I think if you talk to most American's they'd like to see Assange arrested and tried. I bet half would like to see him convicted. There is no pressure to have him pardoned. An e-petition is not pressure at all.
If the prosecution values their dignity so much it is free to do the interview per video or by going to London and finish this thing. The options are there, they just have to use them.
By going to him, which they have been happy to do in many other cases, and have finally agreed to do in this case after the UN criticised the way they have treated him.
Do you honestly believe both that there will be no further objections by Ecuadorian embassy staff and that Assange will agree to walk out of the embassy after the questions are asked and Sweden is allowed to charge him on October 17th? If not, how can you possibly claim that Sweden have been offered an opportunity to "finish it"?
Dignity of the two girls is not involved because they did not report being raped or molested despite what the news say.
Ms. Ardin hosted Assange six days after the alleged incident and threw party for him.
Ms. Wilen and Assange separated in good mood afterwards and had breakfast together.
They went to police in order to persuade him to be tested for sexually transmitted diseases and after the police said they cold not do such thing they basically asked the police "if they could have been raped or molested" without never reporting rape or molestation. In the prosecutors report girls describe sex as unpleasant and that they did not like it. Under Swedish law police and the prosecution are required to register and prosecute all possible rape offenses of which they become aware. Prosecutors even dropped the case once.
As far as I understand, this is just procedural limbo. Swedish prosecutors are required to continue with hearing and Assange is freaked out of his mind because the case is so absurd.
This comment should really be further towards the top to make it more visible.
Unfortunately, due to the media people now associate Assange with "rape."
I grew up thinking rape meant something completely different than whatever happened here, be it, at the worst, what sounds like unpleasant and regrettable consensual sex.
Yeah, I'd rather focus on the victims of sexual assault than on the suspect trying to evade the law. What if it was your daughters/sisters/friends who were abused?
Sweden is not a "banana republic" or whatever you're trying to imply here.
I'm a native Swedish citizen, Sweden is perhaps not a banana republic - but the number of pretty serious oversteps done by the Swedish government due to a mixture of incompetence and the will to please other powerful nations are to many to neglect.
Going on since the forced sterilization, German troop transports, extradition of baltic citizens to the soviet union and seizure of newspapers before publication in the days of the second world war .... continuing to today with the Da Costa case, the Egyptians kidnapped and sent to torture by the CIA with help of the Swedish government, the pediatrician accused of murder, the whole Thomas Quick embarrassment .... the list can be made rather long.
And there is obviously a great deal of pride and prestige put into this case by the attorney, who has not been exactly working their ass off to get the investigation going forward - even bending their own rules quite a bit with the obvious intention to inflict maximum discomfort to Julian Assange - and that makes me distrust their honesty and the entire basis for this case.
Have you read the case against Assange? It's very, very fishy.
At the very worst, this is not a case of rape in the traditional definition of the word. At worst, it is a modern interpretation as what qualifies as rape, as in "I invited him to sleep with me and stay at my apartment, and we were sleeping together for a week, but then a few weeks after we had sex I later regretted it."
If you read all the allegations that his 'victims' brought up, you see that while Assange isn't exactly a gentleman, nothing really bad took place. If Assange wasn't politically active in the way he is, he would get a slap on the wrist and move on with his life. It's pretty terrifying how you have to worry that your own country extradites you to America and this ruins your life even overseas.
EDIT: Before you reply angrily, please read the exact details of the cases. It's more subtle than you think. Just saying "but it's rape!" doesn't cut it here.
This is really not appropriate. There are allegations of forced rape and sexual assault and we shouldn't be trivialising them. If Assange was just an ordinary guy and these allegations were true it absolutely wouldn't be just a slap on the wrist.
Based on Sweden's chequered history with renditions I don't blame Assange for being reluctant to face the charges. But that doesn't mean he did or didn't do anything wrong.
Someone accused of rape should not be given refuge to wait it out.
Its easy for armchair conspiracists to imagine this whole thing an elaborate ruse to extradite Assange to the US, but Assange was being questioned in Sweden before he fled from there and on bail in the UK prior to 'fleeing' to the Ecuadorian embassy. It seems a very roundabout way for the Americans to get at him.
Occams Razor Assange is fleeing justice and abusing the trusting conspiracists trust in promoting the whole American extradition narrative.
PS: so the downvotes roll in :(
Really, are these girls secretly American agents? And the Americans, rather than use two girl agents that had intimate access to Assange, chose to burn them by asking them to escalate to the Police when Assange wouldn't be treated for STDs?
And the stay at the embassy is for political reasons – and like a prison sentence (in a civilized country where prison sentences are about the loss of freedom and not the loss of living as a human being).
Definitely not guilty until proven but at the same time we have a duty to respect the legal process unless there is something truly amiss. So far I remain unconvinced by the arguments that he's fleeing persecution.
There was no assumption of guilt in the parents post. There's an open accusation and it's absolutely normal that people get arrested for rape accusations. Rape is a serious crime and needs to be prosecuted.
The stay at the embassy is self-inflicted. Nobody but Assange chose to violate the conditions of his bail. Assange still is master of his own destiny and could end this at any point. He also enjoys a lot of freedoms that actual prisoners often do not enjoy, among them using the internet. Equating his self-chosen recluse with a prison sentence is unfair to all actual prisoners.
Accusations should be investigated by the justice system, not dismissed just because the person is famous.
