WikiLeaks Announces €100,000 Bounty For Secret TTIP Documents

By Star Fox

Wikileaks on Tuesday launched a crowd-funded campaign to raise €100,000 to be used to reward the person or group that leaks the secretive documents that make up the Trans-Atlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP).

As of Wednesday afternoon (ET) the campaign has already raised 47% of its goal.

A statement on the WikiLeaks’ website reads:

€100,000 reward for Europe’s most wanted secret. The TTIP is a multi-trillion dollar international treaty that is being negotiated in secret between the United States and the European Union. It remains secret almost in its entirety, closely guarded by the negotiators, and only big corporations are given special access to its terms. The TTIP covers half of global GDP and is one of the largest agreements of its kind in history. The TTIP aims to create a global economic bloc outside of the WTO framework, as part of a geopolitical economic strategy against the BRICS countries of Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa.

The Former US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has dubbed the TTIP an “economic NATO,” comparing it to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization military alliance. Over the last two years WikiLeaks has published chapters from two other secret global trade deals, including the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPP) and the Trade in Services Agreement (TISA), despite unprecedented efforts by negotiating governments to keep them under wraps.

Together with the TTIP, these treaties represent the “Three Big T’s”, affecting 53 countries, 1.6 billion people and covering two thirds of the global economy. They aim to create a new international legal regime allowing transnational corporations to bypass domestic courts, evade environmental protections, police the internet on behalf of the content industry, limit the availability of affordable generic medicines, and drastically curtail each country’s legislative sovereignty. Of the “Three Big T’s”, the TTIP remains the least exposed to public scrutiny, and the most significant to the interests of the European public.

WikiLeaks is also crowd sourcing money to reward the release of the better known Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) deal.

$105,654.02 in pledges have been made towards the reward so far which completes 70% of its stated goal of $150000.

WikiLeaks on the TPP:

America’s most wanted secret. The TPP is a multi-trillion dollar international treaty that is being negotiated in secret by the US, Australia, Canada, Japan, Mexico and others. This massive agreement has 29 chapters, of which 26 are still secret. It covers 40% of global GDP and is the largest agreement of its kind in history. The treaty aims to create a new international legal regime that will allow transnational corporations to bypass domestic courts, evade environmental protections, police the internet on behalf of the content industry, limit the availability of affordable generic medicines, and drastically curtail each country’s legislative sovereignty. US Senator Elizabeth Warren has said “[They] can’t make this deal public because if the American people saw what was in it, they would be opposed to it.” Over the last two years WikiLeaks has published three chapters of this super-secret global deal, despite unprecedented efforts by negotiating governments to keep it under wraps. The remaining 26 chapters of the deal are closely held by negotiators and the big corporations that have been given privileged access. The TPP is also noteworthy as the icebreaker agreement for the proposed ‘T-treaty triad’ of TPP-TISA-TTIP which would see TPP style rules placed on 53 nations, 1.6 billion people and 2/3rds of the global economy.

The tenth round of TTIP talks took place in Brussels from July 13-17. According to the European Commission Report, technical progress was made in the regulation part of the deal but significant work is still needed to get the deal done.

As for the TPP, the finalization of the deal came to a screeching halt in Hawaii at the end of July due to differences between major players in the negotiations.

The WikiLeaks-funded incentives might be contributing motivation to a protest group out of New Zealand who calls themselves “Show Us Ya Text.”

The group recently stormed the Auckland Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ office to demand the full release of the TPP deal. Members of TPP protest group ‘Show Us Ya Text’ at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ Auckland office.

Photo: Radio NZ / Nicole Pryor

Star Fox is a U.S. based journalist who contributes to Eyesopenreport.com. His works have been published by recognizable alternative new sites like GlobalResearch.ca, ActivistPost.com and Intellihub.com. Follow @StarFoxReport