Time and again GCHQ and other intelligence agencies have spuriously used 'national security arguments' to suppress information and stifle debate
By Richard Norton-Taylor and Ian Cobain
theguardian.com, Wednesday 16 October 2013
Ever since they were set up more than a hundred years ago Britain's
security and intelligence agencies have been accused of using the excuse
of "national security" to suppress information. Whenever information
has been disclosed against their will, through leaks or whistleblowers,
they have claimed security has been jeopardised.
Agencies are said
to have consistently used this argument to protect themselves from
embarrassment and to suppress evidence of information relating to a wide
range of subjects, from government waste to involvement in torture.
Ministerial claims that the publication of reports based on NSA
and GCHQ documentation undermined national security prompted a scathing
response from United Nations experts on freedom of expression and human
rights.
"The protection of national security secrets must never
be used as an excuse to intimidate the press into silence and backing
off from its crucial work in the clarification of human rights
violations," the UN special rapporteur on freedom of opinion and
expression, Frank La Rue, said.
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