Wikileaks Roundup: catch-up edition

Non-internet life prevented me from getting at the things that are totally happening, but now I've got a sec, and boy, have I got news for you. Helpfully divided into a few of the many-armed-Vishnu-esque wikileaks-related fronts, for greater general benefit of internet topicality etc.

The Men
Let's get Assange out of the way: he's in Vaughan Smith's manor, and says that his life and the lives of his staffers are at risk. Some of his lawyers and supporters, meanwhile, are upset that the Guardian leaked the allegations against him, claiming that it was selectively released to discredit Assange.  No word on what Assange thinks about any of it, except that he still asserts his innocence. All's fair in transparency, guys--more information is better, and wikileaks does not equal its founder....

Bradley Manning's lawyer confirms some of the details of his absurd treatment in Quantico. He's been in there for seven months without trial or conviction. I boil in anger.

The Reaction

Joe Biden, American King of Foot in Mouth, likens Assange to a "high-tech terrorist" on ABC's Meet the Press. That's the strongest wording we've heard from anyone that hasn't called for his death, and the irritation might be coming from his claims that international leaders are now asking his staff to leave meetings. "It makes things more cumbersome, so it has done damage". Oh no, not mildly awkward inconvenience! My only fatal weakness!

 He also maintains the difference between what (he hopes) happened with Wikileaks and what happens when journalists scoop classified information. We'll see, sir Joe.

Meanwhile, the New York Times technology writers say that the greatest casualties in prosecuting Julian Assange would be American--technology firms, journalists, and the reputation of America being a champion of free speech. I think he's right. And late. 

Meanwhile-meanwhile, Glenn Greenwald calls out the ever-expanding wall of secrecy the US gov maintains about its activities. He also brings in the burgeoning surveillance state the US is developing, saying they're in direct opposition to the fundamental principles of running a democracy. I could write a whole other post on this, and a whole other post on the awesomeness of Glenn Greenwald.

Montreal marched in defence of Wikileaks on Saturday. I tip my hat to the whole city.

Someone in the Wikileaks forums has suggested a WikiTerms of Service, holding service providers to a standard of service for their customers that includes not throwing wrenches in free speech.

The Cables

Remember when Obama promised to secure the whole world's nuclear stocks in four years, so we could all stop worrying about nuclear terrorism?
Turns out nukes are still friggin everywhere. In wicker baskets in Burundi, in some guy's car in Georgia, and rumoured to be all over the place elsewhere. The DRC is pit-mining uranium (which totally wins at safety) and is implicated in smuggling of nuclear material--plus, their nuclear research centre in Kinshasa barely has a fence around it. And Russia is just as sketchy, with former military members trying to sell uranium in Portugal, and next to no security in the former Russian republics.

The US appears to have a half-decent response policy in place that they call their "Second line of defense". Every time radiation detectors go off at a border crossing or radioactive material is found on somebody,  the "First line of defense" has already been messed about--someone managed to get the material, in a world where sources are fairly (and rightfully) fanatically regulated. So every time the first line goes down, the "Second line"--namely the US diplomats--get called in. I have no idea what they do then, but at the very least, they report it--and apparently, over 500 reports of this "second line" activation have been called in during the last 15 years.

In good nuclear news (or, at least, better than "zomg we all might die"), Egypt was offered Soveit nukes off the black market, and turned them down.

Foreign Policy's Elizabeth Dickinson gives us a breakdown of failed states in the cables that goes beyond the usual "Somalia and Afghanistan, end of list". The article gives us background information in context, interesting stuff emerging from the cables, and interesting/unexpected things coming out as well. In the list is North Korea, Eritrea, Somalia, Burma, Pakistan, Zimbabwe, Sudan, Cote D'Ivoire, Kenya (really?), and Nigeria (whaa...)

The UK's BAE arms company is trying to bend Tanzania over on the sale of a radar system, and nobody wants to prosecute them. Sneaky and brutal.

Omar al-Bashir, genocidal general president of Sudan, has a pantsload of stolen Sudanese oil money in UK banks. Awesome.

Former UN secretary general Kofi Annan grasped at straws trying to help Zimbabwe, and tried to get Robert Mugabe out of the way by offering him cushy retirement overseas. Proving yet again that when a situation sucks more than is humanly conceivable, even the best options for fixing it will -also- suck.

Wining, dining, ladykilling Italian PM Berlusconi thought about doing more for the international development community in order to not look bad to Bono. On the one hand, this is a surprising piece of proof that someone actually listens to Bono's loudmouthing. On the other, the fact that Bono wields more influence than common sense, empathy, or decades of development research makes me want to put a gun in my mouth.

The super-important cable you've all been waiting for: a cursory mention of Tom Cruise and scientology. Also, I was recently amused/appalled to discover the book store I work for shelves Dianetics in the self-help section. Yes, the whole world is crazy.

For more cableiciousness, the often-rad Guardian has a browsable database by country in a handy little map!


Attendant Hilarity
Rap news 6 breaks it down to the right in a surprisingly eloquent bit of white Australian hip hawp.