WikiLeaks denounces UNESCO After WikiLeaks Banned from UNESCO Conference on WikiLeaks

[Hissyspit]

62. People have been doing it in this thread.

It's not an accident.

http://www.crikey.com.au/2012/02/16/media-briefs-news-cuts-wikileaks-snub-amasian-linsanity/

UNESCO’s WikiLeaks conference snubs WikiLeaks. In the 1980s, the US withdrew from UNESCO, accusing it of being an anti-American, anti-Israel body. Twenty-five years later it’s being accused of being a US stooge, with news that the body is hosting a conference on journalism “after WikiLeaks and News of the World”, with neither of the named bodies being invited to participate.

UNESCO appears to have “subcontracted” the conference to a group called the “World Press Freedom Committee”, a classic Cold War-style ginger outfit (“based in Reston, Virginia”?—?two miles, from Langley, down Dulles Road), now part of “Freedom House”, an NGO group long used to advance US interests at arm’s length. WikiLeaks has denounced the conference, pointing out that no one from WikiLeaks, or News International for that matter, has been invited to speak (the only “pro-WikiLeaks” speaker being Geoffrey Robertson, who only became associated in a legal capacity once Julian Assange suffered personal legal problems).

The one WikiLeaks insider invited (but not attending) is Daniel Domscheit-Berg who left WikiLeaks to form “Openleaks”, a whistleblowing website that, 14 months after launching, is yet to publish, and who destroyed a large amount of WikiLeaks submissions after leaving the group.

WikiLeaks protested to UNESCO about its exclusion from the conference; WPFC rep Ronald Koven replied in Catch 22 style that: “I can only share in your attachment to freedom of expression. It must include our right to give voice to speakers of our choice.” He went on to say that: “The main focus of this conference is not about WikiLeaks as such …”. The titles of five of the six sessions contain the words “… after WikiLeaks”. Not that the World Press Freedom Committee is exactly a model of transparency itself. Try to find out via the committee website who the staff are, or who is even on the committee, and this is the result.

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