They should face those accusations by being interviewed by the persecutor, and if the prosecutor believes there is a case to answer, they should face those accusations in court.
The Swedish police have had the option to interview Assange in London for three years, all expenses paid. They have chosen instead to temporize and delay, and thereby leave the investigation without closure. Note that the Swedish police have conducted foreign interviews in the past, but for some reason seem intent on drawing out this particular process.
They've asked to, multiple times. The Ecuadorian embassy won't let them.
"Last month, Ecuador’s prosecutor-general rejected a previous request from the Swedish prosecutor to question Assange in London. That office, in a letter to Swedish authorities, said it will interview Assange and asked for a list of questions the Swedish prosecutor wants the Ecuadorian prosecutor to ask the Wikileaks founder."
It seems they've finally come to an agreement that looks acceptable to both Ecuadorian and Swedish courts. Provisionally the date has been set for Oct 17th.
They have only asked once, and prior to that they left the offer open for two years. The Ecuadorian prosecutor has every right to intercede in the matter, especially if he is uncertain of the security situation. Interviews by proxy have also been used by Swedish authorities in the past.
Ecuador did not refuse. They are the ones who wanted Assange to be questioned in the embassy in the first place. But obviously there is a procedure for this to happen, and as another commenter says, a date has now been set. The Swedes, after years of refusing to come to London to question Assange, finally agreed after the UN ruled that Assange's stay is arbitrary detention and criticised Sweden for its handling of the case.
Suppose that you're accused of a crime in North Korea and somehow you manage to escape the country.
Will you still respect what you said in the comment and return to NK to stand trial ?
Replace North Korea with Iran, Iraq, Syria or any other country known to be a corrupt or totalitarian state...
Aka at least half of all the countries in the world...
As a foreigner, you wouldn't trust the justice system in those countries and you would be right to try to avoid the trial.
So you see, the validity of what you said depends a lot on the context.
Even if the Swedish investigation and the trial is totally fair, it is not really the issue.
The issue is the extradition treaty with the US - Sweden will have to make a choice - Assange or good relations with the U.S.
And this is were the deadlock is. Go to Sweden and get unfairly convicted (low probability) or get extradited to the US and get life in prison (high probability). Or both.
Sweden is not North Korea and countries don't extradite to the US all the time because the US justice system is atrocious by first world standards.
Should a Swedish court rule against extraditing Assange to the US, that will have exactly no impact on the relationship between the US and Sweden. No government can reasonably expect from another to break its own laws and it is certainly not in US interest for Sweden to go down that route. Not to mention that the US also reserves the right not to extradite to Sweden in individual cases.
> No government can reasonably expect from another to break its own laws and it is certainly not in US interest for Sweden to go down that route.
I feel and respect your desire for and belief in integrity on the part of the system, but it's extremely naive to believe that.
Maybe it's the fact that I've lived in many different cultures (including Sweden for a year btw!) or maybe it's my age, but what I've taken away from life so far is this:
There's the story which all people (should) believe and then there's the shit that happens.
We're being lied to since we're born - santa claus, tooth fairy, God, then justice, patriotism, news, terrorism, traitors and so on.
Wikileaks is one of the tools which shows us a glimpse of the shit that really happens.
Corruption, under-the-table deals, intimidations - including members of foreign governments, illegal detentions of foreign citizens, surveillance..
Always treat 'the System' with healthy skepticism - and that is because the information that it broadcasts is often false - due to incompetence on the part of the 'reporters' (usually) or due to hidden agendas that so many groups have.
The world is a combination of many chess games played at the same time - in some you're a pawn, in some you're a rook, in some you're the board ;).
In most court systems, the defendant is not required to say anything. So (in theory) he can just be tried in absentia. He can even have lawyers representing him.
At least to me (but I'm not a lawyer), the current system violates european human rights. Either he is charged with a crime, in which case the court case should have started years ago (and ended), or he is not officially charged with a crime, in which case he should be free to go where ever he wants until he is charged. The current situation is absurd.
Because in Sweden, procedurally, you do not get charged until you are in custody. Largely because they don't want to make it a separate concern as you put it.
I'm my opinion this goes against european human rights. As soon as Sweden asked for him to be extradited from England, the clock starts ticking. After two years, they violated his right to a speedy trail and he is free to go.
I'm really sad that his hasn't gone to the European Court of Human Right to decide against Sweden (or England, because it is actually England that is keeping him locked up).
Note that I do not have a high opinion of Assange, and it is quite possible that according to Swedish law he did rape those women. But he should have been entitled to a trial in absentia.
No, you get convicted in absentia (assuming there is enough evidence that you did it) and then you are essentially forever a wanted criminal who still has to do some jail time.
Rather extradited – to Sweden or the US, the latter maybe via Sweden … that seems to be the real issue, not the rape accusations (although rape accusations are known as a powerful weapon to destroy enemies – although that does of course not rule out that Assange is actually a rapist under Swedish law).
I think it's quite difficult to sustain the argument that the rape accusations aren't the real issue when he's twice fled jurisdiction on the day it became certain he would be charged with rape if he didn't. If the US had wanted to try to extradite him through legal means, the US had ample opportunity to arrange it during the period Assange was calmly reporting to the UK police every day whilst his legal team tried to thwart the European Arrest Warrant on technical grounds. If they wanted to try to extradite him through illegal means they could have done so at many points during Assange's life and a high profile court case would actually be a major inconvenience.
Fleeing at convenient timing is evidence that the threat of getting arrested and extradited was real. It says nothing about the validity of the sexual assault claims.
