{"id":69159,"date":"2016-01-25T12:00:18","date_gmt":"2016-01-25T12:00:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=69159"},"modified":"2016-01-24T13:26:30","modified_gmt":"2016-01-24T13:26:30","slug":"u-k-court-in-david-miranda-case-rules-terrorism-act-violates-fundamental-rights-of-free-press","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2016\/01\/u-k-court-in-david-miranda-case-rules-terrorism-act-violates-fundamental-rights-of-free-press\/","title":{"rendered":"U.K. Court, in David Miranda Case, Rules Terrorism Act Violates Fundamental Rights of Free Press"},"content":{"rendered":"

19 Jan 2016 – <\/em>A British appeals court has ruled that the United Kingdom\u2019s broad counterterrorism laws breach fundamental rights in a case involving the seizure of encrypted documents from David Miranda, the partner of Intercept <\/em>co-founder Glenn Greenwald, at a London airport in 2013.<\/p>\n

\"david<\/a><\/p>\n

Miranda (pictured above) was detained and interrogated for nine hours at Heathrow Airport in August 2013 while he was assisting Greenwald\u2019s reporting on documents about government mass surveillance leaked by National Security Agency whistleblower Edward Snowden.<\/p>\n

Last year, the High Court in London dismissed<\/a> a legal challenge brought by Miranda over the case on the grounds that it reasonably regarded his actions as \u201cterrorism\u201d as defined by the law. However, that decision was partially overturned Tuesday<\/a> by the Court of Appeal in a ruling that will be viewed as a major victory for press freedom campaigners.<\/p>\n

The ruling finds that the police followed the law when detaining Miranda under a controversial section of the Terrorism Act, Schedule 7<\/a>. However, crucially, it asserts that the statute itself \u201cis not subject to adequate safeguards against its arbitrary exercise\u201d and is \u201cincompatible\u201d with Article 10 of the European Convention on Human Rights<\/a>, which provides the right to \u201creceive and impart information and ideas without interference by public authority and regardless of frontiers.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Court of Appeal\u2019s most senior judge, Lord Dyson MR, stated in the ruling that he accepted there were already some \u201cconstraints on the exercise of the power,\u201d but he believed that these \u201cdo not afford effective protection of journalists\u2019 Article 10 rights.\u201d He added:<\/p>\n

The central concern is that disclosure of journalistic material (whether or not it involves the identification of a journalist\u2019s source) undermines the confidentiality that is inherent in such material and which is necessary to avoid the chilling effect of disclosure and to protect Article 10 rights. If journalists and their sources can have no expectation of confidentiality, they may decide against providing information on sensitive matters of public interest. That is why the confidentiality of such information is so important.<\/em><\/p>\n

Miranda\u2019s appeal was supported by a press freedom litigation fund established by First Look Media, The Intercept<\/em>\u2019s parent company. It was also supported by the rights groups Liberty, Article 19, English PEN, and the Media Defense Initiative. The latter three organizations argued in a joint submission<\/a> to the court that the treatment of Miranda \u201craised very serious concerns about the adequacy of the safeguards available in the United Kingdom for those undertaking, or assisting in, journalist work in the public interest, or their sources.\u201d<\/p>\n

Miranda, a Brazilian national, was detained in London at the height of the international fallout from the Snowden revelations, which featured major disclosures<\/a> about British mass surveillance programs. At the time of his August 2013 detention, Miranda was transporting a batch of the Snowden documents from one reporter to another \u2014 from Laura Poitras in Berlin to Greenwald in Rio de Janeiro. Poitras had been working on stories sourced from the Snowden material with the New York Times <\/em>and Der Spiegel<\/em>, while Greenwald was reporting for The<\/em> Guardian<\/em>, which had paid for Miranda\u2019s trip. (Greenwald, who was then a columnist for the London-based newspaper, left in October 2013 to co-found The Intercept<\/em> with Poitras.)<\/p>\n

