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WikiLeaks' Julian Assange Asks UK Judge to Drop His Arrest Warrant (theguardian.com)
An anonymous reader quotes the Guardian:
WikiLeaks founder, Julian Assange, has asked a UK court to drop the arrest warrant that prevents him from leaving the Ecuadorian embassy in London, where he has been living for five and a half years. Assange, 46, skipped bail to enter the embassy in 2012 in order to avoid extradition to Sweden over allegations of sexual assault and rape, which he denies... Mark Summers QC told senior district judge Emma Arbuthnot at Westminster magistrates court on Friday that now that the Swedish case had been dropped the warrant had "lost its purpose and its function". He said because Swedish extradition proceedings against Assange had come to an end, so had the life of the arrest warrant... Arbuthnot said she would give her judgment about the arrest warrant on 6 February.
Judge Arbuthnot said she'd rule only on the legal issue, though the court had also received evidence about medical problems which included "a terrible bad tooth, frozen shoulder and depression."
Representing the Crown Prosecution Service, Aaron Watkins it would be absurd for defendants to be "rewarded with effective immunity" simply for having evaded proceedings for long enough.
Judge Arbuthnot said she'd rule only on the legal issue, though the court had also received evidence about medical problems which included "a terrible bad tooth, frozen shoulder and depression."
Representing the Crown Prosecution Service, Aaron Watkins it would be absurd for defendants to be "rewarded with effective immunity" simply for having evaded proceedings for long enough.
what does 'evading arrest' really mean? in this context?
in this context it means that some rogue set of governments was out to silence a vocal critic. I don't consider the governments to be in the right and so I dont' consider that a lawful order that *needs* to be followed.
suppose a cop, on his own, commands you to do something that you don't believe is lawful? are you compelled to just follow orders? of course not. only a fool would think you have no power to judge those who are coming after you. not everyone that comes after you under 'color of law' is really under actual color of law. lots of things are very unclear and this was one of them.
even besides technical interp of laws; there is the concept of judging BAD laws. classic example is southern civil war era and escaped slaves. it was 'illegal' to help escaped slaves and yet it was the correct and moral thing to do. but you would be breaking the law if you helped a slave seek freedom.
laws are not absolute and we are men and women, not machines. we reserve the right to judge EVERY SINGLE SITUATION and act as we see fit. most of the time, the laws are aligned with how we see the world around us, but in some cases, they diverge and then we have to follow our own best reasoning.
assange did not feel that the law was correct and I agree that he was being targeted unfairly. to escape a mob from killing you, that's not something I would criticize a person for! and that's exactly the case here; a mob of governments was out to get him and he did the only thing a sane person could do; seek asylum.
so, yes, I think he was setup and he did what he had to do. surrendering to false charges from colluding semi-evil governments is not something I endorse. in the end, you have only yourself to take care of yourself and he did what he had to. I give no blame to him on this. as for the actual charges, too much doubt for me to judge him on that, but the sources all dropped the case, so that tells me most of what I wanted to know.
leave the guy alone. just admit that the evil governments' clock ran out and they should stop throwing good money at bad, so to speak.
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"It is now safe to switch off your computer."
to be fair the charges against him were a thinly veiled attempt to extradite him to the US. It has very little to do about breaking the law.
It was self defense. The papers and badges are bullshit. He was running from kidnappers with guns.
Right, so all laws should be ignored.
What the fuck are you talking about? Is this the level you people have sunk to? Don't put words on other people's mouths.
Follow the laws of the region you're in. Period.
If you live in country A performing an activity that's legal where you live, don't expect country B to come after you because such activity is illegal in B's legal system. Why is this so difficult to understand?
Kim Dotcom, a naturalized New Zealand citizen who has never set foot on the USA, and who was running a business based in NZ, 100% compliant with NZ's laws, is targetted by the US because they didn't like what his business did. Not only that: they destroy his business, seize his assets, and now drag him in a legal battle that's taking him years and millions of dollars to fight.
How is this fair? The US is the world's biggest fucking bully. Just another corrupt regime. A big one.
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