wikileaks

3 Nov 2011
Why Julian Assange Could Be You

By Scott Ludlam in ‘New Matilda’

“If Julian Assange has a case to answer on these serious allegations, he should be held to account for his behavior. But why after nearly a year hasn’t the man been formally charged?

Given that Assange requested and was granted permission to leave Sweden pending action on these allegations, why hasn’t his offer to be questioned via videoconference not been taken up when it would at least establish whether there are grounds for formal charges?

Why have the other legitimate levers described in a UK-Sweden treaty agreement been leapfrogged, with prosecutors launching straight into a bid for extradition?

And why isn’t the widespread epidemic of violence against women not being recognised or prosecuted anywhere quite as athletically as in this particular case?

The obvious answer to each of these questions is: Because of Wikileaks, stupid.

By revealing so much to so many, Wikileaks has opened our eyes wider to cynical and secret government decision making, diplomatic chess moves and the brutality and collateral murder in wars waged like computer games. We cannot unlearn about the war crimes that have been committed, in our names and with our cash, or the fact that governments around the world have now been revealed as systematic liars to their own peoples.

Despite being named the “Napolean of the internet” and the best Australian outlaw since Ned Kelly, Wikileaks will not collapse if Assange is put on trial. If he is sent to Sweden, Assange’s extradition must be conditional on him not being subject to the “temporary surrender” clauses in the bilateral treaty between the USA and Sweden.”

Now there is someone who actually understands what’s going on and why it has repercussions for all of us. The only positive thing in the four page statement released by the British court to the media is that Assange is referred to as a ‘journalist’. This will make it harder to jail him for publishing information the public has every right to have.

Muttering under your breath is a complete waste of time when nothing you say makes any sense and is completely fact free.

“gerard, the future of humanity is not imperiled by Assange answering questions about his sexual encounters.”

This is what I’m talking about. Fact free and makes no sense at all to anyone who understands what is actually at stake here.

I agree with you didine. I used to work with a man who always said, ‘Never argue with an idiot, you only educate them.’ In Hec’s case even that outcome is impossible. You can’t educate imbeciles.

can i at least mutter to myself under my breath?

Heterochromatic and Diamond,

Never argue with an idiot.  They will drag you down and beat you with their stupidity. Best to ignore the ignorance.

gerard, the future of humanity is not imperiled by Assange answering questions
about his sexual encounters  

you can fear that Assange will be martyred, but let’s not proclaim his martyrdom
until such time as it draws nigh.

right now, he’s up for answering questions….not about to be boiled in oil.

heterodynamic:  Your accusations of “celebrity immunity” are asinine.  Look the word up in the dictionary. The guy is admired by millions because he revealed the potentials of the Internet for peace and understanding.  He is feared and hated by those holding power over money and people because he gave the people the tools they need to govern themselves.
People who don’t understand the implications of these facts, and how these facts bear on his present predicament, (and indeed,  on the entire future of the human race) are simply “out of it”, so to speak.

diamond—-FOS, start to finish.

and Swedish.

just sad bits of a being a fan.

I did study law, as it happens, and you did not, as is obvious from your idiotic, redneck pronouncements, contempt for the idea of innocent until proven guilty, your belief in vigilante justice and your petulant Rhett Butler, frankly-I-don’t-give-a-damn attitude to facts.  But no one needs to study the law to know that what is being done to Assange is an American stitch-up with the collusion of Sweden, based not on any idea of the rule of law or justice but on a political vendetta, false charges and a lust for revenge.

from The Universal Declaration of Human Rights

“Article 9.
•No one shall be subjected to arbitrary arrest, detention or exile.

Article 10.
•Everyone is entitled in full equality to a fair and public hearing by an independent and impartial tribunal, in the determination of his rights and obligations and of any criminal charge against him.

Article 11.
•(1) Everyone charged with a penal offence has the right to be presumed innocent until proved guilty according to law in a public trial at which he has had all the guarantees necessary for his defence.”

Assange won’t get any of this.

