The director of Valitor, the finance company currently being taken to court by account handlers for Wikileaks, says that he has no opinion on the work Wikileaks does.
As reported, Datacell – the company which manages donations to Wikileaks – decided in 2010 to take Valitor – the company which oversees Master Card and Visa in Iceland – to court for breach of contract. This decision arose when, in 2010, Valitor decided to block payments from Visa card-holders to Datacell, possibly in keeping with an international policy that Visa and Mastercard were using to block donations to Wikileaks.
The trial began yesterday, with Wikileaks spokesperson Kristinn Hrafnsson writing an article for Vísir wherein he said that while the simple request of the suit is for Valitor to honour their contract, the trial also centres around questions of human rights and freedom of expression.
Vísir now reports that Viðar Þorkelsson, the director of Valitor, says that he has no opinion one way or the other of the work that Wikileaks does. Rather, they received strong indications that Wikileaks was engaging in activities that violated international regulations honoured by credit card companies. In particular, Valitor contends that Datacell did not reveal right away that they were allowing a “payment gateway” for Visa card holders to donate to Wikileaks via Datacell.
Datacell owner Ólafur Vignir Sigurðsson denies these allegations. He contends that Datacell made it clear from the beginning that a payment gateway was open, and that money was going to be directed to Wikileaks. Valitor responded, he contends, by simply blocking any payments from Visa card-holders to Datacell, which Datacells contends is a breach of contract.
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