Wikileaks Update (2010-01-25): US Admits, No Link Between Manning & Assange; Etc.

Per NBC,

U.S. military officials tell NBC News that investigators have been unable to make any direct connection between a jailed army private suspected with leaking secret documents and Julian Assange, founder of the whistleblowing website WikiLeaks.

The officials say that while investigators have determined that [Bradley] Manning had allegedly unlawfully downloaded tens of thousands of documents onto his own computer and passed them to an unauthorized person, there is apparently no evidence he passed the files directly to Assange, or had any direct contact with the controversial WikiLeaks figure.

See also The Guardian. This is an important admission, because most legal scholars believe the US had no case against Assange unless it could show that he was personally involved in conspiring with Manning to cause the leak.

US officials also admitted that, after Manning "refused to follow an order," the Brig Commander had improperly put him on "suicide watch" for two days – which involves restrictions even more extreme than under the "prevention of injury" (P.O.I.) regime he'd previously been on.

Officials have otherwise denied any mistreatment of Manning. But he's been held in solitary for over 7.5 months under P.O.I., which involves severe restrictions that are supposed to be imposed only if necessary in order to prevent an inmate from harming himself, despite the fact that the psychiatrists who have examined him have reported that it's unnecessary. Note that Manning not only has not yet been convicted, but his case has not yet even been set for hearing. His attorney has filed a request for Manning's release based on the lack of response from officials and the fact that his confinement conditions are more severe than necessary, and the United Nations' top anti-torture envoy is investigating the situation. (For more details regarding the conditions in which Manning is being held, see FireDogLake; for more background and links, see here.) UPDATE: General James F. Amos, former commander at Quantico, has written a powerful letter questioning the conditions under which Manning is being held.

Meanwhile, the previous day, David House, one of few previously permitted to see Manning, accompanied by FireDogLake's Jane Hamsher, attempted to deliver a petition signed by 42,000 demanding that Manning be released from solitary. Not only were they not permitted to see Manning, but they were involuntarily detained and their car improperly searched and impounded; details at FDL. Last week, ca. 150 people gathered at Quantico to protest Manning's treatment.

Kevin Zeese has a good discussion on HuffPo of Manning's "crime" of revealing war crimes: "Manning is suffering a fate Thomas Jefferson warned about: 'Most codes extend their definitions of treason to acts not really against one's country. They do not distinguish between acts against the government and acts against the oppressions of the government.'"

Per Greg Mitchell, the hearing on Assange's extradition from the UK to Sweden is scheduled for February 7 - 8. Re- Sweden's case, a former Swedish judge has written that the issuance of the European arrest warrant against Assange was probably contrary to law and has noted a number of irregularities, concluding, "it does appear as if something is being hidden under the carpet” (good summary at WL Central).

The Guardian has an essay on how "WikiLeaks turned the tables on governments, but the power relationship has not changed: [t]he information genie cannot be put back into the bottle . . . [b]ut the authorities continue to exploit the internet as a means of control. Some bits are i.m.h.o. flat wrong, but others are good:

So now we have two competing, and ugly, forces locking horns like bulls. On the one side are governments who, as Evgeny Morozov argues in his new book, The Net Delusion: How Not To Liberate The World, are exploiting the internet as a means of control rather than democratisation. They are aided in their endeavours by corporations such as Amazon, Mastercard, Visa and others who do the bidding of the authorities either under pressure or quite voluntarily in order to ingratiate themselves. On the other side is a small sub-section of the web 2.0 community who regard themselves as above the law, for whom all authority is bad and all information is good. As Jaron Lanier puts it in the Atlantic: "The ideology that drives a lot of the online world … is the idea that information in sufficiently large quantity automatically becomes Truth. For extremists, this means that the internet is coming alive as a new, singular, global, post-human, superior life form."

* * * * *
The media watcher John Lloyd noted recently that the WikiLeaks affair "reduces investigative journalists to bit players whose job is to redact the output and provide context". This predates the current saga. For years the Fourth Estate has under-invested in and devalued its responsibility – to use that pious phrase – to speak truth to power. I can never put out of my mind the remark of an old colleague, a one-time lobby journalist at Westminster, who told me after his first week running communications at a government department that he was staggered by how little journalists actually found out. Much of the content of the British media has been reduced to toxic comment or stenography for the powerful in politics, business, sport and elsewhere.

