The treachery of Julian Assange | Nick Cohen

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You did not have to listen for too long to Julian Assange's half-educated condemnations of the American "military-industrial complex" to know that he was aching to betray better and braver people than he could ever be.

As soon as WikiLeaks received the State Department cables, Assange announced that the opponents of dictatorial regimes and movements were fair game. That the targets of the Taliban, for instance, were fighting a clerical-fascist force, which threatened every good liberal value, did not concern him. They had spoken to US diplomats. They had collaborated with the great Satan. Their safety was not his concern.

David Leigh and Luke Harding's history of WikiLeaks describes how journalists took Assange to Moro's, a classy Spanish restaurant in central London. A reporter worried that Assange would risk killing Afghans who had co-operated with American forces if he put US secrets online without taking the basic precaution of removing their names. "Well, they're informants," Assange replied. "So, if they get killed, they've got it coming to them. They deserve it." A silence fell on the table as the reporters realised that the man the gullible hailed as the pioneer of a new age of transparency was willing to hand death lists to psychopaths. They persuaded Assange to remove names before publishing the State Department Afghanistan cables. But Assange's disillusioned associates suggest that the failure to expose "informants" niggled in his mind.

It is hard to believe now, but honest people once worked for WikiLeaks for all the right reasons. Like me, they saw the site as a haven; a protected space where writers could publish stories that authoritarian censors and libel lawyers would otherwise have suppressed.

James Ball joined and thought that in his own small way he was making the world a better place. He realised that WikiLeaks was not what it seemed when an associate of Assange – a stocky man with a greying moustache, who called himself "Adam" – asked if he could pull out everything the State Department documents "had on the Jews". Ball discovered that "Adam" was Israel Shamir, a dangerous crank who uses six different names as he agitates among the antisemitic groups of the far right and far left. As well as signing up to the conspiracy theories of fascism, Shamir was happy to collaborate with Belarus's decayed Brezhnevian dictatorship. Leftwing tyranny, rightwing tyranny, as long as it was anti-western and anti-Israel, Shamir did not care.

Nor did Assange. He made Shamir WikiLeaks's representative in Russia and eastern Europe. Shamir praised the Belarusian dictatorship. He compared the pro-democracy protesters beaten and imprisoned by the KGB to football hooligans. On 19 December 2010, the Belarus-Telegraf, a state newspaper, said that WikiLeaks had allowed the dictatorship to identify the "organisers, instigators and rioters, including foreign ones" who had protested against rigged elections.

The proof of Assange and Shamir's treachery was strong but not conclusive. Given Shamir's history, there were reasonable grounds for fearing the worst. But even now, you cannot show beyond reasonable doubt that the state has charged this pro-democracy politician or that liberal artist with treason or collaborating with a foreign power because WikiLeaks named names.

One can say with certainty, however, that Assange's involvement with Shamir is enough to discredit his claim that he published the documents in full because my colleagues on the Guardian inadvertently revealed a link to a site he was meant to have taken down. WikiLeaks put the cables on the web last month with evident relish, and ever since I have been wondering who would be its first incontrovertible victim. China appeared a promising place to look. The authorities and pro-regime newspapers are going through the names of hundreds of dissidents and activists from ethnic minorities. To date, there have been no arrests, although in China, as elsewhere, the chilling effect WikiLeaks has spread has caused critics of the communists to bite their tongues.

In Ethiopia, however, Assange has already claimed his first scalp. Argaw Ashine fled the country last week after WikiLeaks revealed that the reporter had spoken to an official from the American embassy in Addis Ababa about the regime's plans to intimidate the independent press. WikiLeaks also revealed that a government official told Arshine about the planned assault on opposition journalists. Thus Assange and his colleagues not only endangered the journalist. They tipped off the cops that he had a source in the state apparatus.

Once we have repeated Orwell's line that "so much of leftwing thought is a kind of playing with fire by people who don't even know that fire is hot", there is work to do. First, there needs to be relentless pressure on the socialist socialites and haggard soixante-huitards who cheered Assange on. Bianca Jagger, Jemima Khan, John Pilger, Ken Loach and their like are fond of the egotistical slogan "not in my name." They are well-heeled and well-padded men and women who know no fear in their lives. Yet they are happy to let their names be used by Assange as he brings fear into the lives of others.