If he’s extradited to Sweden he will be given a secret trial, not a public one and not with a jury of his peers but with a judge and two politicians, one from each party. It will not be public and it will not be fair. He has already been subjected to arbitrary arrest, detention and exile. Any presumption of innocence has been trashed by the media and by rabid right wing commentators in the United States and elsewhere who have called for him to be killed and called him ‘a terrorist’ even though he’s never killed anyone or ever tried to kill anyone. The lion’s share of the killing was in fact done by THE UNITED STATES MILITARY and Assange’s actual crime was to show that unlawful killing being done in a way that made it impossible to deny or finesse. His lesser crime was to reveal that diplomats are corrupt, pathological liars who even lie to themselves.

diamond—-where did you study law?

“diamond—-he was in Sweden, he did do something or
over with the women, he resisted returning to answer
questions and he was caught by the Brits and is going
to be returned to Sweden to answer the questions that
he has resisted answering.

I absolutely no position as to whether he is guilty
of anything in the complaints filed and frankly don’t
give a damn.”

This is incomprehensible bullshit not to mention that none of it is accurate. Whatever he did in Sweden could not possibly be classified as rape in any language, including Swedish. It was consensual sex and that includes the blow job in the cinema. He DID ANSWER QUESTIONS TWICE in Sweden already - both times of his own volition. He was not caught by the Brits as you put it, he turned himself in to the police, exactly as he had gone to the Swedish police twice to answer questions and was told they would not be bringing any charges against him. Frankly you don’t give a damn? Who are you, Rhett Butler? You’re a ridiculous buffoon, you don’t know any of the facts and as you have made plain don’t care about the facts. All you know about Assange is that he’s agin Fascism and that means you’re agin him.

You are an imbecile and your knowledge and understanding of the law and democracy would fit on the head of a pin. You are typical of the kind of people who are opposed to Assange and everything he stands for - namely people who are belligerent, ignorant, unethical, anti-democratic windbags. Your concept of the law differs in no way from a lynching party rampaging around with a noose but I suppose you’re proud of your stupidity and your attraction to legalized lynchings; people like you always are.

diamond—-he was in Sweden, he did do something or
over with the women, he resisted returning to answer
questions and he was caught by the Brits and is going
to be returned to Sweden to answer the questions that
he has resisted answering.

I absolutely no position as to whether he is guilty
of anything in the complaints filed and frankly don’t
give a damn.

he deserves the same treatment that anyone else
charged would get. he goes and answers the questions.

I could care less about his guilt or innocence and I
don’t allow him exemption from process of law because
he—or you—harbor suspicion concerning the
motivation or integrity of the complainers.

the law is there to sort that out. it’s not the job
of interested internet fans to decide that the legal
process should not apply to Julian Assange.

I didn’t want to hear from Atlanta Falcon fans that
Michael Vick shouldn’t have to answer charges of
animal abuse and I don’t want to hear that candidates
to head the IMF shouldn’t have to answer questions.

everyone answers and it gets sorted out as best as it
can be sorted.

“he was there, he acted, he got caught, he goes and he answers questions there.”

If only you had the faintest idea what you are talking about you might be dangerous but as things stand you’re just a dud. The brief given to the British court is so narrow that nothing about the rape allegations can even be introduced into evidence with regards to the extradition. Now why do you imagine that is? It’s because if the facts about the rape allegations were introduced into the court they would immediately be seen to be farcical and manufactured and no extradition could possibly take place.

If you’re really so dumb that you can’t see this for what it is then you should simply shut up. But I don’t believe you are that dumb, I believe you know perfectly well what’s going on here, as indeed the whole world does, but you want to damage Assange’s reputation and pretend you believe he’s guilty of something he hasn’t even been charged with; and he hasn’t been charged because those charges will never stand up (if you’ll pardon the expression) in any court of law. The purpose of these allegations is not to get to the truth about the allegations but to get Assange to Sweden so that the CIA can lock him up in maximum security in America and possibly torture him. And do you or do you not accept the concept of innocent until proven guilty? If you don’t, you’re a Fascist and considering that no charges have even been brought against Assange I think you should hesitate to declare him guilty as charged. Only a dimwitted bully would do that and at the moment you bear a striking resemblance to just such a blithering idiot.

gerard—Assange doesn’t get to dictate where he
answers questions any more than anybody else does.

and he doesn’t get to decide which legal systems and
nations meet his standards.

he was there, he acted, he got caught, he goes and he
answers questions there.

some weird attempted claims of “celebrity immunity” are
farcical.

heterochromatic;  Assange has answered questions in Sweden once and was RELEASED with no charges. Since being in England he has made an ongoinag offer to answer questions to Swedish authorities AGAIN if they would come to the UK. They have repeatedly refused to come to the UK.The reason he doesn’t want to return to Sweden again is that Sweden’s position viz a viz the U.S. is apt to cause them to permit his extradition to the U.S. whereas his protection against extradition is better in the UK.

