Showing posts with label chelsea manning. Show all posts
Showing posts with label chelsea manning. Show all posts

Sunday, September 1, 2013

Snowden Supporters Applaud his Empty Chair in Berlin

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From RT.com
Former NSA contractor Edward Snowden has been awarded the biennial “whistleblower prize” in Germany, worth some $3,900, in recognition of his “bold efforts” to expose the monitoring of communications data by his former employer.
The prize, last awarded in 2011, was officially bestowed upon the 30-year-old at a ceremony in Berlin which took place Friday, prompting a nine-minute congratulatory video message from Guardian journalist Glenn Greenwald on Saturday.

Transparency International Deutschland e.V. contributed towards the award, which is given every two years by the Vereinigung Deutscher Wissenschaftler (VDW e.V.) and the German Section of the International Association Of Lawyers Against Nuclear Arms (IALANA e.V.).
Persons are honored who reveal malpractices and dangerous developments for humans and society, and that affect democracy, peace and the environment.
~ Digital Journal



It seems important to say that Edward Snowden is a person of high moral character. I can't really imagine who would be better fitting for this award, not just this year, but almost any year. That isn't to forget about Chelsea Manning, that isn't to forget that other people have not done great service for humanity.
But when I spoke with him this evening, his first question was not about how things would go. He asked me if I had slept. He asked me how I was feeling. And, uh, I told him that I was fine and he said, 'Are you sure?' (laughter in audience) This is a person who really cares about other people.
This is the person who, while he has been attacked and relentlessly smeared by the propaganda machines, he is the person who has thrown himself onto the very gears of that machine. And he has done it for each and every one of us.
~ Wikileaks Internet Activist Jacob Appelbaum while presenting the Whistle-Blower award to Snowden





If I ran the committee, making the choice of who was to receive this award, it would take me probably one and a half seconds at most to have come to the conclusion that he is the only person deserving of the award this year.
. . . I've written a lot about whistle-blowing and thought a lot about it, and there's two real components to whistle-blowing: One is the disclosure of wrongdoing, serious wrongdoing on the part of factions; and the second one is to disclose that wrongdoing at some risk to yourself. . . . (Snowden) embodies both of those as purely as you can imagine.
. . . Really, a single individual who just on his own made a choice that had extreme ripple effects on all sorts of realms that I think to this day are still underappreciated and unknown. And this lesson that any individual, no matter how formidable the adversary seems, no matter entrenched the oppressive institution appears to be, can stand up to that institution and challenge it and shine light on it and bring about real change, I think is a lesson that all kinds of people around the world, from very young to very old, on every continent of the Earth, will take from this.
~ Glenn Greenwald



















Thursday, August 22, 2013

Bradley Manning is now Chelsea Manning

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Previous Related Posts:
Wikileaks Associate Bradley Manning Sentenced to 35 Years in Prison
Bradley Manning Apologizes at Trial



~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Complete Statement from Chelsea Manning from NBC Today Show
Subject: The Next Stage of My Life

I want to thank everybody who has supported me over the last three years. Throughout this long ordeal, your letters of support and encouragement have helped keep me strong. I am forever indebted to those who wrote to me, made a donation to my defense fund, or came to watch a portion of the trial. I would especially like to thank Courage to Resist and the Bradley Manning Support Network for their tireless efforts in raising awareness for my case and providing for my legal representation.

As I transition into this next phase of my life, I want everyone to know the real me. I am Chelsea Manning. I am a female. Given the way that I feel, and have felt since childhood, I want to begin hormone therapy as soon as possible. I hope that you will support me in this transition. I also request that, starting today, you refer to me by my new name and use the feminine pronoun (except in official mail to the confinement facility). I look forward to receiving letters from supporters and having the opportunity to write back.

Thank you,

Chelsea E. Manning

While Fort Leavenworth, the prison where Manning will serve her sentence, does not offer hormone therapy, (Attorney David) Coombs told host Savannah Guthrie he would fight to ensure his client received the medical treatment she needed. He also said he and Manning had not discussed sex reassignment surgery, and that getting her access to the needed hormones is his priority at this time.
Asked why Chelsea Manning had not made a statement about her gender before the trial was over, Coombs said, “She didn’t want this to be something that overshadowed the case.”
~ MSNBC

The Army does not provide hormone therapy or sex-reassignment surgery for gender identity disorder.
~ Statement from the United States Disciplinary Barracks at Fort Leavenworth