a massive exodus as an estimated 60,000 people have fled to neighbouring countries, including Costa Rica.

Among those seeking asylum are students, opposition figures, journalists, doctors, human rights defenders and farmers.

According to the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR), many families are taking extreme measures to cross the border after being persecuted or receiving threats making it “overwhelmingly a refugee flow.”

After several attempted attacks and being informed that he was wanted “dead or alive,” Manuel left his banana plantations and fled to Costa Rica with his pregnant wife Andrea and their two children.

“We lived with the anxiety of not knowing when they would break into the house to get us…I’m sure if I go home they will hurt me,” Manuel told UNHCR.

Taking great lengths to avoid police, Manuel took a small boat along the Pacific Coast while Andrea walked through a back route of muddy fields with the children.

While they are now safe in the neighbouring country, Manuel and Andrea’s children are still haunted by their last days in Nicaragua where they were hunted by gun-carrying men in uniform.

“My youngest son hugs me every time he sees the Costa Rican police because they look like the officials who attacked us. He hugs me and says that he takes care of his daddy,” Manuel said.

While the Nicaraguan government and the opposition Civic Alliance for Justice and Democracy negotiated two pacts, including one on the release of detained protestors, the agreements have still yet to be implemented in its entirety and further negotiations have stalled.

“The fact that the negotiations have come to a standstill and the Government is not honouring the agreements reached so far, is undermining the possibility of establishing a genuine inclusive dialogue to solve the serious social, political and human rights crisis facing the country,” Bachelet said.

“A solution to the crisis must address the institutional flaws and strengthen the rule of law…it is of paramount importance that a thorough and transparent accountability process is established to ensure justice, truth and reparations, as well as a clear guarantee of non-repetition,” she added, highlighting the need to put victims of human rights violations at the heart of negotiations.

Guevara-Rosas urged the government to respect the public’s rights including the right to assembly, stating: “The Nicaraguan government must put an immediate end to its strategy of repression and release all the students, activists and journalists detained solely for exercising their rights to freedom of expression and peaceful assembly….the brave people of Nicaragua will not be silenced.”

 

Why the Prosecution of Julian Assange is Troubling for Press Freedom

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Opinion

Alex Ellerbeck* is North America Program Coordinator at the Committee to Protect Journalists & Avi Asher-Schapiro* is North America Research Associate

NEW YORK, Apr 16 2019 (IPS) – After a seven-year standoff at the Ecuadorean embassy in London, British police last week arrested WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange–a development press freedom advocates had long feared.

For years, journalists and press freedom advocates worried the U.S. would prosecute Assange under the Espionage Act for the publication of classified information, a scenario that potentially would have set a devastating legal precedent for U.S. news organizations that regularly publish such material.

During the Obama administration, officials ultimately said they would not prosecute because of the possible consequences for press freedom.

It was unclear whether the Trump administration would have the same compunction: while Trump praised WikiLeaks, then-CIA Director Mike Pompeo labeled it a “non-state hostile intelligence service.”

Trump has shown little concern for freedom of the press, once allegedly urging then-FBI Director James Comey to jail journalists. (In response to news of Assange’s arrest, Trump said he would leave it to the Justice Department).

In this context, the charge on which Assange was arrested seemed modest: A single count of conspiracy (with former Army Pfc. Chelsea Manning) to “commit computer intrusion” under the U.S. Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, with a maximum penalty of five years.

Unlike the publication of classified information, hacking computers is not a tool for reporters. Some journalists were quick to point out this out.

“[The] charge here is attempting to help crack a password to steal classified material. Didn’t work but would news orgs do that? (Not in my experience.),” said Greg Miller, a national security reporter at The Washington Post, said on Twitter.

But press freedom advocates, and some journalists, have not expressed relief based on the indictment. A host of organizations, including CPJ, spoke out against the prosecution. Here’s why:

(1) The indictment is flimsy and could simply be a pretext to punish Assange for publishing classified information.