We need also to question the motives of the wider transparency movement. Anti-Americanism is one of its driving inspirations and helps explain its perfidies. If you believe that the American "military-industrial complex", Europe or Israel is the sole or main source of oppression, it is too easy to dismiss the victims of regimes whose excesses cannot be blamed on the west. Assange's former colleagues tell me that the infantile leftism of the 2000s is not the end of it. Never forget, they say, that Assange came from a backwater Queensland city named Townsville. He's a small-town boy desperate to make the world notice.

The grass or squealer usually blabs because he wants to settle scores or ingratiate himself with the authorities. Assange represents a new breed, which technology has enabled: the nark as show-off. The web made Assange famous. It allows him to monitor his celebrity – I am told that even the smallest blogpost about him rarely escapes his attention. When he sees that the audience is tiring, the web provides him with the means to publish new secrets and generate new headlines. Under the cover of holding power to account, Assange can revel in the power the web gives to put lives in danger and ensure he can be what he always wanted: the centre of attention.

Julian Assange autobiography: why he didn't want it published

AppId is over the quota AppId is over the quota  Julian Assange, the founder of WikiLeaks, disowned his 'unauthorised' autobiography on its day of publication. Photograph: Leon Neal/AFP/Getty Images
It started out as a dream £1.2m publishing contract, with a vision of many millions to be made for all parties in worldwide book sales and film deals. But Julian Assange: the Unauthorised Autobiography – as the Canongate publishing director, Nick Davies, titled the book jacket – has turned out to be something of a nightmare, threatening the hoped-for profit bonanza.
There are not many autobiographies whose subject angrily disowns it on publication day, as Assange did, when he revealed that the manuscript had in fact been penned and handed over by someone else: in this case, ghostwriter Andrew O'Hagan, who had hoped to keep his role quiet. The founder of WikiLeaks upheld his reputation for 360-degree belligerence by claiming that he had been "screwed over to make a buck" by an opportunist publisher whom he had tried to injunct.
To complete the picture of acrimony, Assange went on to publicly denounce his former lawyers, claiming they were sitting on his publishers' advance of £412,000, which they were holding to cover their legal fees. Assange's allegations of "extreme overcharging" were rapidly denied by the London media firm of Finers, Stephens, Innocent (FSI).
The saga of Assange's memoirs began last year, when after co-operating with the Guardian and the New York Times to publish a series of huge electronic leaks he had obtained of US military material he was arrested in London, wanted for extradition and questioning by Swedish authorities about claims of sexual assault from two women in Stockholm.
A book deal was drawn up and clinched by the London literary agent Caroline Michel, under which Canongate, the innovative Scottish firm run by Jamie Byng, and the US publishers Knopf agreed to pay £600,000 and $800,000 respectively for the rights, with Knopf paying $250,000 (£162,000) in advance. Canongate also agreed to pay upfront O'Hagan's ghostwriting fee, believed to exceed £100,000.
Assange already seemed to have the possibility in mind that he might withdraw from the deal. Sources close to the Canongate negotiations say he demanded a deal that he could keep £125,000 of the advance whatever happened. Byng laughed this out of court, responding according to correspondence seen by the Guardian: "We cannot accept … the idea that regardless of whether Julian delivers (or regardless of what he delivers or regardless of when he delivers), he will keep £125,000."
Canongate also negotiated a crucial loophole in the contract, which it was eventually to invoke. It would pay Assange £250,000 immediately on signature of the deal, as the publisher's share of the first tranche of the advance.
But it said: "If … the manuscript has not been delivered by the prescribed date or its final form is not acceptable to the Publisher, the Publisher has the right to decide whether to continue to publish the Work. If the Publisher decides to continue to publish the Work the Proprietor agrees that all typescript or notes relevant to the said Work shall belong to the Publisher."
With this reassurance, the publishers on both sides of the Atlantic wrote Assange large cheques and O'Hagan set to work, recording hours of reminiscences from Assange, throughout the winter, at the chilly country premises of Captain Vaughn Smith, owner of the journalists' Frontline Club in London, who had guaranteed to supervise Assange while he was on bail.
The money went into the client account for the Assange defence fund, administered by solicitor Mark Stephens, who was conducting Assange's criminal defence. Assange now claims he thought he was getting the services of top QCs and solicitors pro bono. But FSI, which says only the initial advice tendered was free, eventually put in bills that in total are reported to exceed the advance. Stephens, who made spirited speeches on the courtroom steps in defence of Assange, says: "No single person at FSI believes that Julian was overcharged."
