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March 28, 2024

The parallels between Higgins and Assange

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In attempting to draw a parallel between the Brittany Higgins and Julian Assange situations, John Donnellan (Echo 2/11) demonstrates a catastrophic ignorance of the Assange case.

The Swedish charges Mr Assange was originally held on have long been withdrawn. They related to a rarely cited quirk in Swedish law, which allows for a male who declines the use of contraception, to be charged with rape, even in circumstances where there is consent for coitus. 

The two women involved in the Assange saga have both placed, on record, that they were solicited by Swedish authorities to lodge a complaint, from which the obscure anomaly in Swedish law was enacted to drum up a charge against Assange neither woman pursued.

Julian Assange is in prison for exposing war crimes. He is persecuted for the same reasons Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King and Nelson Mandela were persecuted and thrown in jail: their courage in speaking the truth upset the corrupt hegemony they challenged. 

Julian’s integrity is why he has such global support from a huge cross-section of the community, from heads of State such as Andrés Manuel López Obrador to artists Roger Waters and Brian Eno, to global social commentators Chris Hedges and Russell Brand, to the people maintaining a 24 hour vigil outside Flinders St Station in Melbourne. 

Despite being locked away in a box, Julian Assange is now the most well-known Australian on the planet. Momentum grows every day for his immediate release. 

We should all walk that little bit taller knowing the great global freedom fighter of our time is an Australian.

Marc Westley, Mullumbimby 


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14 COMMENTS

  1. Thank you Marc for providing some of the background & fact behind the politically motivated Swedish police sex allegations against our Australian journalist Julian Assange.

    Its very important to correct the false narratives in order to secure justice for Julian

    I just want to correct a false very commonly held belief perpetuated by the media tho.

    Julian Assange was never at any point charged by Sweden. It was only ever a police allegation made from a ” preliminary police investigation”

    This allegation of ” Rape charges” was used smear Julian globally to undermine his high public support.

    The Swedish police allegations were used to “detain him for questioning” for years while the US Grand Jury prepared its indictment for his Wikileaks journalism.

    A sealed US Indictment can only be unsealed & served once the target is already in custody in a lesser charge.

    The chief prosecutor of Stockholm ,Eva Finne ,dismissed the police rape allegations as ” having no basis” after interviewing the 2 women ” complainents”

    Those colluding with the US shopped around to find a second Swedish prosecutor who would assist in fitting him up. Her name was Marianne Ny. She broke prosecutorial protocols & Swedish law to do so & was publicly condemned by the head of the Swedish bar council Anne Ramberg.

    For thosebinThe Swedish fit up of Julian Assange is documented in

  2. Continuing comment.
    (Sorry, my reply fired off before I wished)

    Those who interested in the shocking Swedish collusion to fit up journalist Julian Assange can read the facts & evidence at justice4assange.com

    It is very professionally researched ,written by a Swedish speaking legal researcher & the largest data base in the world on the subject. All court documents , evidence & witness statements can also be viewed there.

    Its very intriguing easy reading . One day it would make the basis for a script for an excellent political thriller.

    The “Trial of Julian Assange” by law professor & UN investigator Nils Melzer is also recommended as a credible & very readable expose on the subject for anyone.

  3. My God Marc, I have never heard so much gullible drivel, the only thing old mate Julian is ever going to be famous for is selling or providing stolen top secret material to our enemies, helping that turd Trump get elected and almost bringing down democracy in the US and the entire Western defense alliance, and jumping bail and evading justice for four years by hiding in the Ecuadorian embassy, and it was great to finally see him unceremoniously dragged out of there, screaming like a spoilt brat. The only thing this bail jumping conman is entitled to is a fair trial in the US to answer espionage charges, ASAP.

    • Julian Assange is famous because he founded Wikileaks, a safe anonymous media platform for whistleblowers around the world to warn fellow citizens of the crimes & corruption of those in power . Its aim was to defend freedom & democracy.

      During its publishing history Wikileaks has exposed serious crimes & corruption by governments & corporations including murders, kidnappings, child sex trafficking, toxic spills, breaches of environmental law , election rigging, pay to play arms deals, fraud, disaster rorting & election rigging.

      Julian has been honoured with over 25 journalism awards globally & is a member of the Australian journalist uniin & the International Federation of Journalists.