The diplomatic time and resources expended between three countries to detain Assange strikes some observers as disproportionate to the single computer misuse charge.

The indictment is vague about the exact nature of the aid Assange allegedly provided Manning in the course of their interaction, but it does not appear that Assange successfully hacked any password.

Even if his attempts were successful, they would have helped Manning cover her tracks, but not let her break into a system to which she didn’t already have access.

Prosecutors have wide range of latitude; it’s worth remembering that the Obama administration likely had all the same information, but declined to pursue an indictment.

Matthew Miller, a former Justice Department spokesperson in the Obama administration, told The New York Times that he thought the charge was justified but “This is not the world’s strongest case.”

So, is it just a pretext on the part of the U.S. government to punish Assange for the publication of classified information — a practice that should be constitutionally protected? The issue comes in a time of heightened concern for investigative journalists and national security reporters.

Since the September 11 attacks, the government has increasingly classified large amounts of material and punished those who share it with the press. CPJ has written extensively about the chilling effect of this crackdown on reporting in the public interest.

“Given the nature of the charge — a discussion 9 years ago about an unsuccessful attempt to figure out a password — I think it’s fair to debate whether this is a fig leaf for the government punishing someone for publishing stuff it doesn’t want published,” tweeted Scott Shane, a national security reporter for The New York Times.

“If it wasn’t Julian Assange, it would be very unlikely you’d see this prosecution,” Cindy Cohn, executive director of the Electronic Frontier Foundation, told CPJ. “This is what over-broad discretion in prosecution does, it gives them a pretext for going after people they don’t like.”

(2) The charge could be a placeholder, with more to come.

Another reason why the charge may seem so modest: It could be the first of several. Last week, CNN cited U.S. officials promising additional charges against Assange. The press freedom implications of any future charges could be significant–especially if they involve the Espionage Act.

“It may be part of a larger case,” Ben Wizner the director of the American Civil Liberties Union, told CPJ. The current indictment already cites the Espionage Act and describes the cracking of a password as part of a conspiracy to violate it.

The DOJ’s legal strategy could be to pile on more charges after Assange is extradited. The extradition treaty between the U.S. and the U.K. says an individual can only be charged for the “offense for which extradition was granted” or similar offenses, but it also stipulates how governments can waive this rule.

Assange has an extradition hearing on May 2, which gives the U.S. government time to develop new charges.

(3) The language of the case seems to criminalize normal journalistic activities.

While the charge against Assange relates to the alleged conspiracy to hack a password, the language of the indictment sweeps in a broad range of legally protected and common journalistic activity.

Count 20 of the indictment states, “It was part of the conspiracy that Assange encouraged Manning to provide information and records from departments and agencies of the United States.”

The indictment goes on to characterize a number of journalistic practices as part of a criminal conspiracy, including use of a secure message service, use of a cloud-based drop box, and efforts to cover Manning’s tracks.

The cultivation of sources and the use of encryption and other means to protect those sources are essential to investigative journalism. While the government may include these details to show intent or to describe the means and context for the alleged criminal action, they seem to go beyond what is necessary.

Barton Gellman, who led The Washington Post’s Pulitzer Prize-winning reporting on the Snowden documents, told CPJ, “If asking questions and protecting a source are cast as circumstantial evidence of guilt, we’ll be crossing a dangerous line.”

“A lot of the way the crime is described here could be applied to other journalists,” Wizner, at the ACLU, told CPJ. “If the government wanted to just target the attempted intrusion, they could have written a very different complaint.”

(4) The Computer Fraud and Abuse Act is incredibly broad.

In all of the concern over the Espionage Act, journalists may not have sufficiently raised alarm over the law under which the U.S. charged Assange: the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA). “Thinking we should breathe a sigh of relief because it was the CFAA instead of the Espionage act is premature.” Cohn, of Electronic Frontier Foundation, told CPJ.

