Slashdot Mirror
One Year Since Assange Took Refuge in Ecuadorian Embassy
Daniel_Stuckey writes with an article marking the one year anniversary of Julian Assange seeking asylum in the Ecuadorian Embassy. From the article: "Uninterested in facing U.S. justice, Assange said he's prepared to spend five years living there. If he goes out for a walk, he'll be extradited to Sweden to answer rape accusations —after which he has no promise from Sweden to deny further extradition efforts to America, where a grand jury investigation into WikiLeaks awaits. This also means that London's Metropolitan Police have been devoting their resources to keeping tabs on Assange for a year. Yesterday, a spokesperson explained the updated costs of guarding the embassy over the phone: 'From July 2012 through May 2013, the full cost has been £3.8 million ($5,963,340),' he said. '£700,000 ($1,099,560) of which are additional, or overtime costs.'
Julian has a treadmill, a SAD lamp, and a connection to the Internet, through which he's been publishing small leaks and conducting interviews. The indoor lifestyle has taken its toll on Julian, and it led to his contracting a chronic lung condition last fall."
Lots of people turn to raping after making speeches criticizing the primacy of the U.S. dollar, or revealing U.S. top secret documents. Hell, it wouldn't surprise me if Edward Snowden weren't considering raping some poor women right now, or molesting kids, or selling secrets to the Chinese, or kicking puppies.
The cow says "Moo." The dog says "Woof." The Timothy says "Thanks, valued customer. We appreciate your input."
Fugitive, yes. But remember that every oppressive dictatorship in history has carried out their purges and atrocities in the name of 'justice.' It is a very flexible concept. What one country considered justice, another may well consider crimes against humanity - and often the same is true with the roles reversed. He isn't hiding from the rape accusation* - he he hiding from the US (He believes Sweden to be acting as their proxy), and given their treatment of other people involved in high-profile leaks** it could certainly be argued that any paranoia he feels is justified.
If I believed the US were trying to extradite me in connection with a major leak, I'd be packing my bags and buying a train ticket as far as I could go by cash.
*It isn't rape exactly, but there is no precise equivilent in UK or US law, so 'rape' is close enough. A better translation might be 'sex by deception.'
**Manning, kept in solitary confinement for years without trial, then being tried at a secret court in which he isn't permitted to see the evidence presented against him.
No it's worse than that, he posted some text on the internet!
That allegation, as I understand it, is that after having had protected sex with the lady the evening before, she woke up in the morning to discover him having unprotected sex with her.
Unless you believe that the consent to protected sex from the night before includes consent to unprotected sex the next morning, he was having sex with her without her consent. Therefore it would be rape.
Yeah, that's why the far right voted for the PATRIOT Act in the US. Here's a hint, Fascism is not 'far left', it is 'far right'.
And the left is abusing it just as much if not moreso than the right. So get off your high partisan horse and see the nation for what it really is.
Lots of people turn to raping after making speeches criticizing the primacy of the U.S. dollar, or revealing U.S. top secret documents. Hell, it wouldn't surprise me if Edward Snowden weren't considering raping some poor women right now, or molesting kids, or selling secrets to the Chinese, or kicking puppies.
In politics that if you can't attack the message, you attack the messenger. The United States has several organizations dedicated to discrediting people who come forward with allegations of impropriety against the government. It is a standard tactic used by many governments; Distributing disinformation is a time-honored military and political strategy.
And it is very effective. Just look at this thread: Some people have been completely taken in by it and the discussion now revolves not around the correctness of whistle blowing, or whether society benefits from an organization like wikileaks, or if what the government was exposed in having done was right or wrong... the entire discussion now centers largely on Julian.
#fuckbeta #iamslashdot #dicemustdie
The difference is that he isn't facing prison. He's facing Gitmo.
No he's not. He's wanted for questioning. There's a distinct difference.
If he was officially accused of rape - i.e. if there was enough evidence to accuse him then the Swedish authorities would've decided to prosecute and ask for extradition based on that prosecution, instead they just want to get him to Sweden merely to "question" him, even though as the Ecuadorian authorities have pointed out there's no reason they couldn't do this at the embassy if it's necessary before pressing charges because they've done this before in other cases so it's perfectly possible under Swedish law.
Which is really what makes it all so odd, if there's so much certainty he committed rape, why not just press charges and issue a warrant based on that? Why pull him all the way to another country merely to just ask a few questions? He even offered to go to them and do this at the Swedish embassy in London for a while prior to seeking asylum.
Really if the rape charges are legit and he desperately needs to answer them this question could be resolved way more cheaply than funding this ongoing saga. Flying a couple of officers to the UK or using some possibly already present in the Swedish embassy would cost next to nothing just to question. Then once they've question if they want to press charges they can, and Assange's case is suddenly greatly weakened. The fact they're unwilling to spend next to nothing to backup their assertions is quite telling.
You don't spend $3.8million guarding an embassy and then millions more in politician, advisor, lawyer and additional police wages just to ask some questions. There's much more to it than that.
Do note that the executed citizens were promoting terrorist activities against the USA from countries unable to arrest them. Had these people surrendered themselves they would have been brought to trial.
Its true because someone in the government said so? So we can kill them. Based on just that.
We know he was a terrorist because he had a trial? Where the prosecution and defense made there case and a jury agreed he was guilty? No. We didn't do any of that. So we don't know he was terrorist.
Next you'll be saying why bother with a trial for murderers? The prosecution wouldn't be after them if they weren't murderers. We don't need checks and balances. If the prosecution just decides someone is guilty, that's good enough for you right?
Why would the prosecution lie? That would never happen. Could they make a mistake? Surely not!
Bradley Manning on the other hand I have nothing but contempt for and whatever sentence he gets will not be sufficient to satisfy me that he's been punished for what he did.
Nothing but contempt for a person who did what he believed was right, who took tremendous personal risks, and knew what the penalties would be, but carried on because of his conscious? That's the man you have nothing but contempt for?
He is not a bad person, nor a corrupt one. He was merely wrong. In a world full of truly evil and corrupt people seeking personal power, and to erode our freedom... here's a guy who genuinely wants to do the right thing. And you can't punish him enough?
The guy deserves a light sentence. He is not the enemy of america.
You, however, might be. With your acceptence of a transformed america where the government decides which citizens are guilty without trials, and then kills them with drones.