He refuses to go anywhere that makes him extraditable to the US. The Swedish, in turn, say roughly "our general rules are such that we can't guarantee that, and an exception isn't practically possible". Which makes sense, it's arguably better to have plain and simple rules than ones that cover every last edge case.
Personally, I think the Swedish should bend their laws. Globalisation is proceeding, and I think there'll be more country-straddling cases in the next century than there were in the past century. If that assumption is correct, writing rules to cover stances like Assange's is more reasonable than it has been.
Sweden shouldn't have to bargain or compromise with someone accused of a crime just because that person is picky about what countries they set foot in for their own reasons.
IF there are US charges against him and IF the US tries to extradite then I'm sure he'll have an opportunity to fight it.
The current rules for extradition do have their reasons. You may not want Germany to be able to enforce its strict rules about nazi speech all over the world, or Turkey to be able to imprison people who've offended Erdogan.
Haggling over extradition is not unusual. For example, the US has promised not to use capital punishment in order to extradite people from countries that forbid capital punishment.
There is no request for extradition over which anyone could haggle. There is no concrete evidence that the US is going to make such a request.
If there would be a request, as you say yourself, Sweden doesn't necessarily have to honor it, for example if Assange faces capital punishment. Assange could probably fight extradition in court also.
In any case this is nothing here to suggest that this is anything more than a smokescreen thrown up by Assange to distract from the fact that he's a rapist fleeing prosecution.
Sweden asked Britain to extradite him, and Assange is haggling: "I'll come if you'll let me go wherever I please afterwards". That "if" may be insincere but IMO it counts as haggling.
> Sweden shouldn't have to bargain or compromise with someone accused of a crime just because that person is picky about what countries they set foot in for their own reasons.
What is your opinion about what countries should or should not have to do based on? Your feelings about countries in general, or a specific empathy for Sweden?
> IF there are US charges against him and IF the US tries to extradite then I'm sure he'll have an opportunity to fight it.
You're absolutely sure? Why haven't you called Assange yet? I'm sure he'd be happy to know what you know.
Leaving aside the contempt for your own professed ideal demonstrated by the implicit suggestion that the complainants are guilty of perjury, wouldn't it be nice if we had some sort of mechanism, oh, say, call it a court, we could use to assess against a legal standard of guilt?
Oh wait, there is. But Assange has chosen to (illegally) run away from a valid investigation.
If you want to discredit someone publicly, publish articles of him with connection to keywords "rape" and "child pornography". Then let the media do its own work.
You're absolutely right, Assange should face his accusers in court. That's obvious. The problem is that Sweden and the UK are complicit in America's desire to seize Assange and put him in prison without even the possibility of a fair trial, and the first step in that process is his extradition to the US from either the UK or Sweden. That is what's interfering with the case and what Assange is fleeing from, not the rape allegation.
If the UK and Sweden were to agree that Assange wouldn't be extradited to the US I imagine he'd be on the next flight to Stockholm. It's the extradition order that's blocking these two women getting justice, not Assange himself.
Why would a nation give a warrant for communication data associated with a person, close down that persons bank accounts, and send investigators to interview people close to the person and request evidence? Those are the supporting evidence, and while it doesn't conclusively prove anything, some people would conclude that it is enough to warrant caution.
If Assange is facing charges in the US (and I don't think there's any evidence he is) then that's his problem. You don't get to avoid prosecution for a crime because it is politically or legally inconvenient for you.
It's an unrealistic demand, which Assange is fully aware of. The Swedish constitution makes it illegal for politicians to interfer with the judicial system.
Our laws do also, by the way, make it impossible for us to extradite him to the US without the consent of the UK, so it seems awfully convenient that he claims that he would trust an illegal guarantee by the Swedish government but not that it would follow it's own laws. That is, unless the UK is the problem - but then why the hell did he go there in the first place, and stayed there?
This keeps getting claimed. No, Sweden is a sovereign nation and its extradition treaties are bilateral - that means they interpret them as they wish.
If they think the demands for extradition are not fulfilled, they can say so, and that's the final word. There's nothing the US or UK can do but complain, there's no court they can apply to to overrule such a decision (because of course, the UK or US governments would certainly not allow themselves to be overruled by any independent court in a matter like this).
The national courts can overrule the government and say that an extradition is illegal, even if government wants to extradite. But the converse is not true: if the court thinks that an extradition would be permissible, the government can still stop it. They can even promise this beforehand, preempting the need for a court ruling. See sovereignty, again.
At worst this would be "impolite". The government of course loathes to do something like this, because then they have to answer for all the cases they did not intervene in with the courts and the civic service's many rulings. They would like to wash their hands of unpopular decisions. But they do in fact intervene quite a lot.
That the government claims "we must not meddle with the judiciary" as some holy principle is darkly ironic in this case. Because if you don't think it was political that Marianne Ny revived the case after it had been firmly dismissed by the previous prosecutor, how naive are you?
Basically, yes. Like a gentleman's agreement, there's no one around to interpret it for you or punish you if you "misinterpret" it - other than the other party, obviously.
Many countries don't have statutes of limitations. The UK certainly doesn't have a statute of limitation on rape (recent celebrity controversies passim).
You're attacking strawmen. People are free to believe whether Sweden/Assange have ulterior motives, but either way the Swedish prosecutor has behaved improperly. For example see the UN report here: http://www.ohchr.org/EN/NewsEvents/Pages/DisplayNews.aspx?Ne...