The CFAA carries its own set of free expression issues. While it encompasses clearly illegal behavior like hacking, it also criminalizes “unauthorized access to a computer.”

Manning was prosecuted under the CFAA in addition to the Espionage Act, but prosecuting a publisher under the under the CFAA for conspiracy in obtaining the classified information could potentially create a dangerous legal model.

While reporters do not conspire to decrypt passwords, they are often aware of, and might actively discuss with sources, activities that could fall under the broad frame of “unauthorized access.”

As the Cato Institute’s Julian Sanchez wrote on Twitter, “The way ‘helping to hack’ is being charged is as a conspiracy to violate 18 USC §1030 (a)(1) [of the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act]. And good reporters conspire with their sources to do that constantly.”

“For almost every reporter working with a source, the source is providing information in digital form. Anyone who is working with a source who obtained that info in a way that they weren’t supposed to has a CFAA risk,” Cohn said.

She added that any journalists who don’t think there are broader press freedom implications to the Assange prosecution are “whistling past the graveyard.”

(5) Ecuador’s withdrawal of asylum raises questions.

Assange’s arrest came after Ecuador withdrew his asylum protection. In a tweet on April 11, Ecuadorean President Lenin Moreno said the decision came after Assange’s “repeated violations to international conventions and daily-life protocols.”

In a video statement accompanying the tweet, he cited Assange’s repeated “intervening in the internal affairs of other states” via WikiLeaks publications.

Ecuador had previously restricted Assange’s access to the internet based on allegations that he was interfering in U.S. elections and in the referendum for Catalan independence from Spain.

While Assange’s unusual presence in a diplomatic mission created tensions–both inside the embassy and in Ecuador’s broader international relations–withdrawing asylum is an extreme measure, and one that could have troubling implications if it was done in response to publishing.

*Alexandra Ellerbeck, CPJ’s North America program coordinator, previously worked at Freedom House and was a Fulbright teaching fellow at the State University of Pará in Brazil. She has lived in Chile, Bolivia, and Brazil.

*Asher-Schapiro is CPJ’s research associate for North America. He is a former staffer at VICE News, International Business Times, and Tribune Media, and an independent investigative reporter who has published in outlets including The Atlantic, The Intercept, and The New York Times.

 

Hard Battle Ahead for Independent Arab Media

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Civil Society, Crime & Justice, Democracy, Featured, Global, Headlines, Human Rights, Press Freedom, TerraViva United Nations

Opinion

This article is part of a series on the current state of civil society organisations (CSOs), the focus of International Civil Society Week (ICSW), sponsored by CIVICUS, which concluded in Belgrade, April 12

 
Mouna Ben Garga is an Innovation Officer with CIVICUS, a global alliance of civil society organisations.

TUNIS, Apr 12 2019 (IPS) – Sometimes a peak into the future reminds us just how stuck we are in the past and present.

It was the talk of the Middle East’s largest annual media industry gathering: a robot journalist – the region’s first – that wowed some 3,000 industry leaders and practitioners at the Arab Media Forum (AMF) in Dubai recently.

In an address titled “Future News Anchors”, the robot, known as A20-50, waxed lyrical about robots that would report ‘tirelessly’ all day, every day and be programmed to do any task.

At a conference organised around the theme, “Arab Media: From Now to The Future”, it was ironic that journalism produced by programmed automatons was held up as a glimpse of what the future held for media in the Arab world.

Ironic because, considering the state of journalism in the Middle East, it doesn’t sound as much like the future as the region’s present and past.

Looking at news output in this polarized landscape, it often seems that journalists (and their organisations) are like robots, programmed to produce and promote certain political agendas ‘tirelessly’, all day, every day.

From Egypt to Kuwait, most news outlets support specific positions, usually those espoused by the companies or organisations that own or control them – often either toeing the official line or supporting rival agendas or political opposition.

