WikiLeaks Co-Founder Charges Website
With Selling Classified Information
One of the early members and co-founders of the tight-knit, secretive WikiLeaks operation charged today that the website and its co-founder, Julian Assange, sold intelligence information the site had obtained.
John Young, whose name was listed as the public face of WikiLeaks in the site’s original domain registration, also alleged that the website is a lucrative business. Young said he left the site in 2007 due to concerns over its finances and that WikiLeaks was engaged in the selling of documents.
Young was speaking in an exclusive interview on this reporter’s show on New York’s WABC Radio.
“I think it is a money-making operation, no doubt,” Young said of WikiLeaks. “It follows the model of a number of other business intelligence operations. Selling intelligence information is a very lucrative field, and so they are following that model, usually cloaked in some kind of public benefit.”
“But they are far from being the only one that does that,” Young added. “It’s a well-known business model.”
Asked specifically whether he was charging WikiLeaks with selling classified information and documents, Young replied, “Yes.”
This reporter then asked, “When you were at WikiLeaks initially, was your impression they were trying to sell information?”
Young responded, “Well, it only came up in the topic of raising $5 million the first year. That was the first red flag that I heard about. I thought that they were actually a public interest group up until then, but as soon as I heard that, I know that they were a criminal organization.”
Young stated Assange was a “narcissistic personality. He craves attention and he’ll do about anything to get it.”
WikiLeaks Documents Reveal U.S. Concern
For France’s Muslim Minority
The U.S. State Department directed its staff to “engage” and help to “empower” France’s Muslim minorities, according to classified documents released by WikiLeaks and reviewed by this column.
The cables reveal U.S. government staff were instructed to use the French media to educate that country’s public on minority issues and to improve the lot of French Arabs and Muslims. The process called for “considerable discretion, sensitivity and tact.”
A cable dated January 2007 and directed to various U.S. missions in France outlined that the U.S. government must show it “takes seriously the threat of disenfranchised and disadvantaged minorities around the world, including in France, and we are committed to empowering minorities as part of our fundamental belief in participatory democracy.”
The directive accused the French news media of “falling short both in its coverage of discrimination towards them (French Arab and Muslims) and of juvenile delinquency among them.”
France’s five million-plus Muslims largely are North African (Algerian, Moroccan and Tunisian) in origin. The country has faced serious unrest from its Arab and Muslim minority, including attacks against French Jews and two months of civil riots in France in October and November of 2005 when minorities burned cars and public buildings, leading to the declaration of a general state of emergency.
U.S. Worried About Iran Involvement
In Latin America
The U.S. government is deeply concerned that Iran and Hizbullah are gaining a foothold in Latin America, according to classified documents released by WikiLeaks and reviewed by this reporter.
Among the U.S.’s concerns is that Iranian-backed militants may attempt to infiltrate the U.S. or use Latin America as a staging ground for anti-American attacks, it has emerged.
The U.S. caught Iran shipping explosives and attempting to ship unmanned aerial vehicles to Venezuela, the cables revealed.
“Washington analysts assess that Tehran is reaching out to Latin American countries in order to reduce its diplomatic isolation and increase ties to leftist countries in the region that Tehran perceives may share its anti-U.S. agenda,” read a cable from the State Department.
Kerry: Arafat Proved That Reform Is Possible
Sen. John Kerry upheld late PLO leader Yasser Arafat as the prime example of a former terrorist who can be transformed to advance peace, according to classified documents released by WikiLeaks and reviewed by this column.
In a classified diplomatic cable, Kerry was quoted as stating: “Yasser Arafat went from living as a terrorist in Tunisia to signing an agreement with Israel on the White House lawn. The transformation of Arafat is an example of how actors in the region need to take risks if we are to move forward in advancing regional peace.”
Kerry was speaking in a meeting this past February with Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani, the ruler of the Arab state of Qatar.
Kerry implied Arafat was “transformed” into a statesman after he signed the Oslo Accords on the White House lawn.
However, Arafat founded the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades terrorist group – the official military wing of his Fatah organization. He is accused of routinely fomenting and directing violent terrorist attacks against Israelis throughout his tenure as PLO leader. This included the Second Palestinian Intifada, initiated by Arafat after he turned down an offer of a Palestinian state at the Camp David peace talks in the summer of 2000.
Multiple Palestinian officials, including Fatah strongman and Al Aqsa Brigades co-founder Marwan Barghouti, admitted Arafat himself planned the Intifada, in which more than 1,000 Israeli civilians were murdered in terrorist attacks, including scores of notable suicide bombings.
Arafat’s PLO-run media routinely incited violence against Israel while his Fatah-run school system indoctrinated anti-Israel hatred and violence.
Aaron Klein is Jerusalem bureau chief and senior reporter for Internet giant WorldNetDaily.com. He is also host of an investigative radio program on New York’s 770-WABC Radio, the largest talk radio station in the U.S., every Sunday between 2-4 p.m.
