Audio of last week's conference at the centre of a defamation row involving The Australian and a Twitter user proves that much of the information tweeted was actually said.

The audio, obtained by the ABC, captures former Australian newspaper journalist Asa Wahlquist speaking about the trials of reporting on climate change while working at the News Limited-owned paper.

Her comments, in which she describes her experience at The Australian as "excruciating", were retweeted by journalism academic Julie Posetti.

The Australian's editor-in-chief Chris Mitchell has denied the allegations and threatened to sue Ms Posetti for defamation, saying that he believes new media should not be exempt from the "normal laws of the land".

In the audio, recorded by freelance journalism researcher Jolyon Sykes at the journalism conference in Sydney, Wahlquist can be heard saying that she had worked at The Australian for 14 years as a rural journalist.

"Climate change, of course, was a part of what I covered. It was absolutely excruciating. It was torture. There's no other way to put it," she said.

This comment seems to match a tweet made by Ms Posetti which read: "'It was absolutely excruciating. It was torture': Asa Wahlquist on fleeing The Australian after being stymied in covering #climate".

In the audio, Wahlquist then went on to describe Mitchell as taking a "political view" on climate change.

"It took me quite a while to realise that my editor at The Australian, editor-in-chief Chris Mitchell, was taking a political view and he goes down the eco fascist line," she said.

"He sees climate change as being a political movement that the left has now adopted that will, aims to destroy everything that he loves and values."

She went on to say that it was "really debilitating".

Ms Posetti tweeted: "Wahlquist:'Chris Mitchell (Oz Ed) goes down the Eco-Fascist line' on #climatechange.' I left because I just couldn't do it anymore".

Wahlquist also described her experience of reporting in the lead-up to the election.

"The other thing that was happening at The Australian before I left was the editor-in-chief and the edits becoming much more prescriptive and you saw that in the lead-up to the election, where you were actually being told what to write," she said.

Ms Posetti tweeted: "Wahlquist: 'In the lead up to the election the Ed in Chief was increasingly telling me what to write.' It was prescriptive."

In an article published on The Australian website on Friday, Mitchell rejects the allegations and said that Wahlquist also denied making the comments.

"Asa may or may not have said what the tweeter alleges. She denies to me that she did. But either way, the allegations are a lie and Asa has admitted as much," he said.

"There is not protection from the law in repeating accurately allegations falsely made. Asa works from home and I have neither seen her nor spoken to her in years, as anyone on the paper would attest."

Mitchell said he contacted Wahlquist after the tweets were made and he sent her an email saying he had "never spoken" to her about any of her stories.

"Indeed, I have not spoken to you in at least eight years. And I have never stood over people writing stories in 19 years as an editor," he said.