World Press Slams UK Threats Over Snowden Docs

The global group also slammed as a sign of declining press freedom the detention of David Miranda, the partner of Guardian journalist Glenn Greenwald.

Miranda was detained for 9 hours and had personal items confiscated at Heathrow airport under the country’s Terrorism Act of 2000.  Vincent Peyrègne, CEO of WAN-IFRA, ripped Miranda’s detention as “a complete misuse of anti-terror legislation.”

“I am calling on the Prime Minister of the UK, in the strongest possible terms, to provide his assurance that the necessary inquiries will be made to ensure that any inference of association between journalism and terrorism is not part of official policy that puts the UK on the same level as Turkey and Ethiopia, whose governments misuse anti-terror legislation to silence critics,” Peyrègne continued.

The letter from the world press organization comes on the heels of an open letter to Cameron by editors of Nordic countries’ top newspapers, who wrote that the implications of the actions against the Guardian and the detention of Miranda “undermin[e] the position of the free press throughout the world.”

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