Law

EU Parliment Eyes War Crimes Revelations, Calls for Independent Inquiry

The MIT Center for Future Civic Media hosted a panel titled "Civic Media and the Law" to discuss the legal challenges related to crowdsourcing and websites like WikiLeaks, versus traditional journalism source protection.

The panelists included David Ardia, co-founder of the Citizen Media Law Project and Fellow at the Berkman Center for Internet & Society, Micah Sifry, co-founder and editor of the Personal Democracy Forum, and Daniel Schuman, policy counsel at the Sunlight Foundation.

Event details and the video recording of the panel are available at the MIT website

Hacks/Hackers Boston, in partnership with the Boston University School of Communication, Department of Journalism, and the Society of Professional Journalists, is presenting a panel discussion on "Legal liability in the age of WikiLeaks."

The panelists will be First Ammendment attorneys Jon Albano of Bingham McCutcheon and Robert A. Bertsche of Prince Lobel. The panel will be moderated by Dan Kennedy, assistant professor at Northeastern's School of Journalism.

The panel discussion will take place at the Boston University Student Lounge at 6pm. Please find further event details here.

Omar Khadr was taken as a child from his home in Canada to fight the NATO invaders in Afghanistan. When he was 15, he was caught in a battle with US forces. He lost his vision in one eye, was shot in the back twice, and was confined in US torture camps from the time he was 15 until he was 24, without a trial, and without access to a lawyer for years.

Recently, I watched a scene from another time in history, a set piled high with paper, where professionals in business suits scurried through rooms with dollies stacked with boxes of paper, all stamped, signed, and distributed in huge amounts of copies. Everything was tabbed and filed beyond all comprehensibility, people were flipping madly through binders in a race against time, no one agreed on any of the facts or could find any, and the end result was a mop of perspiration and a guess at the facts in most cases.

Extradition has been a touchy subject between Canada and the US at various times in history. During the Vietnam War, the US was infuriated by Canada’s refusal to return draft dodgers, but those were the days when Canada had a very liberal government that annoyed the US and stood up for widely held Canadian values whenever they thought they could get away with it. Times have changed.

Read more ...

Ok, he is not Omar Khadr. He is not Maher Arar either. But to some, this story in its very unimportance sends a very cold chill through Canada.

Marc Emery is a Vancouver icon. The Prince of Pot, a well loved character who founded the BC Marijauna Party and ran for office 12 times, in a province that would have legalized marijuana decades ago, assuming they had ever bothered making it illegal in the first place. Located in the city fondly known as Vansterdam, where the 4/20 celebrations are legend, Marc is not a criminal so much as an integral part of the culture.