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Assange Requests Asylum In Ecuador
david.emery writes "Julian Assange, his appeals in the United Kingdom having run out, today went to the Ecuadorian Embassy in London to request asylum from his pending extradition to Sweden to face questioning for 'unlawful coercion and sexual misconduct including rape.'"
Yes, some of us are really that naive.
Sweden is very liberal about the protection of women and what should constitute sexual abuse. He was a big name, and he broke the law to the point he used his influence to do things that would get other men arrested too. And then instead of answering the charges, he fled the country. Over something that might get him $1000 in fines and told not to come back to the country.
In most countries, what he did would be considered douchebaggery of the highest proportions. In Sweden, they find it criminal...even if it is pretty much a slap on the wrist. When a big name does it, they need to make an example...and the example is he pays a fine much smaller than he has wasted in lawyers so far and goes home. He could have taken care of this months ago, but he wanted to stay in the public eye and pretend that he was oppressed. I wish I could fuck one woman, convince her to drop me off at another woman's home. Fuck her without a condom after telling her I was wearing one, and then go back to the first and pull my condom off halfway through and brag about it...while having half the world look at me as if I'm a political prisoner for doing so...and probably fuck another dozen women in the process.
Gotta hand it to him...he knows how to play others. Are you so naive to think that a man so skilled at manipulation isn't manipulating you?
(BTW I think the US would LOVE to have him in custody, but we all know that he committed no crimes in the US. Treason is not a crime if you aren't a citizen...regardless of what Republicans would like to have you believe)
Way to drink the kool-aid. That or you are astro turfing.
He's not even being charged by the women involved anymore. The women suddenly wanted to charge him AFTER they were approached by a swedish prosecutor. They later attempted to drop the charges, were told they couldn't, eventually succeeded in dropping the charges, only to have the charges somehow re-instituted by a swedish prosecutor with known high up US ties under pressure from the swedish government.
This is all as reported by the SWEDISH Press. Stop fucking astro-turfing to attempt to cover this shit up. This is the most blatant abuse of power by the US over its allies I've ever seen.
He was given permission to leave Sweden. So he did. Then something weird and as yet unexplained happened and another prosecutor decided he was guilty of something without including the two women the original questioning had been about.
I've never heard of this "have to be in Sweden to be questioned by a prosecutor" before. Presumably neither Assange nor his lawyers have as well. The prosecutor was asked several times to come to London during the last 450+ days of house arrest but refused without saying why.
If a prosecutor is enough of a "judicial authority" (not in this country they aren't) to authorise a EAW then the Swedish embassy is Swedish enough to be a venue for questioning.
"Wait. Something's happening. It's opening up! My God, it's full of apricots!"
I'm in New Zealand where the US FBI is getting the NZ Government to charge the owner of MegaUpload 'Kim DotcCom' on their behalf. There is nothing wrong with this, it is part of NZs responsibilities. However, the FBI have been duplicating the MegaUpload harddrives while in New Zealand despite not being permitted to.
In short, the FBI broke New Zealand law. Maybe the US would respect Ecuadorean law if Assange were there, maybe they wouldn't. The USA does more good things than people give them credit for, and I personally am pretty pro-US, but the evidence is the US flouts international laws and norms when it suits them.
If I were Assange then seeking asylum is possibly not a bad thing (issuing an Interpol warrant for the charges he faced is pretty extreme - it shows the lengths that the Powers That Be will go to in order to silence this whistle-blower [he didn't report anything false, just made duplicity publicly known]).