In other WL-related news . . .

WL is suffering financially: "We have been losing more than 600,000 (Swiss) francs a week since the start of the publication of the diplomatic cables," Mr Assange told a Swiss newspaper. "To continue our business, we would need to find a way or other to get this money back." UPDATE: See here for how to donate.

A cache of secret British documents leaked not to WL but to al-Jazeera TV has embarrassed Palestinian officials because of the degree of Palestinian-Israeli cooperation revealed; much more at The Guardian.

The NYT has swung from publishing cables to throttling its coverage down while seeking to distinguish itself from WL and villifying Assange and now, apparently, back again: per The Cutline, The NYT is, like several other major news outlets, considering creating "an in-house submission system that could make it easier for would-be leakers to provide large files to the paper."

Greg Mitchell, who's been blogging the WL for The Nation steadily since cablegate broke, will have a book out on the story soon. Last I saw, the title was to be, The Age of Wikileaks.

A horrifying This American Life episode describes the indoctrination of school kids at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library, against freedom of the press.

And the best recent, WL-related humor: the competition to design a new 'do for Assange (much more at the link).

Wikileaks Update 2010-12-31: Wired Hung Out, Assange Dis-Implicated, Theories of System Collapse, & What Happens When You Steal a Hacker's Computer

During the last week, there's been a furious exchange of articles and tweets in/re- the Greenwald-Wired fight over the Manning-Lamo chat logs, which at present constitute the only evidence outside of the participants' heads that might either implicate or exonerate Assange of any accusations that he actively conspired to bring about Manning's alleged leaks. The issue is seen as critical because (1) Wired has published only about 25% of the logs, and (2) Manning's been incommunicado in solitary for over seven months, while (3) Lamo's been talking rather freely to the media, with the result that The NYT reported that he said Manning said Assange was actively involved in setting up special arrangements for Wikileaks' receipt of Manning's leaks, including a dedicated FTP server, which might or might not suffice as a basis for the US to charge Assange with conspiracy, although that's a whole 'nother issue.

The dust now seems to be settling, with Wired personnel confirming that the unpublished portions of the chat logs contain no reference to any such special facilities; which means there's no such reference in any of the logs except for one reference to an FTP in the portions of the logs that Wired's already published; and the consensus seems to be that that one reference cannot fairly be construed to prove anything amounting to conspiracy on Assange's part – i.e., Lamo's been misremembering or misreported. Sean Bonner and Rob Beschizza at boingboing have the best summary of the spat I've seen to date, plus additional info; and there's more background here (worth reading for its characterization of Assange as "international man of demystery," among other things.) UPDATE: The Guardian now has its own summary.

More great work at emptywheel by Marcy Wheeler, who originated much of the research/analysis relied on by Firedoglake and Glenn Greenwald re- inconsistencies re- the Manning-Lamo internet chats. In "Lamo's Two (?!) Laptops," she highlights additional, disturbing discrepancies in Lamo's statements (worth reading for yourself), and in "Assange Alerts His Hostages!" she spotlights the fact that his "insurance file" probably contains the names of top Arab officials alleged to have close ties to the CIA – info the US is probably just as interested to keep secret as are the Arab officials named.

Floyd Abrams, an attorney who represented The NYT in its battles over the Pentagon Papers, has, to the surprise and disappointment of many, put out a piece attacking Wikileaks. There have been a number of good rebuttals, but Marcy Wheeler may have shredded him best.

Lynn Parramore at HuffPo has an informative and eloquent essay decrying the lengthy detention of Manning under inhumane conditions, "Tortured Until Proven Guilty." And Kevin Carson has defended Manning as "One Soldier Who Really Did 'Defend Our Freedom.'"

Here's another list of "How Wikileaks Enlightened Us in 2010."

Apparently, Western Union has joined the effort to execute Wikileaks through financial strangulation without due process of law. Lasers_pewpewpew responded, "[s]o they are only too happy for you to send money to an African prince who will give you a cut of his fictional $20 million (ala 419 scam), but not to Wikileaks? . . . f*cking Epic!"