Right of political asylum is a tricky concept. Such persons are indeed protected by one legal system from the prosecution from an other legal system. Neither system are required by international standard to back off, but tax payers of both systems are paying for it and thus has some right to question the sanity of it.
As for armchair Occams Razor/conspiracists theorist, the published line of events goes as:
First month in Sweden. Initial questioning only, followed by conversations between lawyer and prosecutor. Assange explicit asked if he could leave the country and got "yes" back. While in UK he had a previous schedule talk in Sweden which got suddenly surrounded by a massive police force. Following this was the international arrest order.
So I ask, what secretly American agents? What elaborate ruse? A ordinary investigation suddenly jumped from "this is barely worth anyones time" to "international arrest warrant and massive police forces". Assange theory is that an external diplomatic force, ie US, meddled with the investigation. The other theory being presented is that this unprecedented chain of events is just normal procedure.
I don't think that girls are agents, but I definitely believe that US has jumped on the bandwagon as soon the opportunity arose. Remember that prosecutor dismissed the case initially and then changed the mind later (presumably after a phone call from the above)? And all the insisting on him coming personally to Sweden is suspicious. First of all, he's not even officially charged yet, he's just wanted for questioning. Why can't he be questioned in the embassy? Why Sweden needs him personally present? Wouldn't it be logical that after all this time he was tried in absentia, with layers to represent him? Remember that this is Sweden, not US. Even if he gets convicted, he'd probably go away with a suspended sentence, or a few months in super-nice Swedish prison, where he'd probably have better conditions than he has now living in the embassy. Why wouldn't he go for it, serve his time and then walk away as a free man, if it was just that? Makes no sense for him to go through all of this, if the threat is not real...
You need a bit more information to see the really funny part.
There is presently a scandal in Sweden regarding how bad the Swedish police and the courts work. The justice system write off cases easily. In many parts of the country, after office hours there are hours of travel for the closest police (if they happen to be free).
Recently it was found that the police doesn't just have the lowest solving percentage in history, they hide that information. And so on.
But in this Assange case, the justice system work hard; it seems they'd follow Assange to the gates of Hell...
(That said -- imho, no part in that circus has any credibility whatsoever.)
Sorry, I thought my point was obvious -- it is hilariously obvious that the tenacity is not about the crime Assange stands accused of.
(I'm not certain if Assange should be sent to a prison in the US or not. Releasing information, which certainly e.g. China and Russia already have, is not bad. On the other hand, releasing secret information must be prosecuted for a state's good.)
Living in Sweden, so kinda care that the police would work a bit harder. But its a massive leap to take general statistics and extrapolate that to one of the most heinous crimes of all - rape. Hopefully the overstretched police are overlooking the drunks and focusing on the rape and murder cases?
You would hope so. In today's news, the police just forgot about when a 72 year old got a gun to his head when visiting a graveyard.
Rather, crime in Sweden is deemed important if a case reach the media. That is a more likely explanation to the situation (without external influences).
So e.g. the case of the old man getting a gun to his head I noted above will probably be solved now, if it still is possible after so long a time.
(And e.g. removing the condom during consensual sex, like Assange, is defined as "rape" in Sweden, but is hardly the upper half of that definition.)
So you believe the rape accusations are valid? If you think that it is not politically motivated or that Sweden will not hand him over to the US as soon as they get him, you must be incredibly naive.
The rape accusations seem valid, but I'm not qualified to judge and neither are you. A court should decide.
I find the whole idea that two girls tried to get him to take an STD test and it escalates to him fleeing to be an incredibly non-credible way for the US to extradite him.
Why didn't the US pursue him for those months he was wandering around London?
What does hand over mean. Assange isn't wanted in America, and as far as I'm aware hasn't broken any US laws either. I'm sure you can find some quotes from blowhard politicians saying something mean about him, but that's not how the justice system works.
So what does hand over mean? And why would neutral Sweden be more likely to hand him over than closest ally, special relationship, NATO and 5 Eyes member Britain?
Saying Assange isn't wanted in the US (and wouldn't be arrested if he came) is the equivalent of waving your hands on someone's face and saying "lalallala I'm not touching you". There's not a literal arrest warrant but you're being tremendously naive or deliberately obtuse if you think he wouldn't be arrested at customs.
Assange is a nutjob who grew up in Australia during the cold war as a teenage hacker thinking the world was going to end. His paranoia and sense of dread lead him to picking the biggest fight in the world possible.
Potentially people have died because of what he did, but also the public has an amazing resource for understanding the larger powers at will in the world around them.
If I have to get armchair about the rapes, everything I've seen it seems like he got high with a couple chicks and had some sex. Deviant I guess because there were multiple. I don't think there is media reports of this, but I'm sure there was some trip or some x involved. He very could be a date rapist. Very possible.
I don't think this claim has ever been made, but he could potentially have drugged and raped two women that were not awake to give consent. It's also possible that he violently forced women to have sex with him.
I want those women to have a reckoning with Assange in a Swedish court. By proxy if need be, to protect them from their assailant.
However, there is a big problem with moving him to Sweden because they are an American ally and we aren't exactly treating Chelsea Manning in a way that I think is appropriate for the gravity of what is happening.
Assange is a person looking for a war to the death because that's what he was brought up expecting. That may or may not be the game that we are playing, but it is the way he sees the world. He has provided a service that potentially could save lives and enable us to have a better shot at a more informed future.
