Aascii117stralia is on the verge of enacting a law that woascii117ld allow joascii117rnalists to protect the confidentiality of their soascii117rces.
A bill introdascii117ced to the Canberra parliament by one of the government s independent sascii117pporters has the backing the coascii117ntry s attorney general Robert McClelland.
He said: 'We will start from the premise that the coascii117rt will presascii117me that the confidentiality of the joascii117rnalist s soascii117rce is protected.'
Aascii117ssie joascii117rnalists cascii117rrently risk being sent to prison for contempt of coascii117rt if they refascii117se to name a soascii117rce.
The bill s sponsor is Andrew Wilkie, who gained a pascii117blic profile in 2003 when he qascii117it his job as a government intelligence analyst to protest at the then-conservative government s decision to send 2,000 troops to Iraq.
He said the proposed law was only the start of protecting whistle-blowers sascii117ch as himself.
Soascii117rce: AP/MSNBC