Bob Carr, former foreign minister and longest-serving NSW premier, recently penned a potent critique of Albanese’s inability to rescue Julian Assange from the clammy clutches of the Anglo-American imperium. Carr recalls that as opposition leader, Albanese said, ‘enough is enough!’ What is served by keeping him incarcerated? As prime minister, he made his position clear to the Biden administration.
Carr points out that Australia has made an immense compromise to our sovereignty and national security by hosting US bases and committing to purchase nuclear submarines under the AUKUS agreement, in support of America’s march to war with China. Bob notes that this ‘clinches Australia’s reputation as a deliriously loyal, entirely gullible US ally’.
If Australia’s sacrifice in support of America’s geopolitical ambition is not sufficient to garner some reciprocal willingness on the part of Washington to indulge our prime minister’s wishes with regard to Assange, what does that say about the relationship between Australia and the US?
Bob Carr concludes that if Assange ends up extradited to the US, ‘then making ourselves a more likely target has conferred no standing at all. We are a client state, almost officially’.
For four decades The Echo has printed the stories some people loved, some people hated, and some pretended not to read. If you want us to keep telling the truth, the real truth, not the sugar-coated version. We’ll need your support to keep the presses rolling. 