Chelsea, Edward, and Assange are martyrs and I'm fairly sure they've accepted it. If they move to the wrong court they might be shot on a boat and dumped in the ocean and we'll not get to have that dialog.
It's fucking tragic if those women were victimized. If this crazy game of chess with these eccentric techie chists isn't allowed to play out verbosely, we will all suffer for it.
Your response is full of defamatory conjecture and bizarre imagination. All we know is that two women have alleged that Assange failed to use a condom and/or intentionally tore a condom, and that the Swedish authorities have refused to pursue the investigation further by interviewing Assange in London. It's not very complicated.
My response speculates a hyperbolic worst case scenario for him that he is a violent rapist and I agree that his victims need to have their day in court.
I am also trying to illustrate that the thing he is a part of and may be using as a fortification against prosecution from that assault, is an important issue as well. Potentially effecting many more people.
I don't have an answer for this, nor a dog in the fight. It's just a very fucking hard situation to make blanket statements about.
You also have to understand the current political climate in Sweden. Assange's case is the ONLY rape that is disclosed/covered publicly.
The 3000% increase in rapes due to immigration forced the government to ban the reporting on rapes to prevent racism. That also includes internet censorship, including foreign news sites.
It isn't crazy. He's crazy. If I search for the equivalent of "rape" on an aggregator of news, I see one case of a rape 12th of September. A man was arrested for suspected rape on the 9th. Man being charged for brutal rape on the 7th. Four men arrested for suspected rape the same day.
All of these are covered in all the major news sites. The poster your responded to belongs to our equivalent of Trump supporters, meaning that, yes, there is a tiny bit of truth in what he's saying (there are some minor problems with violance and rape amongst the refugees) but the extent is extremely exaggerated and fueled by nationalism, paranoia and xenophobia as well as a complete lack of care about the truth.
Here you can see some stats that shows the real statistics, and as you can see the levels are stable. Please note also that this isn't only for rape, but all kinds of crimes with a sexual component (i.e. everything from groping, spreading nude pictures, sexual harassment etc).
Additional information from two days ago: Ecuador says it will allow Swedish investigators to question Assange at the embassy on October 17 [0].
If Sweden is serious about this case, they should accept Ecuador's invitation. Not doing so will further fuel questions about whether this case is a ruse.
Maybe he should have contacted the American ambassador to Sweden, or maybe the US ambassador in the UK :
>Included in the leak was a list of high-profile donors from 2008 and the ambassadorship they received in exchange for their large donation to the DNC and Barack Obama’s Organizing For Action (OFA). Essentially, Obama was auctioning off foreign ambassador positions and other office positions while Hillary Clinton served as secretary of state. The largest donor listed at contributions totaling over $3.5 million, Matthew Barzun, served as U.S. Ambassador to Sweden from 2009 to 2011, served as President Obama’s National Finance Chair during his 2012 reelection campaign, and now serves as U.S. Ambassador to the United Kingdom.
What jumps out of to me is that the initial prosecutor said she didn't believe Assange committed rape, so she dropped the case. But then Sweden's general prosecutor took the case - why would she do that? Is that typical in Sweden?
Another thing it's not made clear by BBC, although it may have been explained in other articles or by Assange himself, is how did the two women meet and already accused him of rape within the span of 3 days?
It's funny how a few years ago Assange was portrayed as a hero fronting this exciting Wikileaks thing which leaked evidence of war crimes and stood up for the whistleblowers and the little man.
Now he seems involved in some strange right-wing cabal involving everything from the Kremlin to Donald Trump? Was he that guy all along, or did he kind of turn into that side of things while stuck in the embassy?
That might explain why he's portrayed as such. I doubt anyone twisted his arm to force him to do his own show on RT (The state sponsored Russian Breitbart) however.
Even if it is discrediting, which is debatable even if you agree RT is corrupt (and the largest western media outlets are not?), honestly would you not expect Assange to partner with foreign states which can offer support? He is having his life ruined on what looks to be pretty obviously bullshit charges, that no nation state would pursue in the way they are if it was not for Assange being seen as a persona non grata of the west.
134 comments
[ 2.7 ms ] story [ 199 ms ] threadParticularly when the Ecuadorean embassy keeps throwing curve balls by blocking requests and insisting on asking the questions themselves.
Ms. Ardin hosted Assange six days after the alleged incident and threw party for him.
Ms. Wilen and Assange separated in good mood afterwards and had breakfast together.
They went to police in order to persuade him to be tested for sexually transmitted diseases and after the police said they cold not do such thing they basically asked the police "if they could have been raped or molested" without never reporting rape or molestation. In the prosecutors report girls describe sex as unpleasant and that they did not like it. Under Swedish law police and the prosecution are required to register and prosecute all possible rape offenses of which they become aware. Prosecutors even dropped the case once.
As far as I understand, this is just procedural limbo. Swedish prosecutors are required to continue with hearing and Assange is freaked out of his mind because the case is so absurd.
I don't agree with those who claim that Swedish rape laws are bad, but I think they are very different from other countries. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rape_statistics#/media/File:Ra...
Unfortunately, due to the media people now associate Assange with "rape."
I grew up thinking rape meant something completely different than whatever happened here, be it, at the worst, what sounds like unpleasant and regrettable consensual sex.
Sweden is not a "banana republic" or whatever you're trying to imply here.