There's a fascinating new piece, "The Transparency Paradox," at colayer, re- what I've called Assange's theory of "the cost of tightened secrecy to organizational I.Q.," or as Volatility puts it more succinctly (see below), Assange's "secrecy tax." The author at colayer makes the point that, while greater transparency maximizes efficiency and profits for a group as a whole, individuals within the group profit most when they're not transparent while others in the group are. Just like, when you're negotiating, you have an advantage if you know what cards the other parties are holding but they're ignorant of yours. And the internet and other technologies now available have greatly reduced the cost of transparency.

Re- the big, "systems" picture, there's a great article at Volatility on "racketeering":

According to Joseph Tainter’s theory of imperial collapse, as societies become more complex, they must expend an ever greater portion of the energy they have available simply on maintaining their complexity. Although social and technological advances may achieve profitable returns for awhile, once a certain level of complexity is reached, diminishing returns set in. Eventually, at the late imperial stage, the complexity of the power structure, the military infrastructure, the bureaucracies, all the rents involved in maintaining an ever more bloated parasite class, their luxuries, the police state required to extract these rents and keep the productive people down, and the growing losses due to the response of the oppressed producers, everything from poor quality work to strikes to emigration or secession to rebellion, reaches a point where the system can only cannibalize itself and eventually collapse.

Julian Assange’s theory of the secrecy tax he’s trying to impose through Wikileaks is one example of these diminishing returns on imperial complexity. All the indications are that Wikileaks has been successful in this.

* * * * *
This is a welter of parasites battening on the same host. They’re in a zero sum game, not only against the people, but among themselves. Each has an interest in just exploiting the host, not killing it. But together they are killing it and therefore themselves. It’s clear none is capable of organizing or regulating the others. The federal government isn’t capable of doing it. If one big bank tried to do it, it would be subverted by the others. Each racket, from highest to lowest, is going to maximize its bloodsucking until there’s no blood left.

Note that, theoretically, so long as the system as a whole remains mostly transparent, it's not a zero-sum game (or at least, its productivity growth would be subject only to such physical limits as peak oil or climate change), because problem-solving and efficiency are maximized by pervasive info-sharing, and everyone's equally incentivized. In contrast, where transparency has sufficiently deteriorated, workers become less productive, both because of reduced info-sharing and because they're disincentivized – i.e., those not sharing info are still incentivized to continue to exploit the others, but once those who are being exploited figure out what's going on, they're discouraged from sharing and working hard just to enrich the exploiters. At this point, the competition devolves from who can produce the most of the best, into who can loot the most the fastest.

To this analysis, Assange adds the dimension of time and the role of foresight, in his 2006 essay for counterpunch, "Of Potholes and Foresight." To put part of his point in other words, a stitch in time often saves nine, and transparency makes that kind of foresight possible, which otherwise tends to give way to political pressures to allocate resources in more near-sighted ways.

Here's an article on governments' moves to control the internets. Not the most precise writing I've seen, but pulls together a few items of interest.

Here's a list of cables published in the Norwegian newspaper, Aftenposten, and not elsewhere. It was not one of the original Wikileaks partners, and everyone's mystified as to how they got the full cable cache. One observer says there are impt. revelations in there that the original partners haven't yet published.

Here's a good discussion of the nature of the Anons and how they view the evolution of collective intelligence. Roughly speaking, they believe their non-authoritarian, open (transparent), emergent mode of collective info-processing and action should and eventually will supplant the authoritarian, top-down, constricted mode common among big corporations and governments.

The FBI has seized a server allegedly used in some of the Anons' DDoS attacks.

And here's a presentation about what happens when you steal a hacker's computer:



Happy New Year, everyone! And remember, "the truth shall make you free." – John 8:32, the Bible, King James Version.

Wikileaks UPDATES (2010-12-15): Manning "Tortured"; Etc.

