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Ecuador Grants Citizenship To WikiLeaks Founder Julian Assange (cbsnews.com)
hcs_$reboot writes: Ecuador has granted citizenship to Julian Assange, who has been holed up inside the Ecuadorian embassy in London for over five years. Quito, Ecuador, has said naturalization should provide Assange with another layer of protection. However, naturalization appeared to do little to help the Australian-born WikiLeaks founder's case, with the British foreign ministry stressing that the only way to resolve the issue was for "Assange to leave the embassy to face justice." Earlier on Thursday, Britain said that it had refused a request by Ecuador to grant Assange diplomatic status, which would have granted him special legal immunity and the right to safe passage under the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations.
Couldn't Ecuador officially employ him as an ambassador, now that he is a citizen? If the UK doesn't like his role as an ambassador, they can always kick him out of the country.
How is the Riemann zeta function like Trump rallies? Both have an endless number of trivial zeros.
I believe Britain wants him for jumping bail.
Breach of bail conditions is a crime.
I think it comes under contempt of court.
Are you suggesting that contempt of court be allowed?
Just because YOU don't think that he should stand trial for the original accusation, doesn't mean that the UK court weren't obliged to make that happen (by international agreement) or that in skipping bail he hasn't committed a crime against a UK court on UK soil.
And, I don't know if you understand this bit:
arrest != charge != conviction.
You can be convicted for resisting arrest, however. Arrest is literally "let's stop him so we can investigate if a crime has occurred". A charge is "We have reasonable belief he did something illegal, which a court will now judge and we may have to detain him until such time as the court can do so". A conviction is "the court has determined beyond reasonable doubt that they have broken the law".
He was wanted for arrest, to answer potential rape charges. As part of this, he was arrested in the UK. A court ordered him to stay within bail conditions (which is a concession, so he's not under arrest for months on end). By breaching those court conditions, he is now automatically CHARGED with contempt of court which will - without some seriously extraordinary circumstance proven to a court - result in a conviction. The contempt charge is now based on the prima-facie evidence of failing to abide by the conditions of the UK court. It doesn't matter WHY. Or what the history is. Or what else is going on. He is now required to stand trial for that if nothing else.
As such, the UK police has a duty to arrest him, to face trial for the charge of contempt of court, which - whether or not he is convicted - will also make him available to stand trial and answer charges from the original arrest.
Not one bit of the that entire last paragraph is optional. Only the potential outcome of it (the courts could in theory side with him and let him go, or they could jsut convict him for the bail offence and let him go, or they could convict him for the bail offence and hand him over as per a valid international arrest warrant).
What they need to do, I think, is sneak him out with some sort of large diplomatic package, which would grant him safe passage to Ecuador.
This signature has Super Cow Powers
Because it was fine when he was doing it to the Republicans. Once he showed the Democrats to be no better and as a result prevented the coronation of Queen Hillary he became public enemy number one.
This would have set an uncomfortable precedent of granting a wanted criminal the freedom to roam around the country he is wanted in.
Assange is only wanted for avoiding prosecution for an alleged crime for which the charges have been withdrawn.
Diplomatic immunity status shouldn't be able to be granted after a crime has been committed.
Former, withdrawn charges shouldn't be grounds for arrest. The British Empire is quite upset that Assange didn't respect their authority, and would like to make an example of him even though there are currently no other charges filed against him.
The supposed victims of his alleged crimes did not believe that he should be charged. The charges filed have been dropped, and the prosecutors who filed them passed up numerous opportunities to question him before doing so. But keep calling him a criminal. That's exactly what three governments want, and you wouldn't want to let them down, would you?
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
He still breached bail which in itself is a crime.
Yes, and the charges he breached bail on have been withdrawn by prosecutors who passed up multiple opportunities to question him, on the basis that they could not question him. How it is just to punish someone for skipping bail when the charges have been withdrawn? If the charges were legitimate, why did the prosecutors pass up multiple opportunities to question him?
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
That doesn't matter, it's a political case, and US is a dangerous country with a vendetta.
The women in Sweden have repeatedly said that no rape was commited, and that they were shocked when people higher up in the police turned it into a manhunt and rape case.
