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Comment by fblp | Hacker News Reader

From the article: - The court made this order to:

"- prevent damage to Australia's international relations that may be caused by the publication of material that may damage the reputations of specified individuals who are not the subject of charges in these proceedings. These orders are made on the grounds that they are:

- necessary to prevent a real and substantial risk of prejudice to the proper administration of justice that cannot be prevented by other reasonably available means; and

- necessary to prevent prejudice to the interests of the Commonwealth in relation to national security. "

The court would be very careful about making such orders and Australia has one of the strongest separations between the courts and the government. This means that the decision is likely to be made for fair administration of justice rather than for political reasons.

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Cute that you say that we have one of the strongest separations between courts and the government, given what Queensland's government has been doing to the court system here. There's been a fair bit of press [1],[2] about the friction between the current government and the court system, due to the state government trying to bend the courts to suit their political desires (examples include the election of an allegedly biased chief justice, the VLAD laws).

I'd agree with you normally, but it seems that the federal government is following the Queensland state government's lead in trying to manipulate the courts to their favour. I dearly hope we see some stronger push-back against that though because the separation of courts and government is one of the best things about this country.

[1]: http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-07-21/queensland-premier-cam...

[2]: http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/queensland/barrister-quits-o...

There's more than one court system in Australia; the order above was apparently made under Victorian jurisdiction.

While it's true about the QLD government, that's not to say our court system is largely healthy (esp compared to most other nations) and needs active awareness. Being aware of what the QLD gov does is not at decrement to the standing of the courts... it should strengthen it.

It seems likely that the individuals named in the order are likely to be brought up in the case.

If - as a totally fictional example - allegations were made that the RBA's Note Printing division attempted to bribe the head of some fictional nation, that would almost certainly damage Australia's international reputation, especially if people within Australia later attempted to cover that up.

Does the public's right-to-know outweigh that damage? Clearly the court thinks not.

I'll just leave these links here:

http://www.afr.com/p/national/probe_sought_on_new_rba_bribe_... (Note that the Saddam/Iraqi link is a separate case)

http://www.aph.gov.au/parliamentary_business/committees/sena... - look at page 370

Yes. Because secret court orders and censorship strengthen trust in the proper administration of justice.

Proper administration and trust in same are not the same thing. A 5-year moratorium on reporting of (possibly false) allegations could definitely be the proper approach.

Why not a 5 year moratorium on any details on any crime, since there could be significant defamation resulting from the trial? Why do these politicians have so much more protection that regular people? If international trade is so important, then why publish any details on any trading partner?

Some jurisdictions keep rape trials in camera for precisely this reason pending a guilty verdict. A great deal depends on the degree and credibility of the allegations made about the foreign counterparty, which I think the court is more qualified to assess than the public.

As for why yu treat some politicians and public officials with kid gloves, the short answer is because they run countries (to varying degrees) and a domestic legal issue, while important, may not be so important that it justifies the risk of destabilizing another country, since Australia will still need to deal with the country in question after the individuals in question have left the stage. Ultimately, the value of diplomatic relations may exceed that of short-term legal transparency, depending on the circumstances.

Nonsense. Which jurisdictions? None of the jurisdictions that value law and order have a complete shutdown of news over rape trials.

This is political censorship. What's next? A ban on any political corruption trials on Australian politicians, especially the prime minster, because it could destabilize the stock market and cause a loss in confidence in the Australian Dollar, causing billions of dollars in potential damage?

Money is not more important than what is right.

Rape trials are commonly held in camera in India. There's a serious debate about preserving defendant's anonymity prior to conviction in the UK, ably summarized here: http://www.criminallawandjustice.co.uk/features/Anonymity-Ch...

I'm not sure there's a single objective standard for 'what is right.' I would be reluctant to accept economic stability as an argument for secrecy, but I would be equally cautious about the possibility of injuring another country's stability. diplomacy and transparency are often at odds, but I don't think that's a negative quality of diplomacy.

Yes, and India is not a bastion for consistent and progressive jurisprudence. You are the only one classifying it as a "serious debate". And since when does accused anonymity equate to a complete banning of reporting on the details of an alleged crime?

If a country's stability is so easily damaged by details of a corruption case, then maybe it's time for a change. Nothing is more important than the truth and the freedom to report the truth. Who should be trusted to judge what should and should not be reported, and how much "damage" the truth would cause someone? The answer is no one.

Lord Justice Leveeson's inquiry into the press (the context in which this discussion of defendant anonymity takes) place has been a very high profile event in the UK. You asked for examples, I supplied some.

I hold a different opinion. The media likes to wax noble about the truth when a great deal of the time it aims to exploit gossip or poorly-substantiated rumor for economic gain, cf. the tabloid press. I can see value in a temporary moratorium which does not distort the historical record but which does not facilitate exploitation of it either. As I've said before, what the public is interested in is not the same thing as what is in the public interest.

You didn't give me an example. The UK attempted example was for anonymity, not a complete shut down of the press.

A small percentage of the media may be involved in gossip, but when it comes to political corruption, we need to have complete transparency, without any compromises. Using the threat of economic consequences is a horrible reason to enable politicians to usurp power from the free press.

I gave you the example of India (which derives its court system from the UK), it's not my fault you didn't like it.

A small percentage of the media may be involved in gossip, but when it comes to political corruption, we need to have complete transparency, without any compromises.