This story just doesn't let up. Glenn Greenwald has delivered on his promise to report the inhumane conditions in which Bradly Manning is being held by US authorities. Manning's been in solitary for months, among other deprivations. Greenwald says an article in "the Journal of the American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law states: 'Psychological effects can include anxiety, depression, anger, cognitive disturbances, perceptual distortions, obsessive thoughts, paranoia, and psychosis. . . . When one exacerbates the harms of prolonged isolation with the other deprivations to which Manning is being subjected, long-term psychiatric and even physical impairment is likely. [The article] documents that 'EEG studies going back to the nineteen-sixties have shown diffuse slowing of brain waves in prisoners after a week or more of solitary confinement.' Medical tests conducted in 1992 on Yugoslavian prisoners subjected to an average of six months of isolation – roughly the amount to which Manning has now been subjected – 'revealed brain abnormalities months afterward; the most severe were found in prisoners who had endured either head trauma sufficient to render them unconscious or, yes, solitary confinement. Without sustained social interaction, the human brain may become as impaired as one that has incurred a traumatic injury.'" Greenwald discusses how, for decades, the US Supreme Court has recognized that prolonged solitary constitutes "torture." He concludes,

If you became aware of secret information revealing serious wrongdoing, deceit and/or criminality on the part of the U.S. Government, would you – knowing that you could and likely would be imprisoned under these kinds of repressive, torturous conditions for months on end without so much as a trial: just locked away by yourself 23 hours a day without recourse – be willing to expose it? That's the climate of fear and intimidation which these inhumane detention conditions are intended to create.

More worthwhile info at the link above. Meanwhile, Jeffrey Skilling, convicted on multiple felony counts in connection with the collapse of Enron, resides in a low security federal prison that offers pool, ping-pong or even foosball to the inmates (Wikipedia). UPDATE: The NYT is now reporting that, as I predicted, US officials hope to build a case against Assange by eliciting evidence that he actually helped Bradley Manning with the leak, so as to cast him as a conspirator rather than just a passive recipient of the material who then published it.

Greg Mitchell says one reader purporting to be a Verizon employee reports that Verizon and AT&T may be censoring news re- WL. "'It appears there's a blanket URL block for any URL containing the word "wikileaks" no matter what the context. . . . '" UPDATE: Apparently the Verizon block affected only the company's intranet service.

The hearing on the appeal of the ruling granting Assange's release on bail will take place tomorrow at 11:30 AM London time.

POSSIBLY IMPORTANT UPDATE: A source sympathetic to WL says, "Wikileaks.org, the original domain name for the cable leaking website, became active again in the US as of Dec. 11, 10 days after being terminated by their original domain name provider, EveryDNS. However, the domain now points to http://mirror.wikileaks.info/ — a notably different site than the thousands of other Wikileaks mirrors, [which] continue to be updated frequently. Something about this smells strange to me – and I can’t help but personally question whether this reinstatement of service was instigated by [the US] government in an attempt to track and/or misinform. (source: http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9201189/WikiLeaks.org_domain_back_online)."

David Love has made a case for Assange as this century's Upton Sinclair.

Tonight's cable release includes material on the BP spill – thanks, Guardian!

Time's editors have decided to ignore the will of the people and, instead of Assange, have chosen FB founder, Mark Zuckerberg, as Person of the Year. In the people's votes/ratings, Zuckerberg came in tenth with less than 5% of the number of votes that Assange had.

The NYT et al. seem to be demonstrating the unreliability of traditional media as publishers of truths inconvenient to the the powers that be; their coverage of the cables or related stories has dwindled – in The NYT's case, dramatically.

Here's an article with more details about a new WL rival, OpenLeaks.

I need to go do some other stuff now.

Wikileaks Update 2010-12-18: Greenwald v. Wired, Infowar as Civil War, WL Copycats, & More

I've updated "The Case for Wikileaks" here. It lays out the arguments and includes lots of links to sources and resources; please use and share it.

Glenn Greenwald at Salon has been pounding on Wired. US Army PFC Bradley Manning is the accused leaker of the cables to WL, allegedly having outed himself to Adrian Lamo, who turned him in. Lamo is a convicted hacker and just two weeks earlier had been released from involuntary psychiatric hospitalization. "For more than six months, Wired's Senior Editor Kevin Poulsen has possessed – but refuses to publish – the key evidence [i.e., the complete internet chat logs between Manning and Lamo] in one of the year's most significant political stories." Meanwhile, Lamo has continued to talk, and his descriptions have contained certain inconsistencies, as shown in analyses by Jane Hamsher at Firedoglake. Poulsen's continued refusal to publish the complete chat logs, Greenwald writes, "has long ago left the realm of mere journalistic failure and stands as one of the most egregious examples of active truth-hiding by a 'journalist' I've ever seen." Most of FDL's analyses and other resources can be found here. (UPDATE: Poulsen and Wired's editor, Evan Hansen, respond here, both attacking Greenwald in return. In addition, Hansen suggests they've held back the full logs because they contain Manning's non-relevant, "sensitive personal information," and Poulsen says the stories published in Wired have already "either excerpted, quoted or reported on everything of consequence Manning had to say about his leaking.")

