Three British journalists I know personally – Johanna Ross, Vanessa Beeley and Kit Klarenberg – have each in the last two years been detained at immigration for hours on re-entering their own country, and questioned by police under anti-terrorist legislation.
This is plainly an abuse of the power to detain at port of entry, because in each case they could have been questioned at any time in the UK were there legitimate cause, and the questioning was not focused on their travels.
They were in fact detained and interrogated simply for holding and publishing dissident opinion on foreign policy, and in particular for supporting a more collaborative approach to Russia – with which, lest we forget, the UK is not at war.
Awọn atimọle wọnyi ti waye laarin ọdun meji diẹ. Gbogbo wọn ni ifọkansi fun iṣẹ iroyin ati pe eyi jẹ ni gbangba eto imulo ti o tẹsiwaju ti tipatipa ti awọn oniroyin Ilu Gẹẹsi ti o yapa.
Ni igba mẹta ni akoko kanna ti ọlọpa beere lọwọ mi ni ile ti ara mi ni Edinburgh fun iṣẹ iroyin, lori awọn ọran mẹta lọtọ. Mo lo oṣu mẹrin ni tubu fun ikede alaye pataki lati fihan pe iditẹ ipele giga kan wa lẹhin awọn ẹsun eke ti o lodi si adari Ominira Ilu Scotland Alex Salmond.
Julian Assange wa ni ẹwọn aabo ti o pọju fun ikede otitọ nipa awọn odaran ogun. Nibayi a titun National Security Bill goes through the Westminster parliament, which will make it illegal for a journalist possess or publish classified information.
This has never been illegal. The responsibility has always lain with the whistleblower or leaker, not the journalist or publisher. It seeks to enshrine in UK law precisely what the US Government is seeking to achieve against Assange using the US 1917 Espionage Act. This is a huge threat to journalism.
It is also worth pointing out that, if Evan Gershkovich was indeed doing nothing more than he has claimed to have been doing in Russia, that action would land him a long jail sentence in either the USA or the UK under the provisions which both governments are attempting to enforce.
On top of that, you have the Online Safety Bill, which under the excuse of protecting against paedophilia, will require social media gatekeepers to remove any kind of content the government deems as illegal.
When you put all this together with the new Public Order Act, which effectively gives the police authority to ban any protest they wish to ban, there is a fundamental change happening.
Eyi kii ṣe ihamọ imọ-jinlẹ nikan lori ominira. Imudani ti nṣiṣe lọwọ lodi si ọrọ ti ko fọwọsi ti wa tẹlẹ, bi o ṣe han nipasẹ awọn atimọle wọnyẹn ati, pupọ julọ, nipasẹ Julian ti tẹsiwaju ati itimole ibanilẹru.
To complete the horror, there is no longer a genuine opposition within the political class. Keir Starmer’s Labour Party opposes none of this wave of attacks on civil liberties. The SNP has been sending out identical stock replies from its MPs on Julian Assange, 100% backing the UK government line on his extradition and imprisonment.
I feel this very personally. I know all of these people affected – Julian, Alex, Kit, Vanessa, Johanna, and view them as colleagues whose rights I defend, even though I do not always agree with all of their disparate views.
Two other people I know personally and admire are under attack. The campaign of lies and innuendo against Roger Waters this last few weeks has been astonishing in both its viciousness and its mendacity, recalling the dreadful attacks on Jeremy Corbyn.
More mundane but also part of the same phenomenon, my friend Randy Credico has had his Twitter account cancelled.
To be a dissident in the UK, or indeed the “West”, today is to see, every single day, your friends persecuted and to see the walls close in upon yourself.
Ẹgbẹ oselu ti iṣọkan, ti iṣakoso nipasẹ awọn billionaires, n ṣe ipalara wa si ọna fascism. Iyẹn dabi si mi ni bayi ko ṣee ṣe.
ZNetwork jẹ agbateru nikan nipasẹ ilawo ti awọn oluka rẹ.
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