You need transparency of result, but you don't need it immediately. Legal proceedings can feature a lot of untruths as well, some of which could cause great harm. The reality is that courts in civilized countries deal with sealed evidence/testimony on a regular basis for a variety of reasons, and this doesn't substantially impede the course of justice even though it may occasionally be perverted. I'm highly skeptical of arguments that reject any possibility of compromise, because they tend to assume the outcome will be a perfect process.

Using the threat of economic consequences is a horrible reason to enable politicians to usurp power from the free press.

I think you're projecting your imagination about what the case involves a bit here. I really don't see enough details to be sure. What if the allegations under seal turn out to be baseless or inaccurate, for example? Is the satisfaction of immediate total transparency worth the damage that may accrue during a multi-year legal proceeding before the court issues a verdict? After all, you can punish guilty parties following a conviction, but it's very hard to repair an innocent person's reputation.

Where senior officials of other countries may be involved in a case, in a variety of capacities from potentially culpable to entirely innocent, are you willing to risk plunging someone else's country into political instability before you've had time to fully assess the evidence? What if the people of the country think the legal proceeding is an attempt to meddle with their internal politics, whether or not this is actually the case?

I strongly disagree with you about transparency being an unalloyed good or a panacea for social ills. Within reasonable limits (and I think a 5-year period for a complex legal proceeding may meet that standard) it can be appropriate to employ judicial discretion.

Obviously, we're not going to agree about this, but I'll put a note on my calendar to follow it up in 2019 and see what the big secret was.

As I said, India is a highly corrupt country, and their judicial system is not worthy of discussion. In a country where bribing of police officers is commonplace, I'm sure everything is open for discussion.

All you are doing is spreading FUD. If you were concerned about innocent people's reputations, then you would want all trials to be "in camera" with no information for 5 years.

There isn't even a single example where having an open trial plunged a country into political instability with the likes of what you describe, let alone from a trial in another country. It's pure nonsense.

"But but but... it COULD happen!" No, it can't ever happen. It's never happened and it never will.

There is no justification to censor the press for any reason, especially political censorship.

You don't have to approve of India's judicial system to acknowledge the fact that it hold some kinds of trials in camera, which was all I asserted.

"But but but... it COULD happen!" No, it can't ever happen. It's never happened and it never will.

Really? Here's an example of a trial that resulted in the collapse of a government, the assassination of a central figure, and eventual reversal of the verdicts by a higher court that found serious irregularities in how the trial had been conducted.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rudolf_Kastner

But carry on, you clearly know far more about this stuff than I do.

Interesting example but still further nonsense. A no confidence vote isn't political instability, that's exactly how the government should be working, ie political stability, especially when you have coalition governments. A government losing power in a no confidence vote happens all the time. That's like saying the US was plunged into ypolitical instability when George Bush Sr. lost his second term because of the "no new taxes" misstep.

Political instability is what happened in Syria, Thailand, Egypt, etc over the last few years. Contrast this to Canada where the same coalition government broke down and cause several elections over a span of a few years. But an educated perso would never consider Canada to be politically unstable.

If you want a more obvious example you could just look at Thailand, but I didn't really want to bring that up because it's so current and it's so hard to tell whether legal actions against erstwhile prime minister Yingluck Shinawatra were brought in good faith or pursuant to the plotting of the military coup (she was dismissed from office by the Thai constitutional Court over the transfer of a national security adviser, which the court said was to facilitate nepotism).

Shush! We can't have anyone be reasonable, now can we, when we are talking about democracy and transparency! Them corrupt fat cats are holding us down, and sunshine desinfectent something, and Assange is being framed, and Down With The Man!

If you're an American and you just posted that, you might as well set fire to your Bill of Rights.

Given the history in the UK: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2011_British_privacy_injunction... , the sentence "The court would be very careful about making such orders" carries little weight.

We've been round this a few times. It would be nice if there was some sort of general, fair, system for preventing people's lives from being ruined by intrusive scandal reporting or unsubstantiated allegations. The current system is the opposite: the press is free to report what they want, except in rare cases where people with a lot of money or power get to suppress substantiated allegations of wrongdoing that the proper authorities are unwilling or unable to investigate.

The Aitken and Archer libel cases stick in my memory; in both cases, conservative UK government ministers got substantial libel damages by lying on the witness stand. In those cases they were found out and eventually imprisoned for perjury. Since then I always read "prevent damage to .. reputation" as "suppress valid accusations of immoral behavior".

It could be for neither justice nor political reasons, but simply commercial ones. These nations are often trading partners, but there are some shocking cases of bad behaviour we already know about: Mahatir Mohammed's shaky case against his political opponent Anwar Ibrahim for example. A lot of these nations are new, early, or pseudo democracies and don't like or understand free press.

...and don't like or understand free press.

That's a fairly ironic statement given the content of these documents.

Malaysia likes it even less than DFAT does.

- necessary to prevent a real and substantial risk of prejudice to the proper administration of justice that cannot be prevented by other reasonably available means; and

- necessary to prevent prejudice to the interests of the Commonwealth in relation to national security. "

What a load of crap. Now that WikiLeaks has actually published the information in the public domain, pray what: 1. Damage has been done to Australia's international reputation?

2. What national security has been affected?

3. What justice has been prevented from being administered? All the Aussies involved in the case will be punished as they are Aussie, all the foreign nationals cannot be touched anyways because they are foreign.

This court order is simply about protecting Australian commercial interests as well as trying to shield the RBA. Securency and its subsidiaries bring in considerable amount of recurring income. Why reveal it's mod op?

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