(The Hired and Apocaleaks Now images are from the right hon. exiledsurfer, whose works all reward attention.)

At some point one has to wonder, is the US holding Manning in solitary just because they're trying to make him talk, or also because they need to keep him from talking while the US spreads its own disinfo?

There's a great piece by Robin Bloor on the big picture, "Wikileaks: This Is Just The Beginning," comparing the current situation to the conflict between Pope Leo X and Martin Luther, which she says arose from the invention of the Gutenberg press. I disagree on a few of her points but think she nails one important aspect of the situation: "it’s a mistake to see the US government as a specific side in this war. This is an info war and info wars take place between power structures not countries. It’s the US power structure, not the US itself, that currently has a side in this war. Info wars are, by their very nature, civil wars between groups of citizens that live under the aegis of a given information control structure. One side wishes to conserve it, while the other wishes to change it." The whole article's well worth reading, including her list of virtual infrastructure needs highlighted by developments in the current conflict.

Great essay by Robert Meerpol, son of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg:

I view the Espionage Act of 1917 as a lifelong nemesis. My parents were charged, tried and ultimately executed after being indicted for Conspiracy to Commit Espionage under that act.

The 1917 Act has a notorious history. It originally served to squelch opposition to World War I. It criminalized criticism of the war effort, and sent hundreds of dissenters to jail just for voicing their opinions. It transformed dissent into treason.

Many who attacked the law noted that the framers of the Constitution had specifically limited what constituted treason by writing it into the Constituton: “Treason against the United States shall consist only in levying war against them, or in adhering to their enemies, giving them aid and comfort” (Article III, section 3). The framers felt this narrow definition was necessary to prevent treason from becoming what some called “the weapon of a political faction.” Furthermore, in their discussions at the Constitutional Convention they agreed that spoken opposition was protected by the First Amendment and could never be considered treason.

It appears obvious that the Espionage Act is unconstitutional because it does exactly what the Constitution prohibits. . . . To this day, with a few notable exceptions that include my parents’ case, it has been a dormant sword of Damocles, awaiting the right political moment and an authoritarian Supreme Court to spring to life and slash at dissenters.

More at the link.

Here's the script for a fascinating speech by Rop Gonggri at the 27th Chaos Communication Congress of hackers, referring to his contacts with Wikileaks: "WikiLeaks could well come out victorious in a new generational conflict, mentioned in the same line with the suffragettes and the Vietnam protesters. But as it stands today, my friend Julian is potentially facing prison time or even assassination for what essentially amounts to practicing journalism." He also notes, "[t]here’s a new American proposal to make all providers of any kind of online service provide the authorities with cleartext of everything that happens." Gonggri's main focus in recent years has been electronic voting machines around the world; specifically, demonstrating how easily they can be hacked. (As I've feared, easily-manipulated machines are already in use in many countries.)

In case you hadn't heard, the CIA has launched a "Wikileaks Task Force," a.k.a. W.T.F.; more here.

The NYT has published an op-ed, "Banks and Wikileaks," making a point similar to the one I raised eight days earlier under the heading, "Payment Process Usurps Due Process" – that the payment processing services performed by banks are in the nature of an essential public utility, and banks should not be allowed to financially strangle individuals or enterprises just because they're exposing embarrassing truths.

Indeed, it should be obvious by now that there are a number of essential services in the nature of public utilities that should not be entrusted entirely to private control. The trend, however, has been in the opposite direction; i.e., to privatize more and more. To the extent that trend prevails, there will be nothing to stop people like Dick Cheney from acquiring control of our financial system, prisons, roads, military, media, elections, schools, social networks, internet, etc., and running them like Halliburton for their own personal benefit and that of their buddies, at the expense and to the detriment of the rest of us.

The Anons targeted Bank of America yesterday (because of its refusal to process payments to WL), achieving intermittent outages; I haven't checked on that situation today.

