The Courage Foundation is an international organisation based in Germany, the UK and the US that supports

whistleblowers Whistleblowing (also whistle-blowing or whistle blowing) is the activity of a person, often an employee, revealing information about activity within a private or public organization that is deemed illegal, immoral, illicit, unsafe, unethical or ...

and

journalists A journalist is a person who gathers information in the form of text, audio or pictures, processes it into a newsworthy form and disseminates it to the public. This is called journalism. Roles Journalists can work in broadcast, print, advertis ...

by fundraising for their legal defence. Founded on August 9, 2013, as the Journalistic Source Protection Defence Fund by Gavin MacFadyen, Barbora Bukovska and

Julian Assange Julian Paul Assange ( ; Hawkins; born 3 July 1971) is an Australian editor, publisher, and activist who founded WikiLeaks in 2006. He came to international attention in 2010 after WikiLeaks published a series of News leak, leaks from Chels ...

it later rebranded in June 2014. WikiLeaks section editor Sarah Harrison served as acting director from 2014 until April 2017, when WikiLeaks became a Courage beneficiary and Naomi Colvin began serving as director. Colvin served as director until 2018. The trustees include

Pentagon Papers The ''Pentagon Papers'', officially titled ''Report of the Office of the Secretary of Defense Vietnam Task Force'', is a United States Department of Defense history of the United States in the Vietnam War, United States' political and militar ...

whistleblower

Daniel Ellsberg Daniel Ellsberg (April 7, 1931June 16, 2023) was an American political activist, economist, and United States military analyst. While employed by the RAND Corporation, he precipitated a national political controversy in 1971 when he released th ...

, former NSA executive Thomas Drake, former MI5 British intelligence officer and whistleblower Annie Machon, Vice President of the Wau Holland Foundation

Andy Müller-Maguhn Andy Müller-Maguhn (born 3 October 1971) is a member of the German hacker association Chaos Computer Club (CCC). Having been a member since 1986, he was appointed as a spokesman for the club in 1990, and later served on its board until 2012. He ...

Guatemala Guatemala, officially the Republic of Guatemala, is a country in Central America. It is bordered to the north and west by Mexico, to the northeast by Belize, to the east by Honduras, and to the southeast by El Salvador. It is hydrologically b ...

human rights lawyer Renata Ávila, and some members of

Pussy Riot Pussy Riot is a Feminism in Russia, Russian feminist protest and performance art group based in Moscow that became popular for its provocative punk rock music which later turned into a more accessible style. Founded in the fall of 2011 by the th ...

. The Courage Foundation supports

and

WikiLeaks WikiLeaks () is a non-profit media organisation and publisher of leaked documents. It is funded by donations and media partnerships. It has published classified documents and other media provided by anonymous sources. It was founded in 2006 by ...

. The Courage Foundation supported

Edward Snowden Edward Joseph Snowden (born June 21, 1983) is a former National Security Agency (NSA) intelligence contractor and whistleblower who leaked classified documents revealing the existence of global surveillance programs. Born in 1983 in Elizabeth ...

(

NSA The National Security Agency (NSA) is an intelligence agency of the United States Department of Defense, under the authority of the director of national intelligence (DNI). The NSA is responsible for global monitoring, collection, and proces ...

whistleblower),

Jeremy Hammond Jeremy Alexander Hammond (born January 8, 1985), also known by his online moniker sup_g, is an American anarchist activist and former computer hacker from Chicago. He founded the computer security training website HackThisSiteLuman, Stuart. ''Chi ...

(

Stratfor Strategic Forecasting Inc., commonly known as Stratfor, is an American strategic intelligence publishing company founded in 1996. Stratfor's business model is to provide individual and enterprise subscriptions to Stratfor Worldview, its online p ...

hacktivist Hacktivism (or hactivism; a portmanteau of '' hack'' and ''activism''), is the use of computer-based techniques such as hacking as a form of civil disobedience to promote a political agenda or social change. A form of Internet activism with roo ...

), Matt DeHart, Lauri Love and

Chelsea Manning Chelsea Elizabeth Manning (born Bradley Edward Manning, December 17, 1987) is an American activist and whistleblower. She is a former United States Army soldier who was convicted by court-martial in July 2013 of violations of the Espionage ...

. The Courage

trustee Trustee (or the holding of a trusteeship) is a legal term which, in its broadest sense, refers to anyone in a position of trust and so can refer to any individual who holds property, authority, or a position of trust or responsibility for the ...

s are Susan Benn, and

John Pilger John Richard Pilger (; 9 October 1939 – 30 December 2023) was an Australian journalist, writer, scholar and documentary filmmaker. From 1962, he was based mainly in Britain. He was also a visiting professor at Cornell University in New York. ...

. Renata Ávila was a trustee before retiring in April 2018 and Dame

Vivienne Westwood Dame Vivienne Isabel Westwood (; 8 April 1941 – 29 December 2022) was an English fashion designer and businesswoman, largely responsible for bringing modern punk and new wave fashions into the mainstream. In 2022, ''Sky Arts'' ranked her the ...

was a trustee before she died. In October 2019, a former

Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons The Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW; French: ''Organisation pour l'interdiction des armes chimiques'', OIAC) is an intergovernmental organisation and the implementing body for the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC), ...

(OPCW) employee later identified as Brendan Whelan presented his dissent with the OPCW's findings about the investigation of the

Douma chemical attack On 7 April 2018, a chemical warfare attack was launched in the city of Douma, Syria by the military of the Ba'athist regime led by Bashar al-Assad. Medics and witnesses reported that it caused the deaths of between 40 and 50 people and inju ...

. Members of the Courage Foundation who attended included

Kristinn Hrafnsson Kristinn Hrafnsson (born 25 June 1962) is an Icelandic investigative journalist who has been the editor-in-chief of WikiLeaks since 2018. He was the spokesperson for WikiLeaks between 2010 and 2017. Career Kristinn has worked at various newspa ...

, Jose Bustani, Helmut Lohre and Gunter Meyer. Courage Foundation published the Statement of Concern at the same time as "Berlin Group 21", which was allegedly created as a front for the Working Group on Syria, Propaganda and Media. Whelan later leaked OPCW documents to WikiLeaks.

Beneficiary conflict

In 2018, three of the trustees decided to remove

Barrett Brown Barrett Lancaster Brown (born August 14, 1981) is an American anarchist, hacktivist, writer, and associate of Anonymous. He is mainly known for his role alongside Anonymous during the early 2010s, including during the Stratfor email leak. B ...

from the Courage Foundation's beneficiary list over "nasty adversarial remarks" he had made about Julian Assange, and a decision was made to prioritise the case of Wikileaks over all other beneficiaries. Courage trustee Susan Benn told Brown that Courage would no longer help him, writing in an email that "You have made a number of hostile and denigrating statements about other Courage beneficiaries who are facing grave legal and personal risks. Courage expects solidarity and mutual aid from its beneficiaries, especially when those among you face extreme uncertainty and danger." In response, Courage Foundation Director Naomi Colvin quit in protest and Brown alleged that he had only been given about $3,500 out of the total $14,000 that had been donated to Courage for him. Renata Ávila called Brown's comments "disloyal and unacceptable."

References

External links

* {{Official website, https://couragefound.org/
Twitter
Edward Snowden Whistleblowing Whistleblower support organizations WikiLeaks