Alan Rusbridger told the Commons Home Affairs Committee that The Guardian has only published 1 percent of the leaked material by Edward Snowden during a hearing on counter-terrorism at Portcullis House in central London on Tuesday, the Associated Press reported.
While being questioned by British lawmakers, Rusbridger told the committee Snowden leaked about 58,000 files, of which the newspaper published "about 1 percent," adding that he had no plans of publishing any more, according to the AP.
The AP reported that the Guardian's printing of the files leaked by Snowden has sparked a debate on privacy and espionage acts by the United States and Britain, and according to lawmakers, aided al-Qaida and other terror groups as they were "rubbing their hands in glee."
During the hearing, Rusbridger accused British officials of "intimidating" the newspaper after various lawmakers said the Guardian should be prosecuted for breaching terrorism law, the AP reported.
"There is no doubt in my mind ... that newspapers have done something that oversight has failed to do," he said, according to the AP, adding that no lives or national security have been placed at risk.
According to Rusbridger, the only reaction that's come from newspapers, like The Washington Post, printing the reports leaked by Snowden is an international debate about the scale of surveillance and intelligence activities happening today, the AP reported
There was a range of questions during the hearing, among which was whether Rusbridger loved his country, asked by the committee's Labour chairman Keith Vaz, the AP reported.
"I'm slightly surprised to be asked the question," Rusbridger said, "but yes we (at the Guardian) are patriots, and one of the things we are patriotic about is the nature of democracy and the nature of a free press," the AP reported.
Rusbridger is being supported by U.S.-based Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press when he stated the Guardian is being extremely pressured with threats of aiding terrorism and endangering civilian lives in a way that should be "inconceivable" in the U.S. where journalists can rely on the First Amendment freedom of speech, the AP reported.
"I feel that some of this activity has been designed to intimidate the Guardian," Rusbridger said during the hearing, according to the AP.
He added the Guardian has come under direct target of top British civil servants and politicians who have asked for the newspaper to be charged and for their hard drives, which held the Snowden files until Rusbridger destroyed them and sent copies abroad, to be confiscated, the AP reported.
A letter sent to the parliamentary panel from the Reporters Committee signed by The New York Times, The Washington Post and the Associated Press said "it appears that press freedom itself is under attack in Britain," and that it's "unwise and counterproductive to react to the reporting on disclosures from Edward Snowden by reflexively invoking security concerns to silence the press or to accuse a news organization of aiding terrorists simply by providing citizens with information they need to know."
"We're not going to be put off by intimidation, but nor are we going to behave recklessly," Rusbridger said.
