Wikileaks Documentary Makers Accuse Assange of Censorship
BY BRENDA COUGHLIN, YONI GOLIJOV AND LAURA POITRAS ON 6/16/17 AT 10:22 AM
We are the producers of Risk , a documentary film about Julian Assange and WikiLeaks. We unequivocally defend WikiLeaks’ journalistic right to publish true and newsworthy information.
The Trump administration’s threats against WikiLeaks and attacks on press freedom are chilling. As Margaret Sullivan recently argued in the Washington Post, prosecuting WikiLeaks under the Espionage Act would set a dangerous precedent for all journalists.
We were disturbed, however, to learn that Julian Assange and WikiLeaks sent cease and desist letters to our distributors demanding they stop the release of Risk : “We therefore demand that you immediately cease the use and distribution of all images of the Named Participants and that you desist from this or any other infringement of the rights of the Named Participants in the future.”
In WikiLeaks’ efforts to prevent the distribution of Risk , they are using the very tactics often used against them – legal threats, false security claims, underhanded personal attacks, misdirection – and with the same intentions: to suppress information and silence speech.
Since 2016, Assange and his lawyers have repeatedly demanded that we remove scenes from the film in which Assange speaks about the two women who made sexual assault allegations against him in 2010 and Sweden’s investigation which has since been discontinued.
In response to our refusal to remove these scenes, Assange and his lawyers are now claiming that Risk threatens the safety of the staff who consented to being filmed, and furthermore, that we are being sexist by including Assange’s own comments about women in the film.
more
http://www.newsweek.com/wikileaks-documentary-makers-accuse-assange-censorship-626613
= new reply since forum marked as read