Following the 2013 coup in Egypt and the civil wars in Syria, Yemen and Libya over the past decade, the pro-government media used the fear of instability and war to silence citizens and twist the facts.

For instance, the Egyptian mainstream media convinced its audience that the 2013 massacre of more than 900 people in Cairo was the only way to fight against terrorism.

In the context of the Middle Eastern media coverage of the killing of the Saudi journalist Khashoggi, both Al-Jazeera and Al-Arabiya television channels took up positions in front of the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul and resumed the fierce row between Qatar and Saudi Arabia, from there.

The truth was lost in this fierce political conflict and the Arab viewer had to cross-check the presented facts with other international reporting. This implicit bias and lack of balance polarized Arab public opinion and pushed news consumers to social media in search of trusted factual information, crushing the credibility in traditional media.

And when they aren’t busy working to manipulate bias in news coverage, Arab authorities are old hands at plain old media repression. Not surprisingly, nations in the Middle East and North Africa again find themselves at the bottom of Reporters Without Borders’ World Press Freedom Index of 2018.

Across the region, journalists and media organisations are under attack for their reporting – from intimidation to arrests, detention, prosecution and the shuttering of outlets. Four Arab countries – Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and Syria – top the list of the world’s worst jailers of journalists ,according to the 2018 press freedom report by the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ).

Egypt jailed the most number of journalists on “false news” charges – 19, amid heightened global rhetoric about so-called fake news; The murder of exiled Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi by Saudi agents in the country’s Instanbul consulate illustrated the extreme lengths the Gulf kingdom’s leaders would go to stop published criticism.

And in Syria, 13 journalists were killed in 2017, and more than 40 journalists and citizen-journalists are currently detained, kidnapped or have disappeared.

In this complex context of divisions, repression and lack of public trust, the future of trustworthy Arab media is in the hands of alternative media, journalists’ unity and active citizens.

Since the Arab spring, independent journalism platforms such as Daraj, Nawaat in Tunisia, and Beirut-based Raseef22 have emerged, offering alternative narratives that counter state propaganda and mainstream media self-censorship.

But the challenges for these organisations are their limited reach – many mainstream news consumers consider them elitist and targeting “intellectual” users – and their financial sustainability.

The key here is inclusivity. One of the most successful news outlets is AJ+ Arabic, a project that grew out of Al Jazeera’s Incubation and Innovation Group, focusing exclusively on social platforms targeting millennials.

The other major challenge – financial survival – calls for new, sustainable journalism business models developed around new forms of storytelling and original content production supported by creative funding approaches including crowdfunding and data sales or services, for example.

Empowering citizen journalism is another possible solution to producing independent media in the Arab world. Indeed, citizen journalists, young bloggers, and active tweeps are not governed by the same relationship between the state and media professionals and are authentic voices and channels to the Arab street – they speak its language and represent its concerns and challenges.

Alternative media leaders need to build the citizen capacity beyond data collection and reporting to include online security, storytelling and counter-narratives. Increasing the transfer of these savoir-faire to citizens would amplify more voices to tackle the polarization effect through facts.

But of course, there is a place in the future of quality Arab media for professional journalism. Professional bodies have a role to play in fight for press freedom in the region.

Local unions have to wage numerous battles for their own independence through advocating for better legislation that affords greater protection to reporters and that prohibits prosecutions for reporting.

They have to promote the development of more journalistic organisations and more actively resist government attempts to contain and control the media by positioning themselves as defenders of free, independent media, creating strong alliances with alternative media, citizens journalists and social media influencers.

They need to be inclusive to promote a positive narrative about the role of the media in citizens’ lives and bridge the social gap between journalists and the general public to increase support for stronger independent media.

As a major regional proxy war rages on in the region, dominating headlines and geopolitical agendas, the battle for a future independent Arab media that is trusted and trustworthy, is one that seeks to do away with robotic journalists and organisations programmed only to serve the interests of the powerful.