The Pirate Party of Canada has unfurled the sails and lifted anchor on the latest Canadian-hosted WikiLeaks mirror.
I wrote a piece that the Pirate Party was seeking an opinion from Elections Canada before hosting a WikiLeaks mirror last month. At the time, Elections Canada hadn’t decided on its response to the request. But it came not long afterwards, and in a word it was “maybe.” It told the Pirate Party that it should check with a lawyer about the legal ramifications of hosting a WikiLeaks mirror. According to party leader Mikkel Paulson, that has been done and the federal party will soon be launching WikiLeaks-PirateParty.ca within the next couple of days.
Canada’s iteration of the international political organization with a name that conjures images of eye patches, peg legs, and talking parrots is following the lead of Pirate Parties around the world that are supporting WikiLeaks. They are doing so in more than just the digital world too, organizing rallies supporting WikiLeaks in Calgary and Vancouver on Jan. 15.
The rallies will publicize the Pirate Party’s support of Julian Assange and WikiLeaks, says party leader Mikkel Paulson. They will also condemn calls for extra-judicial actions against Assange.
“We’re standing up for freedom of speech and freedom of the press,” he says.
The Calgary rally may be particularly motivated after a University of Calgary professor half-seriously called for Assange’s assassination in an appearance on CBC. Tom Flanagan later said he regretted making the comments, telling CBC it was a “thoughtless, glib remark about a serious subject.”
As for Mark Jeftovic, the CEO of EasyDNS who unwittingly was pulled into the WikiLeaks quagmire following a serendipitous typo, his internet service provider will be providing the DNS hosting to the new WikiLeaks mirror. EasyDNS also continues to provide DNS services to two other WikiLeaks mirrors.