Julian Assange Interview on Nieuwsuur (08/09/2016)

Supplemental document for: "Theory that Roger Stone's back channel to Wikileaks was Randy Credico", link: https://wakelet.com/wake/2d352ae9-febe-44a1-a7bb-51674a2e4bf5

Interview with Julian Assange on Nieuwsuur (News Hour) on Dutch television. Interviewer: Eelco Bosch van Rosenthal. Broadcast date: August 9, 2016.

File link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o1qZFpJOqhg

Excerpt one goes from 3:05 to 8:12 in file.

Direct link to file's first excerpt: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o1qZFpJOqhg#t=3m05s

Excerpt two goes from 8:38 to in file.

Direct link to file's second excerpt: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o1qZFpJOqhg#t=8m38s

Transcribed excerpts, the interview excerpts, are in English in the original, with the intros and concluding sections, excluded from this transcript, in Dutch.

FIRST EXCERPT:

JULIAN ASSANGE
We have a lot of material related to the U.S. election, campaign, including related to Hillary Clinton's campaign, to the foundation, and to the DNC.

EELCO BOSCH VAN ROSENTHAL
Does it come from the same source? This leak, or this hack, perhaps, as the other emails?

ASSANGE
We don't- It's been our policy, we never discuss sources, ruling them out, ruling them in, etc. Because you can play an elimination game, to find out our sources. But suffice to say, that there is intense interest in the U.S. election. And has been a driver for a number of interested people, to submit material to the media. Including Wikileaks.

VAN ROSENTHAL
If you are so fond of democracy, if this is about democracy, does it matter that the source of these emails, or the source of the hacking, at least, is most likely from a country that does not take democracy very seriously, Russia? Because that is what has been published.

ASSANGE
Well, that's false. James Clapper, the head of the U.S. intelligence, has come out and said, that they have no attribution, in relation to who supplied Wikileaks material, they're not certain as to motive, and there's our publication, and then there's various hacks that have occured in the United States over the past few years, from a wide variety of actors. There has been a very deliberate inflation by the Hillary Clinton campaign, of course, to try and distract, distract from the revelations rigging the nomination process, and go, look, Russia, or something like that. That's from a journalist point of view, we get this kind of thing all the time. Whenever we publish about some major institution, they're always trying to make a distraction. But, I think it is a serious claim, by the Clinton campaign, why do I say that? Well, because they have now said that an electoral candidate, Trump, is somehow an agent of the Russians. They said another investigative publisher, The Intercept, is an agent of the Russians, is a stooge of the Russians. That Wikileaks is. Even in the Bernie Sanders process, they tried that. So this harkens back to a very grim period, in U.S. history, McCarthyism, where anyone who was politically opposed, you say is an agent of a foreign government.

VAN ROSENTHAL
Yeah, but isn't this what it's about, mostly: you've spoken about Hillary Clinton in the past many times, you don't want to see her even near the White House, you've made that very clear. Is this pure journalism, or is this a personal vendetta? Because it sometimes seems like it.

ASSANGE
No, Wikileaks speaks about power. It has nothing to do with my personal position. I'm the editor of Wikileaks, I have a professional responsibility, the organization-

VAN ROSENTHAL
But you said-

ASSANGE
-never-

VAN ROSENTHAL
-but you've said you'd like to "crush the bastards."

ASSANGE
We would never, not publish such information once we verified it to be true.

VAN ROSENTHAL
You'd publish it about the Trump campaign as well.

ASSANGE
Of course. We would love to publish such information, perhaps we will. [inaudible] What's the allegation here? That CNN wouldn't publish it [the Clinton emails]? The New York Times wouldn't publish it. I think that's a very interesting question. I actually think perhaps they wouldn't. But sources trust that we will publish, as long as it's of interest to the public.

VAN ROSENTHAL
In case a foreign government does interfere with U.S. elections, wouldn't it be interesting to the public to know, wouldn't they need to know?

ASSANGE
Well, what we have here, is proof that Hillary Clinton's campaign and the head of the Democratic party, did interfere with the U.S. elections- Four heads have rolled as a result [firings at DNC, including chairperson Debbie Wasserman Schultz]. This question about countries spying on each other, we know in fact that it's the United States National Security Agency that is the most aggressive spier, on other nations. And we have obtained evidence, which we will publish in due course, about U.S. intelligence agencies interfering in European elections. So-

VAN ROSENTHAL
Does that make this right, in case it's true?

ASSANGE
Yes yes, of course, it's an interesting question that people should look at.

VAN ROSENTHAL
Are you trying to influence the election in the U.S.?

ASSANGE
We're doing as we always done, trying to educate our audience to understand how the world works in practice. So they can make decisions as to what they want to do, who they want to support, who they want to vote for, and so on.

SECOND EXCERPT:

ASSANGE
Whistleblowers go to significant efforts to get us material, and often very significant risks. There's a twenty seven year old, works for the DNC, shot in the back, murdered [Seth Rich], just two weeks ago, for unknown reasons, as he was walking down the street in Washington, so-

VAN ROSENTHAL
That was just a robbery, I believe, wasn't it?

ASSANGE
No, there's no finding. So-

VAN ROSENTHAL
What are you suggesting? What are you suggesting?

ASSANGE
I'm suggesting that our sources take risks, and they are, they become concerned to see things occurring like that-

VAN ROSENTHAL
But was he one of your sources? I mean-

ASSANGE
We don't comment on our sources-

VAN ROSENTHAL
So, why make the suggestion? About a young guy being shot on the streets of Washington?

ASSANGE
Because we have to understand how high the stakes are. In the United States. And that our sources, are...face serious risks, that's why they come to us, to protect their anonymity.

VAN ROSENTHAL
But it's quite something to suggest a murder, that's basically what you're doing.

ASSANGE
Well, others have suggested _that_. We are investigating to understand what happened, in that situation, with Seth Rich. I think it is a concerning situation, there's not a conclusion yet, we wouldn't be willing to state a conclusion, but we are concerned about it. More importantly, a variety of Wikileaks sources are concerned when that kind of thing happens.