A highly-plausible explanation for Amazon's decision to terminate service to WL: per Amazon, "the U.S. federal government continues to be one of our fastest growing customer segments," utilizing Amazon's web services for its Recovery Accountability and Transparency website. More here.

Here's an article about other, WL-like facilities now starting up. According to Robin Bloor (see above), at last count there were six such sites: BalkanLeaks in the Balkans, BrusselsLeaks in Belgium, Indoleaks in Indonesia, Rospil in Russia, Tunileaks in Tunisia, and OpenLeaks, in addition to WL itself. More info about OpenLeaks at techPresident. I.m.h.o., the more, the merrier. (UPDATE: Here's an updated list of copycat sites. Note, these sites vary widely w.r.t. what they do, including what kind of security they afford leakers, what they publish, how they publish, what language they publish in, etc.

1. BalkanLeaks
2. BrusselsLeaks (Belgium)
3. Cryptome (existed before Wikilekas)
4. Der Western Recherche (Germany)
5. Indoleaks (Indonesia)
6. Israelileaks
7. PirateLeaks (Czech Republic)
8. Rospil (Russia)
9. Tunileaks (Tunisia; but this just looks like a site re- cables released by WL)
10. Opennu.nl (Netherlands)
11. OpenLeaks
12. TradeLeaks
13. ScienceLeaks
14. Wikispooks)

UPDATE: A Croation version is also in the works.

Here's an article re- WL from Columbia Journalism Review:

[I]t’s quite difficult to see significant legal differences between what WikiLeaks has done and what newspaper, television, and magazine reporters do all the time. . . . The classification system has been established by our democratically elected officials to obscure the hand of the state. Sometimes it rightly keeps us safe, and sometimes it wrongly keeps us in the dark. . . . But the fundamental problem is that the government cannot be trusted to make these decisions for themselves. . . . [T]here’s nothing to say that every future iteration of something like WikiLeaks would [deal with leaked material as responsibly as WL has]. It’s a frightening prospect.

But the idea that the solution to this potential problem lies in uprooting freedom of speech, and the status quo that has allowed the press to be a persistent, comprehensive watchdog of the national security state is frightening, too.

"Wikidrips": per Greg Mitchell at The Nation, The NYT's publications re- the cables have dried to a trickle, and it's been even longer since the gray lady published anything not already published elsewhere. I note that WL did not bother including The NYT among the original, privileged recipients – it was The Guardian that shared; but it's coverage, too, has dwindled. Today Mitchell notes that, although The Guardian had a you-ask, we-search feature on their site, inviting readers to suggest terms for searching the trove of cables, it discontinued the feature six days ago.

Just learned that all the days of Mitchell's "Blogging the Wikileaks" can be found here.

Updates on Assange & Manning

This is not just an infowar; it's a p.r. war. And most of the p.r. machinery is owned by t.p.t.b.

Neither Assange nor Wikileaks has been charged with any violation of any law in any country on the planet, though not for lack of strenuous effort by the authorities. The allegations against Assange fall far short of anything considered illegal in the US or most other countries, and the women who made them did not want him prosecuted.

He offered to be questioned while in Sweden before departing for the UK – he lingered there for over a month for that purpose – and he repeatedly offered to be questioned while in the UK. But although Swedish police and prosecutors recently travelled to Serbia to question a suspect in another case, they refused to interview Assange in the UK. They don't want to question him; they want him in their possession.

Gary McKinnon, wanted in the US since 2002 for allegedly committing the biggest hack of US military computers of all time, walks free in the UK. Shawn Sullivan, a convicted pedophile wanted in the US since 1994 for alleged sexual violations of three underage girls, walks free in the UK.

On May 26, 2012, the Swedish Foreign Minister announced a visit by US Sec. of State Hillary Clinton; she arrived in Sweden on June 2. This was the first visit to Sweden by a US Sec. of State since Henry Kissinger spent one day there in 1976. Clinton remained in Sweden for a week.

It should be noted that Sweden is known to have cooperated with the US's rendition program, and that at least one innocent individual in its custody, Muhammad al-Zery, though never actually charged, was sent to Eqypt for torture and held for two years in jail without ever seeing a judge.

Without Assange and Wikileaks, a great many terrible crimes committed by various governments and corporations around the world might never have been revealed. This is what has precipitated the unprecedented efforts to shut Wikileaks down and gain possession of Assange.

