Court gag ignored by WikiLeaks

Julian Assange: 'The Australian government is not just gagging the press, it is blindfolding the public.' Photo: AFP

EXCLUSIVE

WikiLeaks has struck again, releasing the text of a secret court order that cannot be published in Australia.

The anti-secrecy group has this morning published a Victorian Supreme Court suppression order that WikiLeaks publisher Julian Assange describes asunprecedented in scope.

The suppression order is itself suppressed. No Australian media organisation can legally publish the document or its contents.

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In a statement provided to Fairfax Media, Assange said it was completely egregious to block the public's right to know and suppress the media in any instance, and especially in cases of international corruption involving politicians and subsidiaries of a public organisation.

Despite the legal implications WikiLeaks publishes this suppression order, as it will others, to uphold our values of freedom of information and transparency of government - the Australian people have a right to know, we work to ensure this right for them, even when their government tries to obstruct it."

WikiLeaks suggests there has not been a comparable blanket suppression order since 1995 when the Australian government sought to suppress publication by Fairfax Media of details of a joint US-Australian espionage operation to bug a new Chinese embassy in Canberra.

Assange argues that the suppression order, together with the Australian government's recent introduction of legislation to criminalise reporting on certain types of intelligence operations, is part of an increasing trend in Australia of suppressing press freedoms for the sake of politics".

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Court gag ignored by WikiLeaks