Shortly after Miranda was detained, British authorities claimed that encrypted material seized from him included 58,000 \u201chighly classified\u201d British documents derived from the Snowden leaks, 75 of which they said they had \u201creconstructed\u201d and been able to decrypt and view. The seizure of the documents led to the London police counterterrorism division launching a criminal investigation that focused in part on journalists who had handled the files. The probe, which was designated the code name \u201cOperation Curable,\u201d remained ongoing as recently as November of last year, The Intercept<\/em> has previously reported<\/a>.<\/p>\n

To justify their seizure of the documents, British authorities had argued that publication of the Snowden files was itself a terrorist act. A memo circulated by security services<\/a> prior to Miranda\u2019s detention asserted that \u201cthe disclosure [of the Snowden documents], or threat of disclosure, is designed to influence a government and is made for the purpose of promoting a political or ideological cause. This therefore falls within the definition of terrorism.\u201d This position was seemingly accepted by the High Court in February 2014, which ruled in favor of the government in a ruling staunchly criticized<\/a> by press freedom groups such as Reporters without Borders. It also appeared to concern the U.K. government\u2019s independent reviewer of terrorism laws, David Anderson, who warned in a July 2014 report<\/a> that the High Court ruling had set a precedent that could mean in some cases that the \u201cwriting of a book, an article or a blog may therefore amount to terrorism.\u201d<\/p>\n

The appeals court\u2019s judgment, however, appears to overturn this aspect of the High Court\u2019s earlier ruling, significantly reining in its conflation of journalism with terrorism. It makes clear that under the European Convention on Human Rights, journalists are entitled to legal protections and should not be subjected to arbitrary stops and searches under counterterrorism laws. The law used to detain Miranda will now have to be changed so that journalists are better protected in the future.<\/p>\n

Kate Goold, a lawyer for the London firm Bindmans who represented Miranda in the case, said that Tuesday\u2019s ruling \u201cemphasizes the importance of interpreting terrorism with its ordinary natural meaning to ensure that legitimate public interest journalism is not stifled through the use of draconian powers.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe notion of a journalist becoming an \u2018accidental terrorist\u2019 has been wholeheartedly rejected,\u201d Goold said. \u201cWe welcome this court\u2019s principled and decisive ruling that Schedule 7 needs to come in line with other legislation to ensure that the seizure of journalistic material is protected by judicial safeguards.\u201d<\/p>\n

Responding to the news Tuesday, Miranda tweeted<\/a> that he was \u201cThrilled with the court ruling!\u201d He added: \u201cMy purpose was to show U.K.\u2019s terrorism law violates press freedoms. And journalism isn\u2019t \u2018terrorism.\u2019 We won!\u201d<\/p>\n

The British government could attempt to launch a challenge against the Court of Appeal\u2019s ruling with the U.K.\u2019s Supreme Court. However, it was not immediately clear whether it intends to pursue the case further.<\/p>\n

A spokesperson for the government\u2019s Home Office insisted in a statement Tuesday that the appeals court\u2019s ruling regarding Miranda\u2019s detention \u201csupports the action taken by police to protect national security.\u201d<\/p>\n

The spokesperson added: \u201cWe also note the court\u2019s decision that Schedule 7 [of the Terrorism Act], as in force at the time of this incident, did not provide sufficient protection against the examination of journalistic material.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe government is constantly working to ensure our counterterrorism powers are both effective and fair. That is why in 2015 we changed the Code of Practice for examining officers to instruct them not to examine journalistic material at all. This goes above and beyond the court\u2019s recommendations in this case.\u201d<\/p>\n

_______________________________________<\/p>\n

Ryan Gallagher<\/a> – \u2709ryan.gallagher@\u200btheintercept.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

Update: January 19, 9:45 a.m.<\/em><\/strong>
\nThis post has been updated to include comment from the U.K. government.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

Go to Original \u2013 theintercept.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

19 Jan 2016 – A British appeals court has ruled that the United Kingdom\u2019s broad counterterrorism laws breach fundamental rights in a case involving the seizure of encrypted documents from David Miranda, the partner of Intercept co-founder Glenn Greenwald, at a London airport in 2013.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[51],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-69159","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-europe"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69159","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=69159"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69159\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=69159"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=69159"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=69159"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}