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In Response to Open Letter, France Rejects Asylum For Julian Assange
Several outlets report that Julian Assange has requested, but been denied, political asylum in France, by means of an open letter published by Le Monde.
From The Globe and Mail's coverage, linked above: Less than an hour after his letter was published by Le Monde's website, Hollande's office issued a statement saying the asylum request was rejected.
"France has received the letter from Mr. Assange. An in-depth review shows that in view of the legal and material elements of Mr Assange's situation, France cannot grant his request," the statement said.
"The situation of Mr. Assange does not present any immediate danger. He is also the target of a European arrest warrant," it noted.
Assange wrote in the letter that his youngest child is French, and so is the child’s mother. "I haven't been able to see them in five years, since the political persecution against me started," he said. Worth noting: Assange's legal team says that Assange's letter has been mischaracterized, and that it is in fact not a request for asylum per se; instead, they assert, the letter merely expresses Assange's "willingness 'to be hosted in France if and only if an initiative was taken by the competent authorities.'"
"France has received the letter from Mr. Assange. An in-depth review shows that in view of the legal and material elements of Mr Assange's situation, France cannot grant his request," the statement said.
"The situation of Mr. Assange does not present any immediate danger. He is also the target of a European arrest warrant," it noted.
Assange wrote in the letter that his youngest child is French, and so is the child’s mother. "I haven't been able to see them in five years, since the political persecution against me started," he said. Worth noting: Assange's legal team says that Assange's letter has been mischaracterized, and that it is in fact not a request for asylum per se; instead, they assert, the letter merely expresses Assange's "willingness 'to be hosted in France if and only if an initiative was taken by the competent authorities.'"
What does Assange's personnality, and your opinion of it, matter ? That's Ad Hominem put to the extreme. What about his work ?
I don't dive into a chef's private life before eating their food; I've no idea about musicians' procilivities and motivations, some of the writers I like are disgusting anti-role-models or pity-worthy dysfunctional wrecks. Ditto directors, actors, even friends... and let's not talk about politicians.
In the end it doesn't matter: the work is more important than who's doing it. Incomparably more. Your character assassination is fully besides the point.
The Cloud - because you don't care if your apps and data are up in the air.
It's the man, not his work, who is seeking asylum.
Actually, even as far as the work itself is concerned, since Assange selects what information he presents, there is a degree of judgment and choice involved. If Assange is prone to making choices based on personal interests rather than objective truth, then even the value of his work is questionable. That is why considerations about the person ("ad hominem") are relevant not just to his asylum request, but also to his work.
Why would you assume that they're succumbing to US Pressure?
This is fucking France, which spent most of the Cold War technically out of NATO, and didn't come back until it was safe in '09. They actively supported Rwanda's genocidal government because they thought the English-speaking rebels were lying about the genocide, to the point of sending troops to try to protect the fleeing government troops. Their response to PRISM was to condemn it as 'espionage' the very fucking day their biggest paper announced they'd been doing the same damn thing to their citizens for years.
They support Assange and Snowden in public, solely because idiots like you will mistakenly assume this means they actually support Assange and Snowden. In private they will do their best to get those guys fucked over, because if those guys are fucked over they can't do interesting things like tell Le Monde about the DGSE. Which is why, despite their PR as privacy advocates, neither guy has actually asked for Asylum. It's not a surprise they were one of the countries that got Morales' plane stopped, and that of the four involved they were the only one that had clout with the other three (Portugal, Spain and Italy were all in the midst of EU-recovery programs at the time, and guess whose the most important economy in the Euro not named Germany?).
So they have a long history of fucking privacy activists over, and then letting the US take the blame.
The UK now has a case against him, and a very strong one. He fled bail, and that is a crime. That crime is still ongoing since he's still fleeing said bail. So they can arrest and charge him for that. Doesn't matter if the original matter is log dropped, he is still on the hook for this.
That's the thing with court dates, bail, and all that jazz: Even if the case against you was going to be dismissed, if you skip bail you are now guilty of another crime. You have agreed to appear in court and a failure to do so is against the law.
The UK had no beef in this originally, they were just acting on an EU arrest warrant. Sweden said "We want this guy," the UK looked at the warrant and said "looks valid per the treaty" and thus arrested him. They had no interest or ability to decide on the validity of the charges, only if the request required them to act per treaty. It did so he was arrested, and then released on bail.
He challenged the extradition all the way up to the high UK court, but the courts found it was a valid request that the UK had to honour. Nothing to do with his guilt, just that the request was a valid one and they were bound by treaty to hand him over. Had he gone to Sweden then, that would have been the end of the UK's involvement. His bail would be returned and the UK would have no further interest in what happened.
However he fled rather than handing himself over. So at that point, he became a fugitive in the UK. They now have a case against him. It is totally separate from the original case, it is simply a case of skipping bail.
Likely they'll want to act on it too, since he's been flaunting it in their face for years.
It's the man, not his work, who is seeking asylum.
But it is his work that is important, regardless of this. Nay, not even his work, the work of the dozens to hundreds of brave souls who fight the slavers and face death constantly so that you may live under the freedom they provide. Something that bears mentioning regardless of the topic.
Actually, even as far as the work itself is concerned, since Assange selects what information he presents, there is a degree of judgment and choice involved. If Assange is prone to making choices based on personal interests rather than objective truth, then even the value of his work is questionable. That is why considerations about the person ("ad hominem") are relevant not just to his asylum request, but also to his work.
Hahaha. You jest right? You complain that one man may be cherry picking what secret documents he reveals, when he has revealed thousands or more... While the other side lies, cheats, steals, fabricates, leaks and murders to deploy their overwhelming propaganda.
We live in a world where the entire mainstream media are controlled by the intelligence services, even as paid assets at the very top. Where stories are censored in multi-continent wide blackouts. Where they are crafted to fit the interests of the rulers of the world. Where a whitehouse and pentagon leak secret material on a weekly basis when it's of interest to them. Where they don't even have to leak secret info if they don't want to because just BullShitting to the media will get your words repeated as truth, with no fact-checking.
Among all of this, you object to one man working against them? I think you woke up and tried to put one pant leg on a flea and the other on an elephant.
Liberty.
It's not an "IF" as to whether Assange cherry picks things for political reasons. He does. There are lots of things he's deliberately kept back with threats to release if certain things happen that he doesn't want (unredacted cables, files against NewsCorp, etc). The most famous was his "insurance file" which was to be released "should anything happen to him", which was left vague enough that it wasn't clear whether he was talking about "being killed" or simply "being sent to Sweden" (the statement being made during his fight to avoid surrender to Sweden). The scummiest blackmail on his part, IMHO, was his threatening to release unredacted documents that could get various aid/human rights organizations' employees killed if said organizations didn't provide him money (most famously his $700k shakedown of Amnesty International).
He refers to the leaks in Wikileaks' possession as his "property", and made all Wikileaks staffers sign an onerous NDA imposing ridiculous fines if they do anything to reduce the monetary value of said property, such as by leaking it.
Dear Lord: One of your creatures may be hurt tonight. Please let it be the other creature.