He who doesn't knock sits

American journalist arrested for silence

Yesterday, New York Times journalist Judith Miller was taken into custody for four months right in the courthouse after she again stated that she would not reveal the source of her scandalous information. “If journalists cannot guarantee the confidentiality of their sources, then they will not be able to hold the government accountable or publish materials that are objectionable to the authorities,” Ms. Miller said.

Judge Thomas Hogan responded: “We must obey the law, because if we give in today, then tomorrow anyone will be able to explain violations of the law by their principles, and we will fall into anarchy.” He ordered the journalist to be placed in a “suitable prison” in the suburbs of Washington. If the prisoner does not speak, she will remain there until October 28, when the powers of the grand jury in the White House leak case expire. But prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald is confident that in the cell people quickly “change their minds and start talking.”

Judith Miller, 57, left the courtroom sad, handing her husband, 76-year-old publisher Jason Epstein, a gold chain as a farewell. Ms. Miller is a renowned journalist and Pulitzer Prize winner. She has been with the New York Times since 1977. She worked in Cairo, Paris, wrote about the Middle East and Al-Qaeda. But especially a lot about the fact that Saddam Hussein “has weapons of mass destruction” (WMD). “Of course, I was wrong, but because my sources were wrong,” she justified herself when Iraq was occupied by America, but WMD were not found there. In the United States, some media outlets even suggest that Ms. Miller deliberately went to prison in order to somehow whitewash her journalistic reputation, which had been tarnished by the Iraqi lies.

The scandal, which ended in prison for Judith Miller, broke out in 2003. Then George Bush justified the need for war in Iraq by the fact that Saddam Hussein purchased uranium for nuclear weapons in Niger. A commission headed by ex-ambassador Joe Wilson was sent to Niger. When he returned, he published an article in the New York Times calling Bush's arguments a lie.

Eight days later, American media, citing sources in the White House, said that Wilson's trip to Niger was organized by his wife, Valerie Plame. Moreover, journalists discovered that this woman was a secret CIA agent, working specifically on weapons of mass destruction. Plame's 42-year-old CIA career was in doubt. Joe Wilson said that by declassifying his wife, the White House took revenge on him for criticizing Bush.

Since US laws prohibit disclosing the names of secret agents, prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald began an investigation into who in the White House “leaked” the information and whether it was revenge on Ambassador Wilson. He interrogated the journalists who wrote about it. Ultra-conservative columnist Robert Novak wrote first. But he was not brought to trial, so it is assumed that he cooperated with the investigation and named his sources.

Until the last day, Time magazine reporter Matthew Cooper refused to hand over his informants. However, yesterday, on the day of the trial, he agreed to testify to the grand jury. And he was left free. As the journalist himself explained, on the eve of the trial he received “personal and unequivocal” permission from his source to testify. According to many, this source is Karl Rove, the “gray eminence” of the White House, Bush’s assistant.

So the only journalist who refused to reveal the source of her information and went to prison for it was Judith Miller. This is despite the fact that she (at least under her last name) never wrote about Valerie Plame, although she communicated with officials on this topic.

According to the New York Times, prosecutor Fitzgerald, having analyzed the records of telephone conversations at his disposal from that time, was convinced that Ms. Miller knew those who named the wife of Ambassador Wilson. The US is confident that the prosecutor has long known which of the Bush administration employees spilled the beans. But he wants to hear it from journalists. According to Joe Wilson, it is no coincidence that the New York Times journalist was punished. He criticized Bush in this newspaper two years ago. And now he considers everything that is happening “a conspiracy to hide the web of lies that was intended to justify the invasion of Iraq.”

Andrey ZLOBIN