{"id":18328,"date":"2022-07-09T05:47:23","date_gmt":"2022-07-09T03:47:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mwehle.eu\/wp\/?p=18328"},"modified":"2022-07-09T05:56:25","modified_gmt":"2022-07-09T03:56:25","slug":"journalists-and-publishers-could-face-life-sentences-if-national-security-bill-2022-being-debated-in-the-u-k-parliament-becomes-law","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.wehle.ee\/wp\/?p=18328","title":{"rendered":"Journalists and publishers could face life sentences if National Security<\/span> Bill 2022<\/span>, being debated in the U.K. Parliament, becomes<\/span> law"},"content":{"rendered":"

Mohamed Elmaazi, Consortium News<\/a>:<\/p>\n

The British Parliament is debating a national security bill which could undermine the basis of national security reporting and ultimately throw journalists in jail for life.<\/p>\n

A person convicted under the new offense of \u201cobtaining or disclosing protected information,\u201d defined in Section 1 of\u00a0National Security<\/span> Bill 2022<\/span>,\u00a0<\/span>faces a fine, life imprisonment, or both, if convicted following a jury trial.<\/p>\n

A review of the parliamentary debate on the bill makes clear that work by press outlets such as\u00a0WikiLeaks<\/em>\u00a0is at the heart of Tory and Labour MPs\u2019 thinking as they push to make the bill law.<\/p>\n

As currently written, direct-action protests, such as those\u00a0conducted<\/a>\u00a0by Palestine Action against U.K.-based Israeli weapons manufacturer Elbit Systems Ltd, could also be captured under the offences of \u201csabotage\u201d and entering \u201cprohibited places\u201d sections of the bill.<\/p>\n

Whistleblowers, journalists and publishers focusing on national security related matters may be most at risk of being prosecuted, though any person who \u201ccopies,\u201d \u201cretains,\u201d \u201cdiscloses,\u201d \u201cdistributes\u201d or \u201cprovides access to\u201d so called protected information could be prosecuted.<\/p>\n

\u201cProtected information\u201d is defined as any \u201crestricted material\u201d and it need not even be classified.<\/p>\n

Under this bill, leakers, whistleblowers, journalists or everyday members of the public, face a potential life sentence if they receive or share \u201cprotected information\u201d which is widely defined.<\/p>\n

That does not mean imprisonment from one day \u201cup to\u201d a life sentence. If\u00a0a judge determines a fine isn\u2019t suitable enough punishment the only alternative is life in prison.\u00a0Following a conviction, a judge would have no choice but to either issue a fine or hand down a life sentence, or both.<\/p>\n

There is no public interest or journalistic defense in the bill, a fact noted by\u00a0some of the parliamentarians<\/a>\u00a0during the debates.<\/p>\n

\u03a9\u00a0\u03a9\u00a0\u03a9<\/p>\n

The bill can be seen as part of a growing crackdown in both Britain and the United States against legitimate journalism that challenges establishment narratives.<\/p>\n

In many respects, the proposed law, which applies to people both inside and outside the U.K., shares many elements with the draconian 1917 Espionage Act, which the U.S. government is using to prosecute\u00a0WikiLeaks\u00a0<\/em>publisher Julian Assange<\/span>.<\/p>\n

\u03a9\u00a0\u03a9\u00a0\u03a9<\/p>\n

As is the case with the U.S.\u2019 Espionage Act, no evidence of actual harm needs to be proven by prosecutors in order to secure a conviction under the National Security Bill.<\/p>\n

There is a broad test of whether the defendant knows or \u201cought reasonably to know\u201d that their conduct is \u201cprejudicial to safety or interests of the U.K.\u201d<\/p>\n

What is, or is not, \u201cprejudicial\u201d to the \u201csafety\u201d or \u201cinterests\u201d of the U.K. is also to be determined by the government of the day,\u00a0according to long established case law<\/a>\u00a0from the U.K.\u2019s highest court.<\/p>\n

This could include anything from environmental, energy, climate and housing policy, to policing, foreign affairs or military policy.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Mohamed Elmaazi, Consortium News: The British Parliament is debating a national security bill which could undermine the basis of national security reporting and ultimately throw journalists in jail for life. A person convicted under the new offense of \u201cobtaining or … Weiterlesen →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-18328","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wehle.ee\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18328","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wehle.ee\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wehle.ee\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wehle.ee\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wehle.ee\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=18328"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.wehle.ee\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18328\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wehle.ee\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=18328"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wehle.ee\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=18328"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wehle.ee\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=18328"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}