GUARDIANS OF TRUTH: JULIAN ASSANGE AND THE DARK SECRETS OF WAR

Content note: War, violence
Turkish journalist Can Dündar followed the fight for press freedom in the Julian Assange case for six months before Assange’s surprise release on 25 June 2024. In this film, Dündar and co-director Sarah Mabrouk focus on the disturbing ‘Collateral Murder’ video, Wikileaks’ most controversial publication. It was not the perpetrators who ended up on trial for the possible war crimes committed by US soldiers, but Assange, who had published the secret information. Dündar and Mabrouk find a survivor of the attack in Iraq as well as a US soldier who was involved in the incident, and shows that, even seventeen years after the events, pain and trauma linger.

• The cinema premiere will be followed by a live discussion between the protagonists of the film Sajjad Mutashar and Ethan McCord. Afterwards, a prominent panel will discuss the balancing act between press freedom and politics, guilt, and reconciliation. Director and patron of the HRFFB, Can Dündar, director Sarah Mabrouk, WikiLeaks editor-in-chief Kristinn Hrafnsson, and another guest will address these topics. The event will be moderated by Dr. Melinda Crane, Chief Political Correspondent at Deutsche Welle TV. Jan Sebastian Friedrich Rust, co festival director and Managing Director of Aktion gegen den Hunger, as well as Dr. Nadja Scholz, Programm Director DW, and Dr. Maik Thieme,
  Managing Director Reporters Without Borders, will welcome the guests and introduce the event.

Initiated and curated by Martina Dase (Strategic Advisor HRFFB, Journalist, Filmmaker) and Frauke Sandig (Commissioning Editor DW Documentaries, Producer of the series 'Guardians of Truth', Filmmaker)

With support of Deutsche Welle (DW) and in Partnership with: