German ‘digital rights’ blog probed for treason

BERLIN: German journalists and lawmakers warned of an attack on press freedom on Friday following news of a treason probe against bloggers who published Internet surveillance plans by the domestic security service.
The investigation against two writers of the blog Netzpolitik.org for allegedly publishing state secrets is thought to be Germany´s first treason case levelled against media since the 1960s. It comes amid continued debate over sweeping online surveillance by the US National Security Agency (NSA) revealed by fugitive intelligence contractor Edward Snowden and the degree of German cooperation.
The German Journalists Association condemned the probe for treason, which carries between one year and life in jail, as an “impermissible attempt to silence two critical colleagues” and called on chief prosecutor Harald Range to drop the case.
Writers of Netzpolitik (Net politics), which focuses on “digital civil rights” and was in 2014 awarded Germany´s Grimme Online Award, were defiant, stating that “we will not be intimidated”.
The blog had in February and April published documents on plans to step up Internet surveillance by Germany´s Federal Service for the Protection of the Constitution, whose chief Hans-Georg Maassen filed a criminal complaint.
Netzpolitik founder Markus Beckedahl, one of the two writers named in the probe, charged it was increasingly clear that the German government is “knee-deep in the swamp of NSA and Co”, in comments to public broadcaster ARD. The chair of the parliamentary judicial committee, Renate Kuenast of the Greens party, said the case “infuriates me and is a constitutional disgrace”, adding that “if there were no investigative journalism, we would know nothing.”