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Bearing hallmarks of the 2019 Australia Federal Police raid on the ABC over its ‘Afghan Recordsdata’, Finnish journalists are on trial for treason after reporting on Finland’s nationwide safety, writes Dr Binoy Kampmark.
ON 16 DECEMBER 2017, Finnish day by day newspaper Helsingin Sanomat revealed an investigative report on the actions of the Finnish Intelligence Analysis Institution (FIRE). Titled ‘Finland’s most secret place’, the report targeted on the army intelligence company’s duties and famous its tough location.
The article was notably pertinent, given debates on the time on whether or not the powers of the seemingly innocuous physique in query needs to be expanded to observe personal knowledge in digital networks whereas discussing an general enlargement of surveillance powers.
Because the newspaper famous in a scathing tone, the MPs debating the matter in Finland’s Parliament appeared ignorant about what was really at stake and going down at Tikkakoski. Within the miasma of celebrated political ignorance, powers could possibly be enlarged with little care and fear, elected representatives remaining – as they usually have in historical past – asleep because the needle is run.
FIRE sounds positively abnormal when it comes to designation and performance. Ditto in Finnish, the place it passes as Viestikoelaitos (alerts take a look at facility).
Through the years, the testing facility has not been reticent about facets of its actions, a lot of it primarily based on a marketing campaign to realize broader acceptability. Its final objective, utilizing radio sign intelligence, is to make sure that the prime minister of the day is apprised of the following potential assault on Finnish territory have been it to occur.
Why I’m not signing up to demand the Government legislate press freedom laws
Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton has declared that journalists who dare publish dirty government secrets will go to gaol, writes Dr Martin Hirst.
The concern here is that the medium of such intelligence has degraded – and where intelligence and signals capacity degrades, broader powers tend to be sought.
As a result, reporters Tuomo Pietilainen and Laura Halminen and the paper’s acting manager at the time, Kalle Silfverberg, are facing the ire of the national security establishment.
Halminen’s apartment was raided in December 2017 by the police, who also seized her computer and flash drives. (It was subsequently found in a 2018 court ruling that a flash drive taken from Halminen’s residence during the police raid could not be used as evidence in the prosecution.) According to MTV, a second instalment on the centre’s activities was not run by order of the editor-in-chief after the first publication drew criticism.
If convicted, the accused parties face prison sentences of up to four years.
Hanne Aho, president of the Union of Journalists in Finland stated to Reuters:
In the amnesiac-rich field of social media, this sounds new. In fact, the process has been in train for some time. Originally, five suspects were named in the investigation, including editor-in-chief Kaius Niemi. On 29 October 2021, charges for the disclosure and attempted disclosure of state secrets were announced against the three who now figure.
In terms of what defence may be mounted, the idea of prior publication – or material that is already available – seems the most sensible. It is standard fare and tends to catch out governments obsessed with not being embarrassed. In fact, pre-trial investigations did little to dispel this point.
International Press Institute Executive Director Barbara Trionfi, in responding to the charges last year, drew attention to its bizarre quality:
Trionfi also notes the lengthiness in investigation and how it constitutes a form of constriction and deterrence:
The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) has also added its voice of concern.
CPJ’s Europe representative Attila Mong has reiterated a comment made last year by Gulnoza Said, CPJ’s Europe and Central Asia program coordinator:
There are some striking similarities to the battle being waged against journalists in another country, one supposedly liberal, democratic and claiming to have, superficially at least, some respect for press freedoms.
AFP raids journalists: We need to talk about our Government
There is no doubt the AFP raids are an affront to our democracy. One in which the hand of a secretive and ruthless Government can be felt, if not seen or heard.
The Afghan Files, published by the ABC, revealed alleged atrocities by Australian special forces in Afghanistan and eventually resulted in a raid of the national broadcaster by the Australian Federal Police (AFP).
The AFP took its time before executing a warrant to raid the Ultimo headquarters in Sydney despite already knowing the core source of the files, the whistleblower and former Special Air Service Regiment (SASR) operative David McBride. The entire affair was one of abuse, deterring intimidation and even terror.
It further left the option of prosecuting one of the journalists who had compiled the report, Dan Oakes, open. The case was eventually dropped by the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions (CDPP) on public interest grounds. While the CDPP had what could only be described as an attack of conscience, the entire measure was both dangerous and farcical.
The prosecutor in the case against the three Finnish journalists has demanded that the online version of the story be scrubbed from the newspaper’s website. But as Aho remarks, very little is being given away about the substance of the charges.
This may well be a sign of things to come, suggesting that Finns may have more to worry about than the distracting antics of their dancing Prime Minister.
The national security wonks, now in a full embrace with NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization) and keen to anticipate the next crisis, will not be thrilled about debates on intelligence and any proposed expansion of powers.
For a country solid and reliable in its defence of press freedoms, this is a rotten turn-up for the books.
Dr Binoy Kampmark was a Cambridge Scholar and is a lecturer at RMIT University. You can follow Dr Kampmark on Twitter @BKampmark.
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