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And, indeed, today it was announced that Greenwald has been charged with "cybercrimes" for his reporting on leaked documents regarding the current Justice Minister, Sergio Moro, who was the federal judge who oversaw the trial of former Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva. Many in Brazil, including Greenwald, have argued that the corruption trial and jailing of Lula was a corrupt show trial designed to get Lula out of office and prevent his re-election in 2018 (when Bolsonaro was elected). The leaked documents showed that Moro, while presiding over the trial, worked closely with prosecutors and helped them strategize.
Since then, there has been speculation that the government was trying to build a case against Greenwald. In July, Greenwald was called before a Congressional committee in which he was directly told he should be jailed. Back in August, the Brazilian Supreme Court actually put a stop to an attempt to investigate Greenwald, after Bolsonaro himself called for Greenwald to be jailed.
However, that appears not to have actually stopped the government's attempts to find some reason to throw Greenwald in jail. The charges against Greenwald argue that he wasn't just reporting on the leaked documents, but that he was part of a "criminal organization" and worked with people to hack into the phones of officials in order to access the documents:
Citing intercepted messages between Mr. Greenwald and the hackers, prosecutors say the journalist played a “clear role in facilitating the commission of a crime.”
For instance, prosecutors contend that Mr. Greenwald encouraged the hackers to delete archives that had already been shared with The Intercept Brasil, in order to cover their tracks.
Prosecutors also say that Mr. Greenwald was communicating with the hackers while they were actively monitoring private chats on Telegram, a messaging app.
Governments hate it when people like Glenn expose their corrupt practices. His mistake was to take on the government located where he lives (because his husband/lover is a Brazilian politician).
ReplyDeleteHe needed to be in a place where America couldn't get at him for publishing the Snowden material.
I think it's all quite worrisome, these attacks on/coopting of the fourth estate...
ReplyDeleteNo disagreement here.
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