Going on since the forced sterilization, German troop transports, extradition of baltic citizens to the soviet union and seizure of newspapers before publication in the days of the second world war .... continuing to today with the Da Costa case, the Egyptians kidnapped and sent to torture by the CIA with help of the Swedish government, the pediatrician accused of murder, the whole Thomas Quick embarrassment .... the list can be made rather long.
And there is obviously a great deal of pride and prestige put into this case by the attorney, who has not been exactly working their ass off to get the investigation going forward - even bending their own rules quite a bit with the obvious intention to inflict maximum discomfort to Julian Assange - and that makes me distrust their honesty and the entire basis for this case.
At the very worst, this is not a case of rape in the traditional definition of the word. At worst, it is a modern interpretation as what qualifies as rape, as in "I invited him to sleep with me and stay at my apartment, and we were sleeping together for a week, but then a few weeks after we had sex I later regretted it."
EDIT: Before you reply angrily, please read the exact details of the cases. It's more subtle than you think. Just saying "but it's rape!" doesn't cut it here.
Based on Sweden's chequered history with renditions I don't blame Assange for being reluctant to face the charges. But that doesn't mean he did or didn't do anything wrong.
Its easy for armchair conspiracists to imagine this whole thing an elaborate ruse to extradite Assange to the US, but Assange was being questioned in Sweden before he fled from there and on bail in the UK prior to 'fleeing' to the Ecuadorian embassy. It seems a very roundabout way for the Americans to get at him.
Occams Razor Assange is fleeing justice and abusing the trusting conspiracists trust in promoting the whole American extradition narrative.
PS: so the downvotes roll in :(
Really, are these girls secretly American agents? And the Americans, rather than use two girl agents that had intimate access to Assange, chose to burn them by asking them to escalate to the Police when Assange wouldn't be treated for STDs?
And the stay at the embassy is for political reasons – and like a prison sentence (in a civilized country where prison sentences are about the loss of freedom and not the loss of living as a human being).
There was no assumption of guilt in the parents post. There's an open accusation and it's absolutely normal that people get arrested for rape accusations. Rape is a serious crime and needs to be prosecuted.
The stay at the embassy is self-inflicted. Nobody but Assange chose to violate the conditions of his bail. Assange still is master of his own destiny and could end this at any point. He also enjoys a lot of freedoms that actual prisoners often do not enjoy, among them using the internet. Equating his self-chosen recluse with a prison sentence is unfair to all actual prisoners.
They should face those accusations by being interviewed by the persecutor, and if the prosecutor believes there is a case to answer, they should face those accusations in court.
"Last month, Ecuador’s prosecutor-general rejected a previous request from the Swedish prosecutor to question Assange in London. That office, in a letter to Swedish authorities, said it will interview Assange and asked for a list of questions the Swedish prosecutor wants the Ecuadorian prosecutor to ask the Wikileaks founder."
(http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2016/02/swe...)
http://johnpilger.com/articles/freeing-julian-assange-the-la...
Will you still respect what you said in the comment and return to NK to stand trial ?
Replace North Korea with Iran, Iraq, Syria or any other country known to be a corrupt or totalitarian state...
Aka at least half of all the countries in the world...
As a foreigner, you wouldn't trust the justice system in those countries and you would be right to try to avoid the trial.
So you see, the validity of what you said depends a lot on the context.
Even if the Swedish investigation and the trial is totally fair, it is not really the issue.
The issue is the extradition treaty with the US - Sweden will have to make a choice - Assange or good relations with the U.S.
And this is were the deadlock is. Go to Sweden and get unfairly convicted (low probability) or get extradited to the US and get life in prison (high probability). Or both.
Should a Swedish court rule against extraditing Assange to the US, that will have exactly no impact on the relationship between the US and Sweden. No government can reasonably expect from another to break its own laws and it is certainly not in US interest for Sweden to go down that route. Not to mention that the US also reserves the right not to extradite to Sweden in individual cases.
I feel and respect your desire for and belief in integrity on the part of the system, but it's extremely naive to believe that.
Maybe it's the fact that I've lived in many different cultures (including Sweden for a year btw!) or maybe it's my age, but what I've taken away from life so far is this:
There's the story which all people (should) believe and then there's the shit that happens.
We're being lied to since we're born - santa claus, tooth fairy, God, then justice, patriotism, news, terrorism, traitors and so on.
Wikileaks is one of the tools which shows us a glimpse of the shit that really happens.
Corruption, under-the-table deals, intimidations - including members of foreign governments, illegal detentions of foreign citizens, surveillance..
Always treat 'the System' with healthy skepticism - and that is because the information that it broadcasts is often false - due to incompetence on the part of the 'reporters' (usually) or due to hidden agendas that so many groups have.
The world is a combination of many chess games played at the same time - in some you're a pawn, in some you're a rook, in some you're the board ;).
Some countries, especially in the Civil Law area allow sentences in absentia.
At least to me (but I'm not a lawyer), the current system violates european human rights. Either he is charged with a crime, in which case the court case should have started years ago (and ended), or he is not officially charged with a crime, in which case he should be free to go where ever he wants until he is charged. The current situation is absurd.
Why can't he be charged while he's still in the Embassy?
I understand that enforcing any judgement rendered by a court becomes a hang up because of his asylum, but that's a separate concern.
I'm really sad that his hasn't gone to the European Court of Human Right to decide against Sweden (or England, because it is actually England that is keeping him locked up).
