Declassified UK December 2022

Posted: 21st December 2022

December 2022

Hi everyone,

This is Lowkey – hip hop artist, academic and political campaigner, plus an adviser to Declassified UK. I want to tell you about Declassified’s impact this year, which is very significant, and why I’m proud to be an advocate for this unique organisation that has achieved so much in such a short space of time. I would urge you to become a paying member, if you’re not already.

First, Declassified really has developed a niche as the media organisation revealing UK foreign policies. It now has over 100,000 twitter followers and its articles have achieved over a million page views in the past 12 months. You may not notice this in the UK, but Declassified’s articles are being picked up and covered in dozens of media outlets worldwide.

Impact around the world

As a serious media organisation, Declassified produces high-quality journalism that provides a public information service. But this work is not just informing people – it is also having a real impact overseas. For example, Matt Kennard’s investigation into UK support for the coup in Bolivia in 2019 went viral in the country. The foreign minister, Rogelio Mayta, called in the UK ambassador to explain the contents of the article and requested a report on the findings.

Matt’s story about a UK-Argentina deal in 2016, when the Argentine negotiator was allegedly drunk, went viral in Argentina earlier this year. Its foreign minister ordered an investigation into the Declassified report and it was front page news in Argentina for a week. There were protests across the country.

Phil Miller’s investigations on Nigeria led to the closure of a military helicopter academy in Cornwall linked to human rights abuses. Following another of his investigations, concerning Uganda, the political opposition in the country called for Britain’s minister for Africa to resign over his business ties to the Museveni regime.

Articles and Films

This year Declassified published 122 articles and three films, in addition to the weekly edition of our public intelligence brief, ‘DC-Intel’. Its films on the Manchester bombing, on exiles in the UK challenging Gulf dictators and on the Yemen war are what the mainstream media should be informing you about – but are not.

Declassified also filmed interviews with Stella Assange, former Ecuadorian president Rafael Correa, former UK Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn and former Bolivian president Evo Morales. The Corbyn interview, which gained around 100,000 views, was especially important, highlighting how the establishment stopped him becoming elected.

Declassified’s articles this year have continued to tell the stories that others are not covering, notably on: the UK role in the Yemen war, the legal conflicts of interest in the persecution of Julian Assange, the UK’s role in India’s Golden Temple massacre in India, the role played by the British American Project in the UK, Britain’s support for Jair Bolsonaro in Brazil and the Oman dictatorship’s UK property empire.

And then look at the range of revelations that Mark Curtis and John McEvoy have made for Declassified this year based on the UK declassified files, revealing, for example: the UK role in war in the US Vietnam, how Shell and BP financed British propaganda, Britain’s covert role in the Yemen war, its colonial war in Malaya, its support for Iran’s Shah and Margaret Thatcher’s support for the US invasion of Panama.

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Helping Activists

What you may not know is that Declassified’s work is also helping activist groups. Take, for example, Phil Miller’s investigations into how the British army is affecting local people in Kenya. These revelations have helped 1,500 Kenyans take the UK Ministry of Defence to court.

Kelvin Kubai, a lawyer for the Lolldaiga Justice Campaign in Kenya has said: “Declassified is providing ethical journalism that does not shy away from unravelling facts that would have otherwise remained shrouded in mystery. Since the British Government entered into a Memorandum with the Kenyan Government to allow military training, Kenyan communities adjacent to these training fields have been sidelined and disinformed on the risk posed by military equipment.

Following investigative journalism from Declassified, information was uncovered on the use of White Phosphorus munitions within the Archers Post training area. Additionally, new evidence following a probe by Declassified established that British ammunition maimed a ten year old Kenyan boy back in 2015. Declassified dispenses information that positively impacts the communities in Kenya, providing key insights that enable them to stand for their rights”.

Support Declassified UK

I know that the Declassified team has a lot more planned for 2023. Your support to them is vital. Please join us in this vital new community.

All the best,

Lowkey