{"id":402267,"date":"2019-04-01T16:50:34","date_gmt":"2019-04-01T15:50:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/newswire\/chelsea-manning-again-takes-fall-for-defending-publics-right-to-know\/"},"modified":"2019-04-01T16:50:34","modified_gmt":"2019-04-01T15:50:34","slug":"chelsea-manning-again-takes-fall-for-defending-publics-right-to-know","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/newswire\/chelsea-manning-again-takes-fall-for-defending-publics-right-to-know\/","title":{"rendered":"Chelsea Manning Again Takes Fall for Defending Public\u2019s Right to Know"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Chelsea Manning was a US Army soldier who released to <\/span>WikiLeaks <\/em>Iraq<\/a> <\/span>and <\/span>Afghan<\/a> <\/span>war logs, with information on torture and civilian killings, including an <\/span>airstrike<\/a> <\/span>that killed two <\/span>Reuters<\/em> <\/span>correspondents; and <\/span>diplomatic cables <\/a>revealing, among other things, a secret deal between the US and Yemen in which the US would bomb the country, and the Yemeni government would claim the attacks. For Manning, these were acts that shocked the conscience, and that US citizens, in whose names they were claimed, should know about. She <\/span>hoped<\/a> <\/span>the release to the media and the public via <\/span>WikiLeaks<\/em> <\/span>would spark \u201cworldwide discussion, debates and reforms.\u201d<\/p>\n

The military sought a court martial and a life sentence, claiming her disclosure \u201caided the enemy\u201d; she was eventually sentenced by a military judge to 35 years, but her sentence was <\/span>commuted<\/a> <\/span>by Barack Obama after she had served seven years\u2014still the longest time anyone has served for disclosing classified information to the media. It\u2019s generally understood that Obama recognized that it wasn\u2019t possible to charge <\/span>WikiLeaks<\/em> <\/span>editor-in-chief Julian Assange, via Manning, without exposing journalists at the <\/span>New York Times<\/em> <\/span>or the <\/span>Washington Post<\/em> <\/span>to prosecution for sharing the same information\u2014not to mention collecting prizes for it.<\/p>\n

Manning has recently been subpoenaed by a grand jury, widely understood to be attempting a case against Assange, though as a grand jury it\u2019s all very secretive, and asked to testify again about her 2010 public disclosures. She refused, citing the very secretiveness of the process, and noting that she had already testified fully about the reasons for her disclosures, that they were her choices alone, and not solicited by Assange or anyone else. A judge then <\/span>ordered her incarcerated<\/a> <\/span>until she agrees to testify or until the jury is done, which might be 18 months.<\/p>\n

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