Note that I do not have a high opinion of Assange, and it is quite possible that according to Swedish law he did rape those women. But he should have been entitled to a trial in absentia.
So he only has another 4 years to go
He refuses to go anywhere that makes him extraditable to the US. The Swedish, in turn, say roughly "our general rules are such that we can't guarantee that, and an exception isn't practically possible". Which makes sense, it's arguably better to have plain and simple rules than ones that cover every last edge case.
Personally, I think the Swedish should bend their laws. Globalisation is proceeding, and I think there'll be more country-straddling cases in the next century than there were in the past century. If that assumption is correct, writing rules to cover stances like Assange's is more reasonable than it has been.
IF there are US charges against him and IF the US tries to extradite then I'm sure he'll have an opportunity to fight it.
The current rules for extradition do have their reasons. You may not want Germany to be able to enforce its strict rules about nazi speech all over the world, or Turkey to be able to imprison people who've offended Erdogan.
Haggling over extradition is not unusual. For example, the US has promised not to use capital punishment in order to extradite people from countries that forbid capital punishment.
If there would be a request, as you say yourself, Sweden doesn't necessarily have to honor it, for example if Assange faces capital punishment. Assange could probably fight extradition in court also.
In any case this is nothing here to suggest that this is anything more than a smokescreen thrown up by Assange to distract from the fact that he's a rapist fleeing prosecution.
What is your opinion about what countries should or should not have to do based on? Your feelings about countries in general, or a specific empathy for Sweden?
> IF there are US charges against him and IF the US tries to extradite then I'm sure he'll have an opportunity to fight it.
You're absolutely sure? Why haven't you called Assange yet? I'm sure he'd be happy to know what you know.
Oh wait, there is. But Assange has chosen to (illegally) run away from a valid investigation.
As I had recalled earlier there was some damning evidence, if true, supporting the case that it is a conspiracy.
Supposedly the girls had denied rape allegations but later retracted or removed traces of the denials.
The evidence is an affidavit from Assange himself. Not many people would consider an affidavit from the accused "damming".
That's a kind way of saying "about as reliable as the idea Reiser was framed by the Russian mob."
If the UK and Sweden were to agree that Assange wouldn't be extradited to the US I imagine he'd be on the next flight to Stockholm. It's the extradition order that's blocking these two women getting justice, not Assange himself.
The Swedes have asked the UK to extradite him to Sweden.
The US hasn't asked either the UK nor Sweden to extradite him to the US. Is there even a court case against him in the US?
The extradition to the US seems to be Assange's own narrative. Why didn't the US reach out to get him on the streets of London?
http://www.mediaite.com/tv/assange-why-is-doj-wikileaks-inve...
Why would a nation give a warrant for communication data associated with a person, close down that persons bank accounts, and send investigators to interview people close to the person and request evidence? Those are the supporting evidence, and while it doesn't conclusively prove anything, some people would conclude that it is enough to warrant caution.
This is the real issue. Whether or not he would likely be extradited if he were to return to Sweden.
Obviously Assange thinks he will otherwise he would have returned long ago.
If you think he would not be, then that should be the focus of your debate.
> You don't get to avoid prosecution for a crime because it is politically or legally inconvenient for you.
You clearly do, if the alternative for the people who want to prosecute you is to violate international norms and storm an embassy.
The UK isn't that complicit, because he's been here for a while and the UK has done fuck all.
http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-31159594
If they really wanted him in the US they'd have spent a tenth of that and had him renditioned.
Our laws do also, by the way, make it impossible for us to extradite him to the US without the consent of the UK, so it seems awfully convenient that he claims that he would trust an illegal guarantee by the Swedish government but not that it would follow it's own laws. That is, unless the UK is the problem - but then why the hell did he go there in the first place, and stayed there?
If they think the demands for extradition are not fulfilled, they can say so, and that's the final word. There's nothing the US or UK can do but complain, there's no court they can apply to to overrule such a decision (because of course, the UK or US governments would certainly not allow themselves to be overruled by any independent court in a matter like this).
The national courts can overrule the government and say that an extradition is illegal, even if government wants to extradite. But the converse is not true: if the court thinks that an extradition would be permissible, the government can still stop it. They can even promise this beforehand, preempting the need for a court ruling. See sovereignty, again.
At worst this would be "impolite". The government of course loathes to do something like this, because then they have to answer for all the cases they did not intervene in with the courts and the civic service's many rulings. They would like to wash their hands of unpopular decisions. But they do in fact intervene quite a lot.
That the government claims "we must not meddle with the judiciary" as some holy principle is darkly ironic in this case. Because if you don't think it was political that Marianne Ny revived the case after it had been firmly dismissed by the previous prosecutor, how naive are you?
As for armchair Occams Razor/conspiracists theorist, the published line of events goes as:
First month in Sweden. Initial questioning only, followed by conversations between lawyer and prosecutor. Assange explicit asked if he could leave the country and got "yes" back. While in UK he had a previous schedule talk in Sweden which got suddenly surrounded by a massive police force. Following this was the international arrest order.
So I ask, what secretly American agents? What elaborate ruse? A ordinary investigation suddenly jumped from "this is barely worth anyones time" to "international arrest warrant and massive police forces". Assange theory is that an external diplomatic force, ie US, meddled with the investigation. The other theory being presented is that this unprecedented chain of events is just normal procedure.
There is presently a scandal in Sweden regarding how bad the Swedish police and the courts work. The justice system write off cases easily. In many parts of the country, after office hours there are hours of travel for the closest police (if they happen to be free).