Assange's Position Re- Extradition & Asylum

The excerpts below are from a statement found on WL Central and made yesterday in front of the Ecuadorian Embassy in London, and they accurately summarize some of the matters that have been the subjects of misrepresentation most recently.

Yesterday Mr. Assange was served with a letter from the Metropolitan police service requesting that he surrender himself to the Belgravia police station at 11.30 this morning.

Mr Assange has been advised that he should decline to comply with the police request. This should not be considered any sign of disrespect. Under both international and domestic UK law asylum assessments take priority over extradition claims.

The issues faced by Mr. Assange are serious. His life and liberty and the life and liberty of his organization and those associated with it are at stake.

The United States Government has instigated a grand jury investigation against Julian Assange and other “founders or managers” of Wikileaks. Australian diplomats have described this investigation as being of “unprecedented scale and nature." There is irrefutable evidence in the public record of subpoenas being issued and witnesses being compelled to testify against Mr. Assange. WikiLeaks, the ACLU, the Center for Constitutional Rights and other groups have been fighting these subpeonas and other issues arising from the investigation in multiple US courts. US officials have said in open court that the FBI file about the investigation has now reached 42,135 pages. The US department of justice admitted yesterday that its investigation into WikiLeaks proceeds. It is only a matter of time before US authorities begin extradition proceedings against Julian and other leading members of WikiLeaks on various charges including conspiracy to commit espionage. There are credible reports that a sealed indictment has already been made against Mr. Assange. Under US law a sealed indictment can only be made public once Mr. Assange is in custody. For a US official to otherwise acknowledge the existence of a sealed indictment is a criminal offense. The Independent newspaper’s diplomatic correspondent reported that informal talks between the US and Sweden have been conducted.

It should be made clear what would happen if Julian was extradited to the USA. The United Nations special rapporteur for torture, Juan Mendez has formally found that the United States has subjected Julian Assange’s alleged source in this matter, the young soldier Bradley Manning, to conditions amounting to torture. The UN found that the United States subjected Bradley Manning to “cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment”. Mr. Manning has been charged by the US government with the capital offense of “aiding the enemy” in relation to his alleged interaction with Mr. Assange. Bradley Manning has been detained without trial for two years and was placed into solitary confinement for 9 months in his cell for 23 hours a day, stripped naked and woken every 5 minutes. His lawyer and support team say these harsh measures were to coerce him into implicating Julian Assange.

So it is clear that there is a legal process in place which will result in taking Julian to the US, which if allowed to succeed would violate his basic rights.

It is accepted by the UK Supreme Court that Julian Assange has not been charged with any criminal offence in Sweden. It is also accepted that he was by told by Swedish authorities that he was free to leave Sweden. And it is also accepted that he has continuously offered to be interviewed by the Swedish authorities here in the UK, should they wish to do so. Although it is normal procedure, Swedish authorities have refused, without reason, to make the 3 hour trip to London and to interview Julian, causing him to be trapped in the UK under virtual house arrest for 561 days and an additional 10 days in solitary confinement – all without charge. Instead they have issued an INTERPOL Red notice and extradition requests.

Julian and his legal team have previously sought assurances from both the UK government and the Swedish government that they will guarantee safe passage after the completion of legal interviews with Mr Assange and both have [refused]. The Swedish executive publicly announced on June 14 that it would detain Mr. Assange in prison without charge.

Once in Sweden under such grave restrictions it would be impossible for Mr. Assange to exercise his asylum rights.

Mr. Assange did not feel safe from US extradition in the UK. We are all too aware of the abuses of the US-UK extradition treaty. Although Mr. Assange has been trapped in the UK, under dangerous circumstances, he at least has had the freedom to apply for political asylum.

It is in this context that Julian has made the difficult decision to seek refuge inside the Ecuadorian Embassy to ask for asylum.

Julian will remain in the Embassy under the protection of the Ecuadorian government while evidence for his application is being assembled and processed.

See also Glenn Greenwald's summary of the situation and Justice for Assange.

Assange would be a fool to allow himself to fall into the hands of the US or any nation subject to its influence. No doubt t.p.t.b. are too smart to dispose of him in a way that might boost his appeal as a martyr; but once in Swedish or US custody, a lot of things could happen. There could be an unfortunate accident, or he could simply be held incommunicado for a very long time.

