Chelsea Manning summoned to appear before the grand jury of the Assange investigation

Chelsea Manning has been summoned before a grand jury in the investigation into Julian Assange, officials said, adding that prosecutors remain interested in WikiLeaks' release of diplomatic cables and military war diaries in 2010.

Attorneys in Virginia filed lawsuits against pirated emails during the 2016 presidential campaign before WikiLeaks published it, and it is not clear that investigators are interested in this activity. Officials discussed the investigation by Assange, who founded WikiLeaks, under the guise of anonymity because of the secrecy of the grand jury process.

Manning, whose New York Times cited summons to appear for the first time, is a former army soldier who spent seven years in a military prison for transmitting to WikiLeaks secret cables and cables. military documents before receiving a switch from President Barack Obama.

Manning's lawyers filed a motion to quash the subpoena.

"I strongly oppose this subpoena and grand jury process in general," Manning said in a statement. "We have seen this power abusing countless times to target political discourse. I have nothing to contribute to this case and I do not want to be put in danger by participating in this predatory practice. "

The summons was signed last month by Gordon Kromberg, National Security Attorney in the Assange case. Last month, Kromberg persuaded a judge to leave under indictment an indictment against Assange, despite his inadvertent exposure to a non-court-related case last year.

Under Obama, Justice Ministry officials had decided not to charge Assange and WikiLeaks after concluding that this could set a precedent that would pave the way for prosecutions of news organizations for publishing news reports. confidential. But the case was reviewed under President Trump.

Steve Vladeck, a professor at the Law School of the University of Texas at Austin, said the Justice Department had accused Assange last year of staying within the 10-year limitation period for illegal possession or publication of national defense information, and is currently working to add fees. "There is nothing else that makes sense," he said.

"The heart of the controversy is that there has never been any lawsuits" for the publication of classified information, Vladeck said. "There has always been the specter of a first amendment defense."

Peter Zeidenberg, a national security defense lawyer, said that he did not see why Manning would refuse summons to appear. "She has already been prosecuted, she has been sentenced, she has served a sentence," he said. "She has no fifth amendment privilege on self-incrimination. If she does not testify, she will be considered a contempt. "

Manning appears to be the last individual to testify before the grand jury charged with investigating Assange in the eastern district of Virginia.

Last July, computer expert David House, who had become friends with Manning in 2010 in a hacker space in Boston that he had founded, testified during 90 minutes before the grand jury. In an interview, House said he met the founder of WikiLeaks in January 2011 while Assange was under house arrest at Ellingham Hall, a mansion located 120 km northeast of London. Assange was fighting a request for extradition from Sweden, where he was facing an investigation into allegations of sexual assault.

Assange asked House to help her run political operations for WikiLeaks in the United States. "Specifically, he wanted me to help get a favorable press for Chelsea Manning," he said.

House, who testified in exchange for immunity, said the grand jury was interested in his relationship with Assange. "They wanted to have a complete overview of WikiLeaks, its goals and why I joined them," he said. "They wanted explanations about why certain things happened and how they happened. . . . Everything was linked to the revelations around the war diaries. "

The grand jury sought to know if Assange had asked Manning to hack the name of WikiLeaks, but did not insist "very hard" on it, he said.

During her trial, Manning testified that she acted herself to send documents to WikiLeaks and that no member of her entourage had forced her to give more information. .

House was not asked about WikiLeaks' release of Democratic e-mails in 2016, which US intelligence agencies have been hacked by Russians. He was not personally aware of it, he said.

He has never been informed of the charges being considered by prosecutors.

House said that his last contact with Assange took place in 2013 and that his last contact with WikiLeaks took place in 2015.

House said he feared retaliation for his association with WikiLeaks and Manning in 2010 and that he did not believe that lawsuits were being filed in the United States.

"This is not an investigation related to national security concerns," he said. "This is an investigation based on retribution and revenge against Mr. Assange for the [2010] flight that he rushed and how this leak affected the career of politicians in Washington, DC ".

Daniel Domscheit-Berg, a former spokesman for WikiLeaks who has been away from Assange, said in an interview that he had been contacted by the German Federal Police in October 2017 and that the American authorities wanted to talk to him about the "Manning-Julian relationship". He also received a letter from March 2018 reiterating the request of the time. Lawyer in the Eastern District, Dana Boente.

He added that the German police had told him that the FBI was interested in "what contact possible – a possible coordination" took place between Assange and Manning, he said. The Americans seemed interested in the "possible solicitation" of Assange of Manning, he said.

Domscheit-Berg told the German police that he was not interested in talking to the FBI.