Government Pressure Puts Chill Over British Press

By: Robert Mahoney | CPJ

The grilling this week by a House of Commons select committee of Guardian Editor Alan Rusbridger crystallized the problems of an independent press trying to serve the public interest in a country that lacks robust legal safeguards of press freedom.

Britain is home to a diverse and fiercely competitive press, but the climate for journalists, particularly those covering national security issues, began to grow chilly after the WikiLeaks revelations three years ago. The temperature plunged, however, in July, when the Guardian  started publishing stories based on classified material leaked to it by former U.S. National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden.