How exactly you would classify Wikileaks can make all the difference in the world. So what happened in the UK’s information tribunal today is important.



But the UK’s information tribunal, headed by judge Andrew Bartlett QC, in a summary and ruling published on Thursday on a freedom of information case, says explicitly: “WikiLeaks is a media organisation which publishes and comments upon censored or restricted official materials involving war, surveillance or corruption, which are leaked to it in a variety of different circumstances.” The comment is made under a heading that says simply: “Facts”. ...The definition of WikiLeaks by the information tribunal, which is roughly equivalent to a court, could help Assange’s defence against extradition on press freedom grounds.

“WikiLeaks walks like a hostile intelligence service and talks like a hostile intelligence service. It has encouraged its followers to find jobs at CIA in order to obtain intelligence... And it overwhelmingly focuses on the United States, while seeking support from anti-democratic countries and organisations...It is time to call out WikiLeaks for what it really is – a non-state hostile intelligence service often abetted by state actors like Russia.”

- Mike Pompeo, the director of the CIA

The US has been considering prosecution of Assange since 2010 when WikiLeaks published hundreds of thousands of confidential US defence and diplomatic documents. US attorney general Jeff Sessions said in April this year that the arrest of Assange is a priority for the US.

The director of the CIA, Mike Pompeo, after leaks of emails from the US Democratic party and from Hillary Clinton, described WikiLeaks as “a non-state hostile intelligence service often abetted by state actors like Russia”. He added Assange is not covered by the US constitution, which protects journalists.

Given the breakdown of the Rule of Law in the United States, it is unlikely that Assange would get a fair trial here (or maybe no trial at all). However, he now has a real chance of beating extradition to the U.S. under British law.

Sweden dropped his arrest warrant seven months ago.



However, police in London said they would still be obliged to arrest him if he left.

The Metropolitan Police Service (MPS) said Mr Assange still faced the lesser charge of failing to surrender to a court, an offence punishable by up to a year in prison or a fine.

But the UK has not commented on whether it has received an extradition request from the US, where Mr Assange could face trial over the leaking of hundreds of thousands of secret US military and diplomatic documents.

Britain has spent at least 12 million pounds policing the Ecuador embassy.

Assange is an easy person to dislike. Even many of his long-time supporters have distanced themselves from him.

Nevertheless, prosecuting Assange and Wikileaks for doing what it was created to do is dangerous.



But if the US Department of Justice prosecutes Assange, as it reportedly may soon, he could become something else: the first journalist in modern history to be criminally charged by American courts for publishing classified information. WikiLeaks may not look like a traditional journalism outlet, but it shares the same ends—publishing true information from its sources. And that means legal action against Assange could threaten the freedom of the press as a whole. "Any prosecution would be incredibly dangerous for the First Amendment and pretty much every reporter in the United States," says Trevor Timm, executive director of the Freedom of the Press Foundation. "You can hate WikiLeaks all you want, but if they’re prosecuted, that precedent can be turned around and used on all the reporters you do like."

...

“Never in the history of this country has a publisher been prosecuted for presenting truthful information to the public," ACLU attorney Ben Wizner, who has defended NSA leaker Edward Snowden, writes in a statement to WIRED. "Any prosecution of WikiLeaks for publishing government secrets would set a dangerous precedent that the Trump administration would surely use to target other news organizations.”

It would be supremely ironic for Democrats to get their wish, of punishing Assange for releasing the DNC emails, while also denouncing Trump's attacks on the news media. You can't separate the two things.

Wikileaks is currently under four different official investigations.