The ones he said he would release if something happened to him…because it looks like
something is happening to him…

This is totally rigged. Assange could have been questioned in England, then
charges could have been made against him, allowing automatic extradition. 

In reading the statements of these two women, they invited Assange into their
beds and could have at any time thrown him out of their apartments.  They didn’t
even say “no.”  If the women were aggressive enough to pursue Assange, they
should be capable of saying “get outta here before I call the police.” 

This is about shutting down wikileaks, not sex crimes.

Sitizen, those are good points. the stupidity involved in canonizing Assange, or in
demonizing him, is merely a sideshow.

heterochromatic, November 2 at 11:25 am Link to this comment

think of this——why the hell shouldn’t Assange answer questions, him being all
for transparancy ?

think of why he’s fighting so hard to avoid facing the charges against him filed by
two women.

Ironic that you twice use the word think yet do not do so yourself. The alleged rape charges, which are looking increasingly like they were trumped up specifically for a purpose that any adult might explain to you. If Assange is extradited to Sweden it is very probable that he will then be, in turn, extradited to the USA and thence to Guantanamo.

But then, you knew this already but chose to play the fool, yet again.

When all this Swedish crap first exploded out of the orifice of the Swedish lawyer, Borgstrom, (who has previously ‘rendered’ refugees to the CIA and allowed them to be tortured when he was so-called Justice Minister of Sweden) Assange went to the Swedish police of his own volition and was interviewed by them. They told him they wouldn’t be bringing charges and he was free to go. After waiting around for forty days he prepared to leave Sweden and go to England. But just to be sure he went to the police again, they interviewed him again and said they wouldn’t be laying charges and he was free to go. But lo and behold! No sooner does he leave Sweden than the website of the Public Prosecutor’s Office puts up a statement claiming that Assange has ‘fled’ the long arm of the law. This stinks of a plan to get him to leave so that he would look guilty and could then be extradited and delivered into the loving arms of the United States’ intelligence services.

Some facts on the ‘wronged’ women.

1. One of them paid Assange’s train fare so he could come to her flat and ‘rape’ her. This was afer she is alleged to have given him a blow job in a cinema.

2. One of them boasted on twitter about going to bed with him. She called him and his friends ‘the coolest people on the planet’. Once the fake rape allegations had been made (because remember Assange has not yet been charged with anything) all the stuff on Twitter was taken down.

3. The day after one of the so-called rapes these women organized a huge party for Assange.

4. The condom that he allegedly used that was broken was tested and found to have no semen and no DNA on it. Clearly it was not used but was deliberately torn by persons unknown.

This is a political witch hunt and the two women involved are political stooges. One of them claimed she was effectively tricked into making the statement she made. There is no case, as the first public prosecutor in Sweden made clear when she dropped the charges. It was only when Borgstrom, friend of the CIA, got involved that the whole Frankenstein’s monster came to life again. In a normal situation the charges would have been dropped and stayed dropped because there is no case but since rape cases in Sweden are held in secret and the US will be standing by like a slavering dog to get its paws on Assange the only thing you can know for sure about these allegations is that they are definitely not normal and almost certainly manufactured for political purposes.

which secrets, prisnersdilema ?

ya think that he has secrets about the sex lives of those two women who are his
accusers?

and he’s been hoarding all that stuff until now?

because of his great commitment to transparency ?

can I get a “knuk, knuk” ?

Can’t wait to read all those secrets Assange releases in retaliation….

think of this——why the hell shouldn’t Assange answer questions, him being all
for transparancy ?

think of why he’s fighting so hard to avoid facing the charges against him filed by
two women.

Remember this:  Originally, both women said they “did not particularly want to press charges.” They were later convinced.  What changed their minds?

Think about this: What purpose would a rape comviction serve in stirring up hysteria? And what does hysteria usually do to fair judgment? And are the rape charges related to the release of the WikiLeaks cables? Or not? Why are they being persistently pressed? What is extradition?

Ask questions.