Israel Shamir's recent article on CounterPunch, Redacting Corruption: The Guardian's Political Censorship of Wikileaks, follows on from his previous piece, Paradigm in Belarus: The Minsk Election in a Wikileaks Mirror, in levelling some serious allegations against The Guardian newspaper and its journalistic practices.
The earlier piece was an odd amalgam of politically questionable apologism for the regime in Belarus and invective against The Guardian and the mainstream Western press, part of which provided valuable insight into the selection biases of newspapers (as I documented here) and part of which invoked conspiratorial motives that are unnecessary to explain those same selection biases.
Charges against The Guardian
The newest piece, published on January 11th, presents evidence that The Guardian has been engaging in strange redaction procedures on some of the cables it has been releasing, and infers from this that there is some foul play involved in The Guardian's editorial decisions. Because of Shamir's peculiar status, it is necessary to suject his claims to some scrutiny. As I will outline here, Shamir is mostly correct that The Guardian has been redacting the cables aggressively, and that the result of the redactions is, effectively, to conceal the correspondences of American diplomats writing candidly of a culture of corruption involving British corporations and high ranking officials in the former Soviet bloc. However, odious though this situation is, Shamir's inference to conspiracy or foul play in order to explain these redactions is, I believe, probably too quick.
The means by which this foul play is insinuated are not always explicit - this is not how groundless suspicion is normally inculcated. Instead, we have a series of rhetorical questions, which guide the reader past a menagerie of better explanations, and towards the one Shamir apparently wants.
From: Redacting Corruption: The Guardian's Political Censorship of Wikileaks, by Israel Shamir.
[I]t is now clear that The Guardian edits and distorts the cables in order to protect their readers from unflattering remarks about how their corporations behave overseas. The Guardian has deliberately excised portions of published cables to hide evidence of corruption....
[The Guardian's editing process] It looks like nothing so much as political self-censorship...
Why does The Guardian wish to conceal evidence of corruption in Kazakhstan? Are there Blairites ensconced in The Guardian’s editing room? It does seem like someone at The Guardian wants to save us from becoming disillusioned about free markets. Is the free market incompatible with free speech?...
Why did The Guardian choose to excise the vast majority of the cable? To protect the British go-between? To protect the connection with Chernoy, a prominent Israeli businessman? Is there an Uzbekistani criminal pulling the strings at The Guardian? There doesn’t seem to be much logic behind the move, or any real interest in publishing the cables.
Unless Shamir is being facetious, we are asked, then, variously, to humour the possibility that the one or all of the following statements is true:
Having laid the groundwork for it, Shamir feels confident, in the middle of the article, to state his thesis explicitly, careful to present it as the only correct inference from the data he has presented.
From: Redacting Corruption: The Guardian's Political Censorship of Wikileaks, by Israel Shamir.
Although the agreement between Wikileaks and The Guardian permits the newspaper to block out the names of innocent people who might suffer upon disclosure, the Astana cable was clearly redacted for political reasons, in order to protect the image of the kind of predatory capitalism they preach in the East.
This is not the most likely explanation of The Guardian's conduct. Before I get to that, though, it will be necessary to verify that the redactions Shamir alleges did in fact occur.
The Guardian's redactions
The bulk of Shamir's article focuses on the 10ASTANA72 cable, which was created on January 25th, 2010 in the U.S. Embassy in Astana, Kazakhstan. The cable was subjectlined: KAZAKHSTAN: MONEY AND POWER. Shamir draws attention to redactions in The Guardian's version of 10ASTANA72. He compares the redacted paragraphs in The Guardian's version of the cable with (heavily edited) selections from the full cable. It was initially difficult to verify that his own extracts from the full version of 10ASTANA72 were correct, since he did not link to a source. The Astana cable available on the Wikileaks site contained the same redactions as did The Guardian's version, on the date of the publication of Shamir's article. On January 13th, however, the unredacted Astana cable was made available on the Wikileaks site. This allows us to verify whether Shamir's claims are true.
The cable describes a dinner with Maksat Idenov, the First Vice-President of a state-owned Kazakh oil and gas company, KazMunayGas, during which details emerge on a culture of corruption involving Kazakh government officials and companies involved in the energy industry. We are informed that Idenov is well connected, and has personal ties to the President of Kazakhstan, Nursultan Nazarbayev. The first redaction Shamir draws attention to is a short passage in the SUMMARY of the Astana cable. A perusal of the unredacted version on the Wikileaks website reveals that the text redacted in The Guardian's version was indeed, as Shamir claimed, the text I have bolded in the following extract.