But the row over money appears to have played a crucial role in the implosion of the book project. All sources agree that O'Hagan did his job diligently and produced a draft manuscript by March, as required. But Assange refused to sign off on it. Some sources suggest that, after failing to sell the Hollywood film rights to his memoirs, Assange realised that all future payments on the book would be swallowed up by his lawyers. If, on the other hand, he had no visible assets, his legal representatives could whistle for their money.
Assange himself, according to the statements he put out, denies this. He claims he was "not in a position to dedicate my full attention to a book" in view of his upcoming fight against extradition. He also claims that he was willing to renegotiate a delivery date. Canongate firmly rejects these claims, insisting that Assange would never confirm in writing his agreement to any new delivery date. The publisher says that even a week before it put out the unauthorised version, it gave Assange a final chance to fulfil his side of the bargain.
Both Canongate and Knopf were in a painful position. Knopf has now cancelled its contract, and the Assange camp will not respond to claims that Knopf wants its $250,000 back, other than to say it is sitting in the FSI legal account. Canongate, £350,000 out of pocket on the advance and the ghostwriter fees, had intended to recoup all its money and more besides, by sales deals with 38 foreign publishers. Had it not published, there would have been a large hole in its finances. As it is, many of the foreign deals are now in jeopardy and will have to be renegotiated. Only two are reported to have firmly signed up so far to the new "unauthorised" book. One publishing source says: "The economic climate of the deal has certainly altered for Canongate." One benefit for the publisher, however, is that under the get-out clause in the contract it will no longer be obliged to pay the second and third tranche of the advance – a saving of £350,000. Canongate has, however, promised to pay Assange any royalties he is due after the paid-out advances have been recouped.
One of the problems Canongate faces in this extraordinary literary imbroglio is that the book it has put out will be criticised for its inadequacy and, in some cases, the manuscript's errors. Owing to the secrecy with which copies were dumped out to bookshops, there appears to have been only a limited process of factchecking. The book appears to stop abruptly late last year, before Assange had even published his final batch of leaks in the form of the US diplomatic cables. It does not deal with major aspects of Assange's career, such as his breach with his former partner at WikiLeaks, Daniel Domscheit-Berg. Assange himself is criticising it on the sidelines for being an erroneous and unchecked manuscript. Canongate themselves describe it as a "draft" rather than a completed work.
Some observers still believe that Assange stands to make a small fortune from his eventual royalties. The book itself will certainly find a sale among WikiLeaks aficionados around the world. Its account of the Swedish sex allegations against him, still to be resolved, contains new hints that the young women who complained about him were "neurotic", "vague" or had a mysterious hostile agenda. His references to the "hardcore feminism" he suffered from in Sweden will ignite controversy again, weeks before British appeal judges are due to rule on his continued attempt to fight extradition.
A sizeable proportion of the manuscript is devoted to attacks on media organisations with which he formerly co-operated, including the Guardian. These too, are accused of "double-crossing" him. Guardian reporters are characterised as "weaklings with a crush" rather than "men of action and principle", and on one occasion are described as "lily-livered gits in glass offices".
The former editor of the New York Times, Bill Keller, is the target of special ire for his allegedly unco-operative attitude, described as "a moral pygmy with a self-justifying streak the size of the San Andreas fault". Assange writes: "The cock crowed three times and Bill Keller shamelessly denied us."
Assange denies the disclosure made in the Guardian's previously published book, that he once said US informants in Afghanistan "deserved to die". He now maintains he was merely quoting an attitude held by some unnamed others. He is silent on accusations made against him that he associates with antisemitic propagandists. He is also silent on some of the details of the sex allegations, particularly the accusation that he had sex without a condom against a woman's wishes. He does admit, however, that he may be seen as "cold" and a "chauvinist pig" by some people.
It is likely that this week's publication will represent a unique publishing melodrama. But it is yet to be seen whether Canongate can turn it into adequate sums of cash.