How is he a traitor? At no point did he ever have any allegiance to the US, nor any obligation to not publish the secrets Bradley Manning gave him? Funny how you leftists used to love him, until he published the proof of how corrupt your Designated Queen really is.
Just over a year ago and Assange was still a hero of the Left. The Moment Hillary conceded he became enemy #1 to the left.
But the political aspects aside, even if I agreed with you that Hillary should be President, Assange is still not a traitor/ Under no definition of the word does he qualify as such. He is not a US citizen and has no loyalty to it nor any obligation to keep anything he finds out about it secret.
I'm too lazy to compose a creative sig.
Does anybody remember when he was a hero?
A hero? Nope, sorry. There are heroes in this world, but Assange was never one of them.
For exposing the corrupt US government to the whole world? Did that go down the memory hole? Benedict Cumberbatch played him in the movie, for fucks sake.
Here's a hint about movies: You can use them to tell stories.
Stories aren't always true. You'd think you'd know about propaganda. Maybe you should learn to recognize a work of fiction concocted to spin a message.
And he does what he always does, expose the corrupt US government to the whole world, and he suddenly became the worst criminal in the world? How does this even work?
Well, it turns out, DUMB-and-DUMBER, he isn't the worst criminal in the world. If he was, then he'd have been caught selling oil to North Korea or something. He's just a self-serving hack who gets in the news from time to time, isn't doing anything meaningful, and accomplishing little except burning up some attention from time to time.
Notice how he didn't actually do anything about the corruption in the US government, in state government, or even a city. Nothing he did accomplished one bit of constructive, actual, meaningful, accomplishment. Nobody impeached. Nobody significant prosecuted. Nobody significant resigned. Even lying fraudsters Andrew Breitbart and James O'Keefe managed to get a resignation and a prosecution.
And besides, he's shown his true colors. What did Wikileaks do about the Panama Papers? Oh. What did Wikileaks do about Trump? Worked with his campaign.
Sorry man, Assange bonered himself. Worse than the time Sherlock Holmes got caught fucking the Hound of the Baskervilles.
Hi lawyer has said multiple times that he'd be willing to face these charges if both countries would guarantee that Assange would not be extradited to the US (something they claim they have no intention of doing) and both countries have flat refused to make this guarantee, leading to the belief that that is exactly what they plan to do. And the moment he hits US soil, he'll be Gitmod, whether it's in Guantanamo or a US prison. Everyone involved knows it and so much money and many man hours spent on this shows that there is no other likely reasoning for this. Remember, officially this is over a non-consensual act during consensual sex that the girls went to the police to track him down, soley to get an STD test. The police, upon finding the importance of the individual accused, pressured the girls into pressing charges, which they have since withdrawn, and sent out an interpol alert reserved for the world's most dangerous and most wanted. Sound like your standard everyday secondary rape case, yes? (/sarcasm)
"Be particularly skeptical when presented with evidence confirming what you already believe." -
none of the ruling class liked him. Yeah, there's plenty of corporatist sellouts on both sides. And Hilary is, well, just awful. Vote in your primary. If you and everyone else had done that we'd be saying Mr President to Bernie instead of a guy that confuses Call of Duty with the real world .
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
"What do you call someone that has sex with a woman outside of her consenting terms?
A rapist."
So, a man who cheats on his wife is a rapist?
--- "We've always been at war with Eastasia."
The end of the previous post was too abrupt, so let me clarify:
1. The charges for jumping bail have not been withdrawn, so I deny the stated premise of your question ("the charges have been withdrawn").
2. The Swedish "charges" were not withdrawn when Assange jumped bail, so I deny the intended premise ofyour question as well. Sweden's withdraw from their process cannot retroactively justify jumping bail years earlier.
Jumping bail is an independent crime and is independently wrong -- living under the rule of law also means that citizens must follow the process of the law, not simply take the law into their own hands by jumping bail, escaping, resisting arrest, or some more severe action. Assange only did the first action in that continuum, but if you're going to permit self help, where do you draw the line? Can I knock out an arresting officer so long as the charges that the officer attempts to arrest me on are eventually withdrawn?