Recently it was found that the police doesn't just have the lowest solving percentage in history, they hide that information. And so on.
But in this Assange case, the justice system work hard; it seems they'd follow Assange to the gates of Hell...
(That said -- imho, no part in that circus has any credibility whatsoever.)
If they'd follow Assange to the gates of Hell, they've just fly to the embassy and interview him there
(I'm not certain if Assange should be sent to a prison in the US or not. Releasing information, which certainly e.g. China and Russia already have, is not bad. On the other hand, releasing secret information must be prosecuted for a state's good.)
Rather, crime in Sweden is deemed important if a case reach the media. That is a more likely explanation to the situation (without external influences).
So e.g. the case of the old man getting a gun to his head I noted above will probably be solved now, if it still is possible after so long a time.
(And e.g. removing the condom during consensual sex, like Assange, is defined as "rape" in Sweden, but is hardly the upper half of that definition.)
The rape accusations seem valid, but I'm not qualified to judge and neither are you. A court should decide.
I find the whole idea that two girls tried to get him to take an STD test and it escalates to him fleeing to be an incredibly non-credible way for the US to extradite him.
Why didn't the US pursue him for those months he was wandering around London?
So what does hand over mean? And why would neutral Sweden be more likely to hand him over than closest ally, special relationship, NATO and 5 Eyes member Britain?
Potentially people have died because of what he did, but also the public has an amazing resource for understanding the larger powers at will in the world around them.
If I have to get armchair about the rapes, everything I've seen it seems like he got high with a couple chicks and had some sex. Deviant I guess because there were multiple. I don't think there is media reports of this, but I'm sure there was some trip or some x involved. He very could be a date rapist. Very possible.
I don't think this claim has ever been made, but he could potentially have drugged and raped two women that were not awake to give consent. It's also possible that he violently forced women to have sex with him.
I want those women to have a reckoning with Assange in a Swedish court. By proxy if need be, to protect them from their assailant.
However, there is a big problem with moving him to Sweden because they are an American ally and we aren't exactly treating Chelsea Manning in a way that I think is appropriate for the gravity of what is happening.
Assange is a person looking for a war to the death because that's what he was brought up expecting. That may or may not be the game that we are playing, but it is the way he sees the world. He has provided a service that potentially could save lives and enable us to have a better shot at a more informed future.
Chelsea, Edward, and Assange are martyrs and I'm fairly sure they've accepted it. If they move to the wrong court they might be shot on a boat and dumped in the ocean and we'll not get to have that dialog.
It's fucking tragic if those women were victimized. If this crazy game of chess with these eccentric techie chists isn't allowed to play out verbosely, we will all suffer for it.
I am also trying to illustrate that the thing he is a part of and may be using as a fortification against prosecution from that assault, is an important issue as well. Potentially effecting many more people.
I don't have an answer for this, nor a dog in the fight. It's just a very fucking hard situation to make blanket statements about.
Standard immigrant-hatred. Very much en vogue throughout Europe right now.
All of these are covered in all the major news sites. The poster your responded to belongs to our equivalent of Trump supporters, meaning that, yes, there is a tiny bit of truth in what he's saying (there are some minor problems with violance and rape amongst the refugees) but the extent is extremely exaggerated and fueled by nationalism, paranoia and xenophobia as well as a complete lack of care about the truth.
https://www.bra.se/bra/brott-och-statistik/valdtakt-och-sexu...
Here you can see some stats that shows the real statistics, and as you can see the levels are stable. Please note also that this isn't only for rape, but all kinds of crimes with a sexual component (i.e. everything from groping, spreading nude pictures, sexual harassment etc).
If Sweden is serious about this case, they should accept Ecuador's invitation. Not doing so will further fuel questions about whether this case is a ruse.
[0] http://www.reuters.com/article/us-ecuador-sweden-assange-idU...
"Swedish court upholds Assange warrant, clears way for questioning in October"
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-ecuador-sweden-assange-idU...
So as far as I can see, he will be questioned in place, in October.
>Included in the leak was a list of high-profile donors from 2008 and the ambassadorship they received in exchange for their large donation to the DNC and Barack Obama’s Organizing For Action (OFA). Essentially, Obama was auctioning off foreign ambassador positions and other office positions while Hillary Clinton served as secretary of state. The largest donor listed at contributions totaling over $3.5 million, Matthew Barzun, served as U.S. Ambassador to Sweden from 2009 to 2011, served as President Obama’s National Finance Chair during his 2012 reelection campaign, and now serves as U.S. Ambassador to the United Kingdom.
Oh, I don't think that will help.
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-11949341
What jumps out of to me is that the initial prosecutor said she didn't believe Assange committed rape, so she dropped the case. But then Sweden's general prosecutor took the case - why would she do that? Is that typical in Sweden?
Another thing it's not made clear by BBC, although it may have been explained in other articles or by Assange himself, is how did the two women meet and already accused him of rape within the span of 3 days?
Now he seems involved in some strange right-wing cabal involving everything from the Kremlin to Donald Trump? Was he that guy all along, or did he kind of turn into that side of things while stuck in the embassy?
Even allowing yourself to be interviewed on RT is discrediting. As I said, they are a Breitbart-esque state controlled propaganda arm of the Kremlin.
Steven Segal did this before, when he needed some spotlight:
https://www.theguardian.com/media/2014/oct/30/rt-russia-toda...