The Revolution Will Be Digitised by Heather Brooke - review

AppId is over the quota AppId is over the quota  'A force of nature in journalism': Heather Brooke. Photograph: Antonio Olmos
Heather Brooke is a force of nature in journalism. She instinctively knows the enemy: power, with its attendant bureaucracy closing ranks to keep secrets safe. She knocked it flat as she first prised out the details of MPs' expenses. Now, laptop in hand, she sets out to explore and exploit the wonders of the worldwide web; a place where information can roam infinitely free, the great modern battlefield for reporters, governments, lawyers. She pushes forward, explaining and deploying the new gambits of evolving technology.
But even the formidable Ms Brooke learns complex things as she researches along, finding kindred community spirits among hackers from Iceland to California. And the most complex thing of all is the man who dominates the action: the incredible (and incredibly annoying) Julian Assange. Brooke hasn't set out to write just another inside account of the WikiLeaks saga: this is a melange of anecdote, imagination and experience designed to open our eyes to the possibilities of digital change. But Assange, rumpled, tetchy, inspirational, often objectionable, keeps barging in right at the heart of that experience.
In the beginning, encountering him at a conference in Norway, Brooke sees only the inspiration. "The UK is the worst liberal democracy in the world," he proclaims. "It's never been through a revolution so it's still a feudal state." Its laws were made for the benefit of the aristocracy. Now they're made for the new lords, "the political elite". Meat and drink to a reporter who already thinks that, and wants to blow the house down. She's focused (with the help of an Icelandic MP) on making Reykjavik an information haven on tax haven lines. She's hunting for a hero. Julian, the lord of all hacking, welcomes her to his universe.
WikiLeaks, a brave deed in a closed world, is gearing up for its great unloading of 250,000 assorted American secrets. But can you just dump tons of such stuff on the web? Freedom to publish en masse also means freedom to miss the story or the point. Maybe Assange needs a paper like the Guardian to sift, choose and make safe the most important tales? Maybe recruiting other traditional print outlets – say Der Spiegel and the New York Times – can keep the legal elite at bay?
It's when Brooke, a close observer and occasional participant in this exercise, has to work in contact with Assange day by day that doubt creeps in. No picnic; indeed, at the end, a dog's dinner. One climactic meeting with Assange sees him attacking her for supposedly seeking to sabotage his enterprise. "It seemed to me he was just furious about losing control of the cables [and] I'm sure the Pentagon felt exactly the same about him." Suddenly the freedom fighters need watching, too.
How do you make freedom's ideals fit for purpose in the midst of profound digital revolution? You can have basic ideals, fundamental attitudes. Brooke despises the men in suits oiling in to shut down the free flow of information, and she represents good journalism when she does. Real journalism isn't fitting in, bending the knee, chasing gongs, falling silent. Real journalism is rough trade in the greatest public interest of the lot: truth that those who want to make the effort can discover for themselves. But watch the devils of detail come sneaking through, throwing smoke bombs.
Brooke self-evidently loves the burgeoning global community of hackers: men in jeans, not suits; voices of dissent, not conformity. But where does authority of some kind fit in? "Exemptions for the disclosure of official information must be for two reasons only: where it is in the public interest (not the nation's interest) or to prevent actual (not imagined) harm." All of that with a bias towards publication, and an "independent appeals organisation".
Which, of course, raises every kind of difficult question. Did the original, carefully sanitised cables from the Afghan front line cause any of the actual harm the Pentagon and tame politicians alleged? Has the latter-day Assange dump of hundreds of thousands more produced a bloodier actuality? Who can decide between public and national interest except judges, men in wigs? Who appoints "independent" appeals tribunals except the same people who appoint independent police complaints commissioners? And, while we're pondering the imponderables, define the difference between good hacking and bad hacking in a book that casts a leery eye over Google and the rest of the big boys, who can eat any trace of your privacy before breakfast, but doesn't contain one solitary mention of the accursed M word, Murdoch.
Loads of questions at the close, then: loads more to set any thoughtful reader's mind whirling. Brooke's third journey of a book doesn't pretend to offer last words, but it's vivid and honest about its own contradictions, a solid, sentient contribution. Her starter for 10 more, perhaps?

