# Search: secrets and espionage laws The number of entries reflects the depth of this record, not the severity of a country's conduct. Filters: country, continent, tactic, stage, from, to, level, actor, leader, outlet, outcome, source_kind, has_case, plus q, sort (date, date_asc, country, tactic, relevance), per_page (up to 100), page and view (table or cards), as query parameters. 22 incidents match this view. - 15 December 2025: [China (Hong Kong): conviction and 20-year sentence of the media owner Jimmy Lai under the National Security Law, 2025 to 2026](https://thewaronnews.com/incidents/2025-hong-kong-convicts-jimmy-lai-under-national-security-law). On December 15, 2025, the High Court of Hong Kong, a special administrative region of China with its own courts, convicted Jimmy Lai, founder of the newspaper Apple Daily, on two counts of "conspiracy to commit collusion with foreign force… - November 2024: [China: editor Dong Yuyu is sentenced to seven years for espionage over meals with a diplomat](https://thewaronnews.com/incidents/2024-china-dong-yuyu-espionage-sentence). A Chinese court sentenced Guangming Daily editor and columnist Dong Yuyu to seven years in prison for espionage after his 2022 arrest while having lunch with a Japanese diplomat, a case his son called purely political. - 17 January 2024: [Iran: journalists Niloofar Hamedi and Elahe Mohammadi are sentenced to 13 and 12 years](https://thewaronnews.com/incidents/2024-iran-hamedi-mohammadi-sentenced). Iranian journalists Niloofar Hamedi and Elahe Mohammadi, who broke the story of Mahsa Amini's death in police custody, were sentenced to 13 and 12 years respectively on national-security-linked charges tied to their reporting, and later re… - 14 July 2023: [Zimbabwe's Patriotic Act criminalizes journalists' contact with foreign governments](https://thewaronnews.com/incidents/2023-zimbabwe-patriotic-act-criminalizes-foreign-contact). President Emmerson Mnangagwa signed the Patriotic Act, which criminalizes meeting foreign governments or officials with intent to harm Zimbabwe's sovereignty, with penalties up to death for advocating armed intervention and up to ten years… - 5 September 2022: [Russia: journalist Ivan Safronov is sentenced to 22 years for treason](https://thewaronnews.com/incidents/2022-russia-safronov-treason-sentence). A Russian court sentenced military correspondent Ivan Safronov to 22 years in prison for treason, accusing him of spying for a foreign state, in a case his supporters linked to his 2019 reporting on Russian arms sales to Egypt. - 14 December 2021: [Vietnam: journalist Pham Doan Trang is sentenced to nine years for anti-state "propaganda"](https://thewaronnews.com/incidents/2021-vietnam-pham-doan-trang-nine-year-sentence). A Vietnamese court sentenced Pham Doan Trang, founding editor of the independent outlet The Vietnamese, to nine years in prison for distributing anti-state "propaganda" under a national-security provision of the country's penal code. - 5 June 2019: [Australian Federal Police raid the national broadcaster over reporting on alleged war crimes in Afghanistan](https://thewaronnews.com/incidents/2019-australia-afp-raids-abc-afghan-files). Australian Federal Police spent hours searching the headquarters of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) over its 2017 "Afghan Files" reports on alleged killings by Australian special forces that breached the laws of armed conflic… - 23 May 2019: [United States indicts WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange under the Espionage Act](https://thewaronnews.com/incidents/2019-us-assange-espionage-act-indictment). The United States indicted WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange on 17 counts under the Espionage Act over the 2010 publication of leaked military and diplomatic files, charges press-freedom groups said could expose ordinary national-security j… - 3 September 2018: [Myanmar sentences two Reuters journalists to seven years under the Official Secrets Act for reporting on a massacre](https://thewaronnews.com/incidents/2018-myanmar-reuters-journalists-official-secrets-act). A Myanmar court sentenced Reuters reporters Wa Lone and Kyaw Soe Oo to seven years under the colonial-era Official Secrets Act after police handed them classified documents at a dinner shortly before their arrest, while they were investiga… - 17 October 2014: [United States pursues New York Times reporter James Risen's testimony for years before dropping its demand for his source](https://thewaronnews.com/incidents/2014-us-james-risen-subpoena-jeffrey-sterling). For years, federal prosecutors sought New York Times reporter James Risen's testimony identifying a confidential source in a CIA leak case; the Supreme Court declined to hear his appeal, but Attorney General Eric Holder ultimately chose no… - 29 December 2013: [Egypt arrests and later convicts three Al Jazeera journalists on terrorism-related charges](https://thewaronnews.com/incidents/2013-egypt-al-jazeera-journalists-jailed). Months after the military removed President Mohamed Morsi, Egyptian security forces arrested Al Jazeera English journalists Peter Greste, Mohamed Fahmy and Baher Mohamed at a Cairo hotel; courts later convicted them of aiding a banned orga… - 10 October 2013: [United States: Espionage Act prosecutions of sources for leaks to the press, 2009 to 2013](https://thewaronnews.com/incidents/2013-obama-doj-charges-eight-under-espionage-act). A report by the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), a non-profit organization in New York that documents cases of journalists imprisoned or killed worldwide, published on October 10, 2013, found that since 2009 the United States Depart… - 20 May 2013: [United States search warrant names Fox News reporter James Rosen a possible co-conspirator in a leak case](https://thewaronnews.com/incidents/2013-us-doj-names-fox-reporter-co-conspirator). A 2010 FBI search-warrant affidavit, unsealed in 2013, described Fox News reporter James Rosen as a possible co-conspirator in violating the Espionage Act because he sought classified information from a State Department analyst, and used t… - 25 January 2013: [United States prosecutes former CIA officer John Kiriakou under the Espionage Act for identifying a covert colleague to a journalist](https://thewaronnews.com/incidents/2012-us-john-kiriakou-espionage-act-cia-torture-source). Former CIA officer John Kiriakou, who in 2007 was the first CIA officer to publicly describe the agency's waterboarding of a detainee, pleaded guilty to identifying a covert colleague to a journalist and was sentenced under the Espionage A… - 5 July 2010: [United States charges Army analyst Chelsea Manning under the Espionage Act for leaking to WikiLeaks](https://thewaronnews.com/incidents/2010-us-chelsea-manning-espionage-act-wikileaks). The U.S. Army charged intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning under the Espionage Act, a 1917 law against disclosing defense information, after she gave WikiLeaks, a website that publishes leaked documents, a large archive of military and dip… - 8 June 2009: [North Korea: American journalists Laura Ling and Euna Lee are sentenced to hard labor](https://thewaronnews.com/incidents/2009-north-korea-ling-lee-sentenced). A North Korean court sentenced Current TV journalists Laura Ling and Euna Lee to twenty years of "reform through hard labor" after their arrest for crossing the border from China without authorization, and both were released months later f… - 6 July 2005: [New York Times reporter Judith Miller jailed for refusing to name a confidential source in the Valerie Plame affair](https://thewaronnews.com/incidents/2005-us-judith-miller-jailed-plame-source). A federal judge jailed New York Times reporter Judith Miller for contempt after she refused to tell a grand jury who told her the identity of CIA officer Valerie Plame, part of a special counsel's investigation into the leak. - July 1995: [Nigeria's military government convicts journalists by special tribunal over coup-plot reporting](https://thewaronnews.com/incidents/1995-nigeria-abacha-journalists-tribunal). A special military tribunal convicted four Nigerian journalists as accessories to a supposed 1995 coup plot after they reported on it, sentencing them to lengthy prison terms with no right of appeal, under the military government of Genera… - 15 June 1971: [United States government seeks an injunction to stop The New York Times publishing the Pentagon Papers](https://thewaronnews.com/incidents/1971-us-pentagon-papers-injunction). After The New York Times began publishing a leaked secret history of the Vietnam War, the Nixon administration obtained a court order stopping further publication, the first such order against a major American newspaper. The Supreme Court… - 19 December 1941: [United States creates an Office of Censorship and a wartime code for the press](https://thewaronnews.com/incidents/1941-us-office-of-censorship-wartime-press-code). Twelve days after the bombing of Pearl Harbor, President Franklin Roosevelt created the Office of Censorship. Its director, Byron Price, a former Associated Press editor, wrote a Code of Wartime Practices asking newspapers and broadcasters… - July 1917: [United States postmaster bars the magazine The Masses from the mail under the Espionage Act](https://thewaronnews.com/incidents/1917-us-espionage-act-bars-the-masses-from-the-mail). Weeks after the United States entered the First World War, the New York postmaster used the new Espionage Act, a law against interfering with military recruitment, to bar the socialist magazine The Masses from the mail. A judge's order pro… - 1917: [United States Postmaster General Burleson strips the Milwaukee Leader of its mailing rate](https://thewaronnews.com/incidents/1917-us-burleson-mail-ban-milwaukee-leader). Postmaster General Albert Burleson used the wartime Espionage Act to strip the Milwaukee Leader, a socialist daily, of its low-cost second-class mailing rate, cutting off its main channel to readers. The Supreme Court upheld the revocation… Download this view. CSV, JSON or Markdown. CC BY 4.0; credit "The War On News, thewaronnews.com". - CSV: https://thewaronnews.com/search?tactic=secrets_and_espionage_laws&view=cards&format=csv - JSON: https://thewaronnews.com/search.json?tactic=secrets_and_espionage_laws&view=cards - Markdown: https://thewaronnews.com/search.md?tactic=secrets_and_espionage_laws&view=cards Source page: https://thewaronnews.com/search?tactic=secrets_and_espionage_laws&view=cards. The War On News, CC BY 4.0.