Just ask only for everyone to dress exactly the same way, cut the air the same way and look as much as possible as him... then everyone goes to the Ecuador embassy and leave all at same time. Do this several times, but only once of then Assange MAY really leave the embassy
The police could not track so many people and after several attempts, they will give up or agree in a valid solution... or he MAY leave in one of the attempts
Better yet, ask everyone to use a burka, that will be easier to hide as everyone is the same, be either men, women, white, ginger, black, asian, etc ... it may also requires women police (i do not really know how someone with burka is identified by a police)
Higuita
"Breach of bail conditions is a crime."
Not necessarily. If I have good reason to believe that my right to life, my right to a fair trial etc will be violated, human rights law can potentially override criminal law.
(IANAL but I have chatted to an English lawyer about this).
--- "We've always been at war with Eastasia."
You know you can be arrested for resisting arrest....
How it is just to punish someone for skipping bail when the charges have been withdrawn?
Because they are two distinctly different crimes perpetrated against two distinctly different people.
If the charges were legitimate, why did the prosecutors pass up multiple opportunities to question him?
The didn't. They have been trying to interview him under the normal Swedish protocol for fear that whatever Assange was offering was a worthless facade that served only to be gobbled up by his fans.
And guess what, they were right. When they eventually conceded to interview him in 2016, Assange dicked them around with lawyers not being available, then the embassy insisted that an Equadorian prosecutor will ask only a set of prepared questions and that the Swedish prosecutor wasn't allowed to talk while "questioning" him, effectively turning the entire farce into nothing more than a statement which the prosecutor was pissed about.
But hey it made for good headlines. I especially like that formal bit about him being available and doing everything Sweden has asked of him since 2010, to say nothing of the fact that he was extradited to the very people who he apparently was complying with only to run off and hide in an embassy. I'm he's almost invoking Trump level of bullshit every time he makes a statement.
Hi lawyer has said multiple times that he'd be willing to face these charges if both countries would guarantee that Assange would not be extradited to the US (something they claim they have no intention of doing) and both countries have flat refused to make this guarantee, leading to the belief that that is exactly what they plan to do.
... or leading to the belief that low level prosecutors lack the ability to make a guarantee regarding extradition. Which they do.
And the moment he hits US soil, he'll be Gitmod, whether it's in Guantanamo or a US prison. Everyone involved knows it and so much money and many man hours spent on this shows that there is no other likely reasoning for this. Remember, officially this is over a non-consensual act during consensual sex
A non-consensual sexual act is sexual assault, and you appear to be admitting he did that.
As for "during consensual sex", that may apply to the incident in which he slipped the condom off, but it doesn't apply to the sleeping woman he raped. Unconscious people cannot consent.
... that the girls went to the police to track him down, soley to get an STD test. The police, upon finding the importance of the individual accused, pressured the girls into pressing charges, which they have since withdrawn
Neither charges were withdrawn by the girls involved. The sexual assault charges have expired, because Assange was a fugitive for long enough that the statute of limitation tolled. The rape charges are still pending.
... and sent out an interpol alert reserved for the world's most dangerous and most wanted. Sound like your standard everyday secondary rape case, yes? (/sarcasm)
Yes, actually. You admit he committed sexual assault, he's also a rapist and bail jumper. Pursuing him via an INTERPOL alert - which are not only reserved for the most dangerous and most wanted, but any fugitive fleeing internationally - is entirely expected.
Ignoring the argument because you dislike it does not mean that the argument was not made. "The UK court system does not want the accused to self-help by jumping bail so long as they merely feel that the charges are unjust."
Hyperbole. Try "I'm so innocent, I need not even permit a trial."
The suckers who put up his bail have been been punished, while he resides at a place of his own choosing at liberty to do as he pleases. That is not house arrest, it's at most self-imposed exile.
No. That's over with. There's no possibility that his is found "not guilty" of failing to appear at court hearings that were to be held years ago, especially since there would be no jury involved.
Says you. The UK courts and prosecutors probably hold a different opinion because otherwise you may as well throw out the concept of bail and bail jumping -- you need simply buy your freedom and never appear for trial.
Don't forget the secret warrant issued by the Illuminati. Assange should just shoot his way out of the embassy, carjack a ride to the shore, and steal a board to head for international waters. It'd all be obviously defensible because "they're out to get him."
I don't agree with your implied premise here either.