From: 10ASTANA72 (Wikileaks' unredacted version with Guardian redactions bolded)
1. (S) SUMMARY: During a private dinner, KazMunaiGaz First Vice President Maksat Idenov named, in his view, the four most powerful gate-keepers around President Nursultan Nazarbayev: Chief of Administration and General Services of the President's Office Sarybai Kalmurzayev, the President's Chief of Staff Aslan Musin, State Secretary-Foreign Minister Kanat Saudabayev, and the tandem of Prime Minister Karim Masimov and Nazarbayev's billionaire son-in-law Timur Kulibayev. According to Idenov, in Kazakhstan, market economy means capitalism, which means big money, which means large bribes for the best connected. The following details are a single snapshot of one version of current reality. The significant point is that Nazarbayev is standing with Idenov, not Kulibayev, to maintain international standards to develop the massive Kashagan and Karachaganak hydrocarbon projects. END SUMMARY.
Another redaction obscures the allegation by Idenov that British Gas and Italian energy company, ENI, are "corrupt," and appears to imply that Idenov's proximity to President Nazarbayev is what stands in the way of Timur Kulibayev, Nazarbayev's son-in-law, seeking bribes from these companies.
From: 10ASTANA72 (Wikileaks' unredacted version with Guardian redactions bolded)
5. (S) Soon, intermediaries arranged an Idenov-Kulibayev meeting. Idenov said they both pretended to ignore the core problem -- Kulibayev's, he alleged, avarice for large bribes. Idenov averred he told Kulibayev, "Please watch your image and reputation. You have a real opportunity to improve your own image and the image of the nation." Idenov said Kulibayev was "like a Buddha with a Paris manicure," and both understood life would continue. Idenov said he believes he has, so far, the president's protection. "But the games continue," he said. Idenov alleged that both BG and Italy's ENI are corrupt-- and Kulibayev is salivating to profit from them -- but, so far, Idenov stands in the way. "So long as Nazarbayev says he wants Kashagan and Karachaganak developed according to international standards, that's what I'll do."
Shamir's remaining example of suspicious redaction is confusing. He chooses to paraphrase the passages that were unredacted in the Guardian cable, and to insert the redacted passages in boldface. Compare:
From: Redacting Corruption: The Guardian's Political Censorship of Wikileaks, by Israel Shamir.
Just before dinner, Idenov was overheard “barking into his cell phone” at British Gas (BG) Country Director Mark Rawlings “who is ‘still playing games with Mercator's James Giffin,’ the notorious AmCit fixer indicted for large-scale bribery on oil deals in the 1990s, whose case drags on in the Southern District Court of New York. Idenov tells him: ‘Mark, stop being an idiot! Stop tempting fate! Stop communicating with an indicted criminal!’ ”
and:
From: 10ASTANA72 (The Guardian's redacted version)
When the Ambassador arrived, Idenov was barking into his cell phone, "Mark, Mark, stop the excuses! Mark, listen to me! Mark, shut up right now and do as I say! Bring the letter to my office at 10:00 pm, and we will go together to take it to (Minister of Energy and Mineral Resources, MEMR) Mynbayev at his house." On ending the call, Idenov explained he was talking to British Gas (BG">BG) Country Director for Kazakhstan Mark Rawlings who had missed the deadline to deliver a letter about arbitration on the Karachaganak super-giant oil-field project (reftel). Still clearly steamed, Idenov XXXXXXXXXXXX "I tell him, 'Mark, stop being an idiot! Stop tempting fate! XXXXXXXXXXXX Idenov asked, "Do you know how much he (Rawlings) makes? $72,000 a month! A month!! Plus benefits! Plus bonuses! Lives in Switzerland but supposedly works in London. Comes here once a month to check in. Nice life, huh?"
The apparent disparity between the two versions led some readers to believe that Shamir was doctoring the Astana cable, but a close reading of the above reveals that Shamir hasn't doctored anything - only advertised the redactions in a confusing way. To set the record straight, the following is the same passage from the full cable on Wikileaks' site, with the redacted parts bolded.
From: 10ASTANA72 (Wikileaks' unredacted version)
When the Ambassador arrived, Idenov was barking into his cell phone, "Mark, Mark, stop the excuses! Mark, listen to me! Mark, shut up right now and do as I say! Bring the letter to my office at 10:00 pm, and we will go together to take it to (Minister of Energy and Mineral Resources, MEMR) Mynbayev at his house." On ending the call, Idenov explained he was talking to British Gas (BG) Country Director for Kazakhstan Mark Rawlings who had missed the deadline to deliver a letter about arbitration on the Karachaganak super-giant oil-field project (reftel). Still clearly steamed, Idenov alleged, "He's still playing games with Mercator's James Giffin," the notorious AmCit fixer indicted for large-scale bribery on oil deals in the 1990s, whose case drags on in the Southern District Court of New York. "I tell him, 'Mark, stop being an idiot! Stop tempting fate! Stop communicating with an indicted criminal!'" Idenov asked, "Do you know how much he (Rawlings) makes? $72,000 a month! A month!! Plus benefits! Plus bonuses! Lives in Switzerland but supposedly works in London. Comes here once a month to check in. Nice life, huh?"
The Shamir article goes on to draw attention to the almost complete redaction of the 06TASHKENT902 cable, the full version of which apparently relates incriminating material about Uzbekistani political operative Salim Abduvaliyev, who is described here as a "crime boss" and a "top mobster." Absurdly, Shamir also finds that The Guardian "decided not to publish [06TASHKENT465] at all." Unless he has any evidence that The Guardian considered publishing 06TASHKENT465 and decided not to, this is a strange imputation - we could equally hold any media-partner with Wikileaks accountable for not having published cables the other media partners have covered. Both of these cables (hyperlinked above) have since January 13th become available on the official Wikileaks website, and are now available to confirm Shamir's claims.
Why did the Guardian redact this information?
Shamir is quite correct to find these redactions troubling. They do appear to present information of solid public interest to The Guardian's readership. The redacted parts of 10ASTANA72 add to a picture wherein the Vice President of a state-owned Kazakh oil and gas company is advising a British Gas Director to desist in apparently substantive dealings with the former head of the Mercator Corporation, James Giffen. Giffen had been charged with the bribery of Kazakh president Nursultan Nazarbayev to secure contracts for Western companies ensuring access to the Tengiz oil fields. The affair has come to be referred to as Kazakhgate. Prior even to his arrest, Giffen had become ex-C.I.A. analyst Robert Baer's "Mr. Kazakhstan" in his book See No Evil, which in turn came to inspire this character in Steve Gaghan's movie, Syriana.
In November, Giffen was acquitted. Shamir expresses quite common doubts about the decision of the court, and about the process of justice, in the Giffen trial, on the basis that the mitigating factors explicitly recognized by the judge appear to have been that the CIA had put a stamp of approval on what otherwise would have been corrupt practices.
From: Redacting Corruption: The Guardian's Political Censorship of Wikileaks, by Israel Shamir.
Again, the bold and very relevant information of the Astana cable has been removed from publication so that British taxpayers might not learn that the regional director of a prominent British company insists on dealing with an indicted grafter. The readers of The Guardian may never know that the case of American citizen (“AmCit”) James Giffen (spelled incorrectly in the cable) was dismissed by US District Judge William H. Pauley III because the bribes he gave to the Kazakh officials were authorized by the CIA. The judge publicly lauded the “notorious fixer” as a Cold War warrior who helped the Jewish cause and stated for the record that “his business dealings were CIA-authorized operations”.
But the mention of Giffen, and the context it puts the other redactions in, actually presents us with a far more likely explanation for why The Guardian redacted as it did. The discussion in the 10ASTANA72 happened in January of 2010, nearly a year ago, and the reference to Giffen presents us with insider banter on James Giffen's "notoriety," whose trial had been ongoing since his arrest in 2003. It is apparent that harm to reputation was a substantial part of Mr Giffen's defense, and reference was again made to this in the ruling that dismissed the charges against him, in November of 2010.
From: Judge Lauds Giffen As a 'Patriot'
[Judge] Pauley said the ordeal that Giffen, 69, underwent after his March 2003 arrest at John F. Kennedy Airport in New York, hurt his reputation and his business. "How do you give a 69-year-old man his reputation back?" he asked, implying that the 60-plus count Foreign Corrupt Practices Act case against Giffen and his tiny New York-based investment bank Mercator Corp. never should have been brought.
The 10ASTANA72 cable associates an American businessman's name with the same crimes for which he has very recently been acquitted. He considers the corruption charges brought against him to have been highly damaging to his own reputation and to that of his former business. These are not points that are likely to be lost on The Guardian. The U.K. paper clearly stated at the outset that it would be particularly averse to the risk of libel suits against it, and would publish according to this aversity.
From: The Guardian: Editor's Note on Wikileaks' Embassy Cables
There are some cables the Guardian will not be releasing or reporting owing to the nature of sourcing or subject matter. Our domestic libel laws impose a special burden on British publishers.
The special burden referred to here is well documented, especially by Wikileaks' own publication record. The British law of libel is one of the classic villains of Wikileaks' four-year history. To pick an example, the British press was prevented by a secret media-injunction from reporting on the the Minton report, a report detailing a mass chemical contamination accident involving the British multinational Trafigura off the Ivory Coast, in which over 100,000 people were affected. (The Minton report is available in Wikileaks' archive, available here.)