      His prosecution & political persecution has been condemned by journalism organizations globally.

    • Wow Keith, you swallowed the propaganda hook, line and sinker.

      He published leaked info to the public (something the media do every other day) that evidenced war crimes and illegal behavior by politicians and authorities.

      I’m sure you’re not fond of blowing up kids and innocent people in the name of global stability e.g. Afghanistan…..how did that go again?

      I’m not particularly fond of Julian Assange either, but I am fond of the truth and giving people a fair go whether I personally like them or not.

      • Wow Steve, it never ceases to amaze me just how easily some people can be conned, you and the whole Julian Assange “fan club” are being drip fed cherry-picked “facts” by this creep’s legal team because they know their only hope of beating the pending charges is to make enough noise and hope the US relents. If all these so called “facts” Alison Smith keeps producing were correct, then old mate Assange wouldn’t have a thing to worry about would he, can you process that important point?, What you and your luminaries are actually doing by campaigning for “dear” Julian amounts to aiding and abetting a convicted bail-jumper and fugitive. You are right about one thing though, I’m not fond of blowing up kids, or in fact any human beings in any wars, but sadly it shows no sign of stopping.

        • “…sadly it shows no sign of stopping”

          perhaps because reporting on the ills of war and dodgy politicians is censored and journalists are locked up for sharing the truth.

          We can lead you to water Keith but…

          • Seriously Steve, you people are a real worry, I seriously doubt whether you or your conspiratorial luminaries would be able to lead yourselves to water let alone lead anyone else, I think I’ll pass on that offer. The reputable mainstream Global news organizations generally do an excellent balanced job of reporting from all the Global war zones and to claim their highly respected reporters are somehow censored by their organizations is blatant stupidity; the problems foreign reporters usually face is intimidation from authoritarian and corrupt Govt’s in the country’s in which their reporting . And as for what that disreputable Assange may or may not have done for the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq- in the greater scheme of things, in the real world- nothing as changed, these illegal and immoral wars show absolutely now sign of abating. The real problem is with people like you and your cohorts, who applaud and encourage the stealing and release of classified defense material to our enemies, with reckless indifference that puts the lives of our servicemen and women in danger; you people should be ashamed yourselves.

  4. Julian Assange has not been indicted for helping with the release of material relating to war crimes. It is alleged he helped release a huge volume of material and none of that covered by the indictment related to the war crimes material.
    Certainly none of the Wikileaked Australian material that I read had anything to do with war crimes. It was material that was in judged by experienced Australian diplomats as needing to be kept confidential to protect the interests of Australians.
    Just as Medibank customers should expect whoever is found to have stole their confidential information to be arrested and tried for their crime, all Australians should be able to expect any person alleged to have helped release our diplomatic secrets to similarly face trial. That the many journalists who benifitted from the release of our information are happy to laud his actions should not deter the US from ensuring that Mr Assange is he is held to account for what are very serious criminal allegations.

  5. Assange US Indictment Facts

    1) On the 23/5/19 the US Justice Dept wrote that Wikileaks Afghan War, Iraq War & Guantanamo publications were covered in the Assange Indictment

    2) The publcations revealed war crimes
    Eg:

    A) Afghan War- US military contractor DynCore engaging in sex trafficking of Afghan boys

    B) US military sending detainees & Iraqui citizens peacefully protesting against war rorting to the Iraqui Special forces where they knew they were being horrifically tortured

    C) Guantanamo Files
    Described hiding the torture of detainees from the Red Cross

    3) In the US military magazine ‘Stars & Stripes’, retired US Colonel Ann Wright referred to these war crimes in her article: ” Instead of Atracking Wikileaks: Fixed What It Exposed’

    4) Julian Assange was unanimouslyhonoured with the 2010 annual global ‘ Sam Adams Award’ for ‘ Integrity in Intelligence” by a panel of former, senior retired intelligence officers for these exact same Wikileaks publication named in the US Assange Indictment.

    The panel included former CIA & FBI officers

    Thesev

  6. CIA torture whistleblower, former CIA officer, John Kiriakou has publicly stated that Julian Assange will not get a fair trial if extradited to the US.

