Australian police’s ‘savage’ raid of public broadcaster ABC raises press freedom fears
- A day earlier police raided a journalist’s home in Canberra over a report that detailed authorities’ attempts to obtain power to spy on Australian citizens
- Prime Minister Scott Morrison has tried to distance himself from the raids, occurring just days after his re-election
ABC News executive editor John Lyons, who provided a minute-by-minute account of the raid on social media, said it was a “bad, sad and dangerous day” for a country that had long valued press freedom.
“I have never seen an assault on the media as savage as the one we’re seeing today at the ABC,” Lyons told ABC television.
The raid came a day after the federal police agency searched the home of Newscorp journalist Annika Smethurst over a separate report published last year which outlined proposals to give the foreign intelligence agency powers to spy on Australians for the first time.
Newscorp, Australia’s biggest newspaper publisher, described Tuesday’s raid as “outrageous” and a “dangerous act of intimidation towards those committed to telling uncomfortable truths.”
Also on Tuesday, Ben Fordham, a radio broadcaster, said that his reporting had become the subject of an investigation by the Department of Home Affairs, which oversees the national police, after he revealed that six boats carrying asylum seekers had recently tried to reach Australia.