When an attempt was made by British MP Paul Farrelly to circumvent this injunction, under parliamentary privelege, by asking a parliamentary question about the report, the Carter-Ruck law firm, representing Trafigura, managed to injunct The Guardian and other papers from mentioning even Farrelly's question. The result was the following, from David Leigh, on 12th of October, 2009.
From: Guardian gagged from reporting parliament
The Guardian has been prevented from reporting parliamentary proceedings on legal grounds which appear to call into question privileges guaranteeing free speech established under the 1688 Bill of Rights.
Today's published Commons order papers contain a question to be answered by a minister later this week. The Guardian is prevented from identifying the MP who has asked the question, what the question is, which minister might answer it, or where the question is to be found.
The Guardian is also forbidden from telling its readers why the paper is prevented – for the first time in memory – from reporting parliament. Legal obstacles, which cannot be identified, involve proceedings, which cannot be mentioned, on behalf of a client who must remain secret.
The only fact the Guardian can report is that the case involves the London solicitors Carter-Ruck, who specialise in suing the media for clients, who include individuals or global corporations.
During an ALDE-organized EU parliamentary debate on Freedom of Expression, Assange spoke specifically about this issue, and his exchange with libel lawyer Alastair Mullis during that debate became quite popular on Youtube shortly afterwards. The full discussion can be seen here.
One issue Assange draws specific attention to is that British libel law is such that large companies can abuse legal process to force publishers into silence. Publishers often agree to out-of-court settlements in order to avoid the onerous costs of defending a libel case against deep-pocketed companies. And an even broader effect is that U.K. media organizations avoid the reportage of information that is likely to render them liable to litigation.
In the U.K. the burden of proof is on the publisher. "Have you stopped beating your wife yet? Prove it to me. See you in court..." The reason that the U.K. system is abused so much is that the burden of proof is on the writer to prove everything. That means if you're a Ukrainian investigative journalist and I know some, that write about the electricity oligarchy in Ukraine, in Ukrainian, in a Ukrainian newspaper, who was sued in London by that Ukrainian oligarch, and couldn't afford, or chose not to spend money briefing lawyers in the U.K. paying for that whole case. They instantly lost because they did not establish their proof burden. Furthermore libel cases in the U.K. on average are a hundred times the expense of libel cases in Continental Europe. Now the strategy used by Carter-Ruck and other libel firms working that sector is to do what? It is to make publishers bleed. Publisher's don't have much money. If you're working for a billionaire like Nadhmi Auchi all you've to do is keep the publisher in court, keep them bleeding with legal costs; eventually the publishers say, we cannot sustain these legal costs anymore, therefore we're just going to pull out of the case. At the moment you pull out of the case and haven't established your proof burden, under the U.K. system, youa re then liable for all your opponents costs. The result of which is you have to pay all your opponents costs. You spoke about damages but you deliberately avoided costs. Costs are normally more than damages. So that's how the whole trick works... The cases in the U.K. are just extraordinary. These are extraordinary abuses. And in a way it is not the law at the end that is the problem. It is the law at the beginning that is the problem. It is the process that is the problem and it is inequious access to justice that is the problem...
It is far more likely that the redactions to which Israel Shamir draws attention in his article were performed by a litigation-averse British publisher to ward off the prospect of either
or
If this theory is true, and I submit that it more plausible than Shamir's theory, the result is that, yes, The Guardian appears to have censored itself, and the public has thereby been deprived of one avenue of discovering suspect practices by British corporations in the former Soviet bloc. This is certainly an undesirable state of affairs - something those of us who care about the exposure of corruption and the discovery of the truth ought to lament.
But it betrays an unsophisticated appreciation of the phenomenon of corporate media censorship to lay the sole responsibility for this omission at The Guardian's feet. The chilling-effect which gives rise to a culture of self-censorship is a problem, but it is a systemic problem with branches in the state of the law, in the media culture we find ourselves in and in the regulatory regime in which corporations operate, and which define their capabilities and powers. Shamir is very eager to impute conspiratorial motives to The Guardian, but a useful mantra when addressing concerns like this is that most 'conspiracies' are just the accidental harmony of many self-interested actors, playing out. I believe that that is what we are seeing here.
None of the above necessarily excludes the prospect that there are, in fact, untoward and politically motivated editorial decisions being made in The Guardian offices, but it is intended that the above reflections raise a slightly more plausible answer to Shamir's rhetorical questions than the one he provides himself.
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