Australian WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange was awarded a peace medal by the Sydney Peace Foundation for leaking many governments secret documentation thus challenging “the old order of power in politics and journalism”.
Reported by AAP, the director of the Sydney Peace prize foundation Professor Stuart Rees said “Peace from our point of view is really about justice, fairness and the attainment of human rights,” Professor Rees said. “Assange has championed people’s right to know and has challenged the centuries-old tradition that governments are entitled to keep the public in a state of ignorance.”
The Sydney Peace Foundation noted that “WikiLeaks has exposed the extent to which governments, the military and business all over the world have used secrecy to cloak their real intentions and activities,” it said.
Professor Rees said Mr Assange’s work believes “… those in power moved quickly to silence their critics even by perverting the course of justice,” he said in a statement.
Mr Assange is on bail in Britain, under house arrest, awaiting a court decision on whether he should be extradited to Sweden to face sexual assault allegations.
The Sydney Peace Foundation is a not-for-profit organisation set up in 1998 within the University of Sydney.