WikiLeaks-named Ethiopian reporter in unredacted cable flees country in fear

AppId is over the quota AppId is over the quota  Wikileaks named Ethiopian reporter Argaw Ashine, along with many others, when founder Julian Assange (pictured in July) agreed for leaked US cables to be published unredacted. Photograph: Lefteris Pitarakis/AP
An Ethiopian reporter has fled the country after being named in a WikiLeaks cable, in what a media rights group said was the first instance of one of the leaks causing direct repercussions for a journalist.
Wikileaks recently published all its cables unredacted, naming sources that were removed by partner media organisations, including the Guardian.
The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) said reporter Argaw Ashine fled at the weekend after being interrogated over the identity of a government source mentioned in a leaked 2009 US cable. Argaw was the local correspondent for Kenya's Nation Media Group.
The cable said Argaw was told by an unnamed source that the government would target six journalists from a newspaper seen as critical of the government. That paper closed later that year after citing harassment and intimidation.
Joel Simon, the New York-based CPJ's executive director, said: "The threat we sought to avert through redactions of initial WikiLeaks cables has now become real. A citation in one of these cables can easily provide repressive governments with the perfect opportunity to persecute or punish journalists and activists.
"WikiLeaks must take responsibility for its actions and do whatever it can to reduce the risk to journalists named in its cables. It must put in place systems to ensure that such disclosures do not reoccur."
Ethiopian officials on Thursday denied Argaw's account to the CPJ that he had been harassed and intimidated because of the cable.
A government spokesman said officials had separately arrested five opposition figures on Wednesday, including a journalist, on allegations of terrorism. They follow dozens of other terrorism-related arrests and detentions in recent weeks, including those of two Swedish journalists.
The main opposition coalition said recent events illustrate a pattern of oppression as citizens tire of the longtime leadership and seek change. Human rights groups have long accused Ethiopia of cracking down on political dissent.
Shimeles Kemal, the government spokesman, said Argaw was not pressured to name a source and that Ethiopian law allows journalists to protect their sources.
"This is a very absurd and ridiculous accusation, the allegation that he was threatened by security to leave the country or disclose a source," Shimeles said.
Argaw has asked the CPJ to not reveal his location.
Eskinder Nega, a journalist and publisher whose newspaper was shut down over allegations that the paper incited violence during disputed elections in 2005, was among the five opposition figures arrested on Wednesday, Shimeles said. After the newspaper was shut down, Eskinder continued to speak critically of the government in public forums, and articles under his byline appeared on opposition-aligned websites.
"According to the police statement, these people have been involved in activities, they have plotted, planned and carefully laid out contrived plans that are likely to wreak havoc in the country through launching terrorist attacks and throwing the country into utter chaos," Shimeles said.
Opposition party official Negasso Gidada said another person arrested, Andualem Arage, served on the editorial board of an opposition-party newspaper. He denied the charges that the five were involved in terrorist activities.
Negasso said the party newspaper had been advocating for "the right to struggle in a peaceful, democratic, constitutional and legal way.
"The people are fed up because of the social, economic and political situation and the people follow also what is happening in North Africa and Arab countries ... and people are saying, 'When is our turn? When shall we go to the streets?'" he said.
"The attitude is so strong in the country, in the people, soon it will explode, and the government is afraid of that, and by arresting political party members and leaders, the government thinks it will take precautionary measures against that."