nuclear-news

British police detain journalist Kit Klarenberg, interrogate him about The Grayzone

The Grayzone, MAX BLUMENTHAL·MAY 30, 2023

British counter-terror police detained journalist Kit Klarenberg upon his arrival at London’s Luton airport and subjected him to an extended interrogation about his political views and reporting for The Grayzone.

As soon as journalist Kit Klarenberg landed in his home country of Britain on May 17, 2023, six anonymous plainclothes counter-terror officers detained him. They quickly escorted him to a back room, where they grilled him for over five hours about his reporting for this outlet. They also inquired about his personal opinion on everything from the current British political leadership to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

At one point, Klarenberg’s interrogators demanded to know whether The Grayzone had a special arrangement with Russia’s Federal Security Bureau (FSB) to publish hacked material.

During Klarenberg’s detention, police seized the journalist’s electronic devices and SD cards, fingerprinted him, took DNA swabs, and photographed him intensively. They threatened to arrest him if he did not comply.

Klarenberg’s interrogation appears to be London’s way of retaliating for the journalist’s blockbuster reports exposing major British and US intelligence intrigues. In the past year alone, Klarenberg revealed how a cabal of Tory national security hardliners violated the Official Secrets Act to exploit Brexit and install Boris Johnson as prime minister. In October 2022, he earned international headlines with his exposé of British plans to bomb the Kerch Bridge connecting Crimea to the Russian Federation. Then came his report on the CIA’s recruitment of two 9/11 hijackers this April, a viral sensation that generated massive social media attention.

Among Klarenberg’s most consequential exposés was his June 2022 report unmasking British journalist Paul Mason as a UK security state collaborator hellbent on destroying The Grayzone and other media outlets, academics, and activists critical of NATO’s role in Ukraine.

Because Klarenberg’s reporting on Mason relied heavily on leaked emails, Mason falsely accused him of “assisting a Russian state-backed hack-and-leak disinformation campaign.” Mason has also reported the leak of his emails to the British police………………………………………………………………………………….

While reporting on leaked material, Klarenberg engaged in the same journalistic practice that the West’s most prominent legacy newspapers, from The New York Times to The Washington Post, depend on to break news themselves. In fact, Thomas Rid, a self-styled disinformation expert and professor of Strategic Studies at Johns Hopkins University, has stated that journalists “should not shy away” from covering the leaks first reported by Klarenberg.

It therefore appears that British authorities did not detain Klarenberg for any legal breaches, but because he reported factual stories that exposed the national security state’s own violations of both domestic and international law, as well as the malign plots of its media lackeys.

Interrogated under Counter-Terror provisions, grilled about non-existent Russian ties………………………………………

……….  police interrogators homed in on Klarenberg’s work with The Grayzone. “They asked which publications I wrote for, and I told them I wrote for many,” he said. “One even remarked they’d never previously heard of ‘MintPress Zone.’ Their overwhelming, if not exclusive, interest was in The Grayzone.”

……Then came a blizzard of questions relating to The Grayzone: How much was Klarenberg paid by this publication, how often, and into which bank account? Who owned the site? How much contact did he have with Max Blumenthal, the author of this article and editor of The Grayzone? Had he met Blumenthal in person?

The counter-terror officers then rattled off a series of unfounded questions related to Russia: Does The Grayzone have an agreement of any kind with Russia’s Federal Security Bureau (FSB) to publish hacked material? Has Klarenberg knowingly been in contact with any FSB operatives? Is he in touch with current or former personnel of Russian state media? Who owns The Grayzone and is it sponsored by Russia?

(As has been publicly stated many times, The Grayzone is a fully independent outlet founded by me, Max Blumenthal. Unlike many of our adversaries, this outlet does not accept funding or support from any state, including Russia.)

At this point, the officers took Klarenberg’s bank cards out of the room for an extended period. They also seized his camera memory cards and sims, demanding he provide pin codes to open them. “What was done with my bank cards, I do not know,” he remarked. “The same for the SDs – what they got off these old and barely used cards was unclear.”……………………………………………………..

Throughout the interview, the counter-terrorism police probed Klarenberg aggressively on his political affiliations and beliefs. Was he involved in any activist causes in Belgrade? What did he think of the Russian government?

…………………………………. He remains under investigation by the British state at the time of publication.  https://thegrayzone.com/2023/05/30/journalist-kit-klarenberg-british-police-interrogated-grayzone/

June 2, 2023 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | 2 WORLD, media