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Swedish Investigators Attempt Assange Interview; Wikileaks Makes Major Release
cold fjord writes: It seems Julian Assange rates his own section (The Assange Matter) on a Swedish government website related to the investigation. It contains some FAQs on points that seem to keep coming up in Slashdot discussions. The website isn't completely up to date at the moment since it doesn't discuss the recent attempt by Swedish investigators to interview Assange in the Ecuadorian embassy in London. Unfortunately that attempt failed since the government of Ecuador didn't give permission to the Swedish delegation to enter their embassy. That is quite odd given the years of demands for this. Concurrent with this, Wikileaks has started releasing what is reported to be more than 500,000 leaked Saudi Arabian diplomatic documents that are sure to stir up some controversies. Most are in Arabic so it may take some time for their contents to filter out.
If you trust Google translate for diplomacy, you'd better be ready for war.
Oh come on. Who goes to war over "yarn lightly extra nowhere fnord"?
Google is fine with the so-called Romance languages, but it fails hard when trying to translate Asian languages to Romance languages and vice versa.
Sometimes I think there was a concerted effort by Asian users to poison Google translate's database back when it was accepting user corrections. Especially of Japanese. It never seemed to get any better, and is still awful.
It's absurd to say there's a statute of limitations on how long it takes to bring somebody into court. If that were the case, then someone charged with a crime who flees would be able to return to the jurisdiction that originally charged him when the limitation was up.
I work in the judiciary in Brazil and can't tell how things work in Sweden, but many of these things are similar in most countries, maybe people can discuss the differences here.
Here in Brazil there are three limitations, one to accept the charges, one to give a sentence and one to execute the sentence.
The first limitation is on how long before the charges are accepted on court. The prosecutors have to press the charges and they have to be accepted. That is slightly different from the time to press the charges because the accused have to be officially informed of the charges, as he has the right to a preliminary defense before the charges are accepted. Pressing the charges by official news extends this limitation.
After the charges are received (that's the term in Portuguese), the limitation for sentencing is equal to the one to receive the charges. That is: 1. to have a judgment were all the proofs are presented and the informed defendant has the opportunity to be interrogated and defend himself or be defended by a public attorney if he flees, 2. for the judge to give a sentence and 3. for all the possible appeals until reaching a final sentence ("trânsito em julgado" - Google translates it to "res judicata").
The third limitation is on how long after the final sentence the government has to execute the sentence.
So the first limitation is about informing the person about the accusation and the third limitation is about making the person fulfill the sentence. (basically like "bringing somebody to court").
If the criminal flees (or is not found) for enough time, he can return/stay in the jurisdiction.
To give a clear and very common example I get here: the limitation for drug possession for personal use is 2 years, 1 year if he/she is under 21. When the guy was found with drugs he was living in a district with one cop doing everything. The police report takes 4-6 months to arrive at the judiciary. We have to check if he can make deals with the prosecutor by checking his criminal records, he has something on another city, we have to ask them exactly what it is (maybe he was found innocent) -> another 3-8 months depending on how many records and where they are. Then he has the right to make a deal (different deals for charged or not charged people), we set a deal hearing ->1 - 4 months (depending on the judge and world soccer schedule), and can't find him (moved away). Try to find him -> 3 to 8 months (the cop at that district only replied to our third reiteration). If he moved to São Paulo, we have to ask them to do the deal hearing, six months latter they reply that the address we gave was wrong or that he moved back. Over and it doesn't matter if he was/wasn't fleeing.
On the other hand, crimes against children have to limitations.