    These are the facts he stated:

    1)On the Wikileaks Grand Jury who issued the Assange ” Espionage” Indictment:

    * Was held in secret
    * 4 prosecutors
    * No defence attorneys allowed
    * No judge
    * EDVA (Eastern District Court of Virginia) was deliberately chosen to convene the WL Grand Jury

    The Jury pool is drawn from the EDVA
    The EDVA has the highest concentration of staff/ families from the US intelligence community, US State Dept & US defence contractors in America.

    2) If Julian is extradited to the US, his trial will be again be held in the EDVA.

    * No national security defendant has ever won a case in the EDVA

    * He will be placed under SAMS (Special Administrative Measures)

    SAMS is extreme isolation with very restricted contact with family & lawyers who are will be under strict gag orders.

    No touch torture is also allowed under SAMS

    SAMS is requested by the CIA, the same agench revealed to be plotting Julians assassination in the UK

    *Julian will not be entitled to a public interest defence

    Given the above facts, no person in their right mind would agree to be extradited to the US to appear before this Star Chamber

  7. Great info Alison. I never knew all the facts. It seems like there is no real justice in the US. Whoever has the most money or knows how to manipulate the law seems to be right. If there’s not a loop hole in there somewhere then they’ll invent one or pass a law to create one. If you’re rich and connected then you are innocent. Even if you’re guilty. Money and might is always right. Would be good if he could be put on trial in Oz rather than US. His father hasn’t given up . Maybe he could talk to Albo. Ynever know your luck in the big city.

  8. If there was anything disclosed by WikiLeaks that shouldn’t have been disclosed then that’s the fault of the US, because the US stopped collaborating with WikiLeaks on redacting sensitive information. The US told WikiLeaks that WikiLeaks should stop its operations and if they didn’t then the US would reserve the right to throw the book at WikiLeaks based on the fact that they were disclosing classified information that was not redacted by the US.

    WikiLeaks redacted sensitive information itself the best way it could, but the US is intent on prosecuting WikiLeaks based on the pure formality that as long as it isn’t the US that did the redacting then the US will be allowed to say that WikiLeaks endangered the lives of human sources. The way the US justice system then works is that it is then up to WikiLeaks to prove that this is not the case. So, it’s a reversal of the burden of proof, Assange is de-facto presumed to be guilty as charged until proven innocent beyond a reasonable doubt.

    Now suppose for argument’s sake that it is really true that lives were endangered due to what WikiLeaks published. Then because that happened in the context of the US stopping to assist WikiLeaks with redacting sensitive information in order to be able to make WikiLeaks either stop or to have a case against WikiLeaks, this would mean that it is the US who is guilty of having used its human sources has human shields against WikiLeaks.

    Another thing is that in principle, even if WikiLeaks is responsible for doing great damage to US interests by publishing information, then that would not be any different from any other journalist publishing information about, say, Russia or China that does damage to their interests. If Russia were to arrest a British journalists who reported on Russian military positions in Ukraine that were targeted by the Ukrainian military on the basis of that report, then if Russia were to arrest that journalist in an occupied part of Ukraine and would put that journalist on trial, then I don’t think that Britain would agree that this journalist committed any criminal acts at all.

    The fact that in Russia he cannot get a fair trial and that Russia was wrong to have started the war are all irrelevant here. If Assange can be prosecuted by the US for leaking information that put lives in danger then the question is why Britain would never agree that at least in principle, Russia or China could do the same to a British journalist for similar reasons.

  9. Some more facts

    1) Wikileaks worked with mainstream media organizations globally to publish the truth about the Afghan & Iraq Wars including the New York Times, Le Monde, El Pais & The Guardian.

    Fespite this only Wikileaks editor Julian Assange was charged by the US.

    2) Mainstream media editors, journalists , journalist unions & free press organizations globally are protesting Julian Assange being charged.

    He is an accredited, multi-award winning professional journalist.

    3) Julian Assange requested the help of the US to redact these whistleblower documents as part of Wikileaks harm minimization procedure.

    The US refused so Wikileaks then redacted the documents itself.

    Australian journalist Mark Davis testified that he witnessed Julian Assange stay up all night to redact 10,000 names

    4) At the trial of the US military whistleblower Chelsea Manning, the Pentagon was forced to admit under oath, that not one person was physically harmed as a result of Wikileaks war reporting

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