Persecution of Julian Assange and Wikileaks will continue

The powers that be will not rest until he is locked-up for a long, long time

The results of Julian Assange’s extradition hearing are in, and the news isn’t good for the rebellious WikiLeaks founder!

Assange has lost the case, and is to be extradited to Sweden in 10 days. Assange has seven days to appeal the verdict.

Assange surrendered to the police himself December 2010, stating earlier that he had agreed to meet with the UK police in regards to the outstanding warrant and rape accusations in Sweden. He is due to appear at City of Westminster Magistrates’ Court later.

Julian Assange turnes himself in to Police

Assange is accused of sexual assault by two women Assange had met in Sweden during a business trip to the country in August 2010. Although the charges of rape were initially dropped, the case was later reopened and an appeals court has upheld the original accusations.

The most serious of the four allegations relates to an accusation that Assange, during a visit to Stockholm in August, had sex with a woman, Miss B, while she was sleeping and without a condom, against her consent. Three counts of sexual assault are also alleged against another woman, Miss A. If found guilty of the rape charge he could face up to four years in prison.

Most of the evidence was in written form in a large ring binder that eventually included over 20 tabs. This was supplemented by live evidence from four witnesses who all took the trouble to attend from Sweden.

• The first prosecutor confirmed details of the allegations to a tabloid newspaper, which breaches confidentiality but is not unlawful.
• Ms Ny is not the proper issuing judicial authority.
• Ms Ny allowed an appeal against the initial decision not to prosecute (which is permissible in Swedish law but unfair as Mr Assange was not allowed to make submissions). Ms Ny allowed an appeal against the initial decision not to prosecute (which is permissible in Swedish law but unfair as Mr Assange was not allowed to make submissions).
• Ms Ny did not arrange for questioning to take place in a more appropriate way, for example by Mutual Legal Assistance: "It looks malicious."
• The prosecutor Ms Ny is "biased against men and takes for granted that everyone prosecuted is guilty... She is so preoccupied with the situation of battered and raped women that she has lost her balance".
• The complainant’s lawyer, Mr Borgstorm, has been critical of Mr Assange in the press saying he is a coward for not returning to Sweden.
• There are political considerations behind this prosecution. The issue of sexual offences is very political in Sweden.
• There is an improper motive behind the issue of the EAW. The real motive is that Mr Assange is outside Sweden and Ms Ny wants to arrest him immediately after he is interviewed, regardless or what he says. "That may be her approach. Let him suffer for a bit so he can be a bit softer." "Everything is peculiar. The case is not proceeding normally."
• Using the EAW is disproportionate.
• The EAW has not been issued for prosecution, but for the purposes of enforcing the order for detention referred to at box (b) of the EAW. The prosecutor has repeatedly stated that she has obtained the warrant to question Mr Assange. This is simply a Preliminary Investigation which is defined in the code and ends before a decision to prosecute is taken.

The full ruling can be found HERE.

The defence argued the Swedish prosecutor had no authority to ask for Assange's extradition under the warrant, and furthermore that extradition could not be for questioning. The barrister representing the Swedish prosecutor said the intention was to prosecute him and that the allegations made against Assange by two Swedish women would be offences under English law too.

Since there is no system of bail in Sweden, he would be detained in custody if extradited until a possible trial or release.

Assange’s arrest is just one of many problems for WikiLeaks and its founder. Since it started releasing secret embassy cables, the site itself has been the victim of DDoS attacks, and several companies, including Amazon, PayPal, and its DNS service provider, EveryDNS.net, have denied WikiLeaks service.

I believe the issue is not rape at all, but the persecution of someone blatantly going against the establishment and thereby undermining their authority.

They want to make an example out of him and will not rest until he is locked-up for a long, long time. In fact, if it were up to "the establishment" he would be tried for treason and either executed or sent to prison for life.

What the powers that be fail to recognize, is that Assange may end up a martyrer, thus giving freedom of the press more power than if they had just let him be.

However, we cannot let Julius Assange take the fall for a cause that affects us all. Speak up against censorship! Speak up agaist the persecution of Assange!

Written By: Tom Retterbush

Sources

Arrested WikiLeaks chief denied bail in U.K. (msnbc)

Julian Assange extradition hearing decision – live updates  (guardian.co.uk)

In short, the complaints in the report and in live evidence are: