Backlash of the Year at Guardian over Bradley Manning Vote

Bradley Manning has won the Guardian's Person of the Year Award after what the newspaper described as "fishy voting patterns".

Manning, an Army intelligence analyst, is in a military prison accused of releasing the Collateral Murder video, which shows a US Apache helicopter crew killing unarmed civilians and two Reuters journalists.

He is also accused of sharing the Afghan War Diaries, a series of US diplomatic cables and the Iraq War Logs.

The Guardian appears to be unsatisfied with the result of its online poll, suggesting that he only won after WikiLeaks tweeted supporters to vote for Manning.

Initially, Malana Yousafzai, the 14-year-old girl shot in the head by the Taliban for defending education for girls in Pakistan, dominated the vote, gaining an "overwhelming majority" in the initial stages of the poll.

Readers appeared to think her victory was a foregone conclusion. The newspaper wrote: "The Guardian's 2012 person of the year vote has concluded and the winner, after some rather fishy voting patterns that belied earlier reader comments on the poll, is Bradley Manning."

It continued: "In the latter stages, following a series of tweets from the @Wikileaks twitter handle telling followers to vote Manning, thousands of voters flocked to his cause.

"Manning secured 70 percent of the vote, the vast majority of them coming after a series of @Wikileaks tweets."

Since the Guardian announced its winner, there has been a backlash from WikiLeaks and others, with many saying the Guardian did not want Manning to win.

M Cetera tweeted: "Honestly, the Guardian's reaction to Bradley Manning as their 'Person of the Year' shows they had no intention of him winning the poll."

Snarky Physics said: "If you didn't want to know the internet's opinion, why did you hold the poll on the internets? Silly"

micah lee added: "Why doesn't this say "Congrats to Bradley Manning for winning Person of the Year by a landslide!"?"

Following the announcement, WikiLeaks responded with a series of tweets angry about the newspaper's response to the result: "Guardian's announce of Bradley Manning as Person of the Year says nothing about his courage, instead attacks WikiLeaks.

"Guardian has shown zero respect for Bradley Manning. No mention of 900+ days in prison, abusive treatment, bravery. Just undermining vote.

"Guardian horrified that popularity contest turns out to be popularity contest."

Mark Rice-Oxley, Guardian Person of the Year project editor, said: "It was an interesting exercise that told us a lot about our readers, our heroes and the reasons that people vote."

Previously, Manning had won another Guardian poll about who should win the Nobel Peace Prize.