Here's a recent BBC piece on the situation:



Below are just some of the revelations made thanks to Wikileaks, as of back in Dec., 2010:

How about the needless gunning down by U.S. military forces of a Reuters cameraman and Iraqi innocents shown in the leaked "Collateral Murder" video? Or, limiting inquiry to the U.S. Embassy cables, what about the revelations that six months before the worldwide economic meltdown, the governor of the Bank of England was secretly proposing a bailout of the world's biggest banks funded by nations such as the U.S.; or that the British government secretly assured the U.S. that it had "put measures in place to protect your interest during the UK inquiry into the causes of the Iraq war"; or that the U.S. dismissed British objections about secret U.S. spy flights taking place from the UK, amid British officials' concerns that the UK would be deemed an accomplice to torture; or that, in response to U.S. pressure, the German government assured the U.S. that it would not follow through on its investigation of the CIA's abduction of a German citizen mistakenly identified as a terrorist, Khaled el-Masri; or that the U.S. threatened the Italian government in order to make sure that no international arrest warrants were issued for CIA agents accused of involvement in the abduction of cleric Abu Omar; or that the U.S. sought assurances from the Ugandan government that it would consult the U.S. before using American intelligence to commit war crimes; or that as of 2009, Shell Oil had infiltrated all the main ministries of the Nigerian government; or that pharmaceutical giant Pfizer paid investigators to unearth corruption links to Nigeria's attorney general so as to pressure him to drop legal action for harm to children from a drug trial; or that government corruption in Afghanistan is rampant (viz. an incident last year when then vice-president Ahmad Zia Massoud was stopped in Dubai while carrying $52m in cash); or that the U.S. seeks to manipulate nations opposed to its approach to global warming; or that the U.S. and China worked together to prevent European nations from reaching an agreement at last year's climate summit; or that the Vatican refused to cooperate with an official Irish inquiry into clerical child abuse; or that BP covered up a giant gas leak in Azerbaijan eighteen months before the Gulf of Mexico disaster? To mention just a few items revealed as of 2010-12-21. (UPDATE: See also Glen Mitchell's "Why Wikileaks Matters" for The Nation; the Electronic Frontier Foundation's "The Best of Cablegate: Where Public Discourse Benefited from the Leaks"; Glenn Greenwald's "What Wikileaks revealed to the world in 2010" at Salon; Wikileaks - A timeline of the top leaks at The Telegraph; and to add just one from 2011 so far, "WikiLeaks points to US meddling . . . to keep the [democratically-elected] Jean-Bertrand Aristide out of Haiti." FURTHER UPDATE: See Greg Mitchell's "32 Major Revelations (and Counting)," including the fact that Wikileaks' publications are widely believed to have helped inspire the uprising in Tunisia against a brutal dictator; OpEd News; Greg Mitchell's top Cablegate picks as of his 100th day of blogging the Wikileaks story, here; and Kevin Gosztola's 100 leaks in 100 tweets, here.

Manning Wins Access to US Damage Assessments

Meanwhile, from AFP:

A US military judge ordered prosecutors Monday to share more documents with WikiLeaks suspect Bradley Manning after defense lawyers accused them of hiding information that could help their client's case.

For months, Manning's defense team has demanded access to reports by government agencies, including the CIA, that assessed the effect of the leak of classified documents to the WikiLeaks website.

Manning is accused of passing on a massive trove of files to WikiLeaks but his lawyers believe the reports will show the alleged disclosures had no major effect on the country's national security.

Judge Denise Lind ruled that government prosecutors must provide "damage assessment" reports from the CIA, the State Department, the FBI, the Office of the National Counterintelligence Executive (Oncix) and other documents that were relevant for the defense.

I strongly suspect that if the effects of the release were really so damaging to legitimate US interests or to innocents in general, the gov't would by now have managed to identify a few particulars it could afford to make public.

UPDATE: Patrick Cockburn has a fine essay at The Independent:

All governments indulge in a degree of hypocrisy between what they say in public and in private. When democratic openness about general actions and policies is demanded, they pretend they are facing a call for total transparency which would prevent effective government. This deliberate and self-serving inflation of popular demands is usually aimed at the concealment of failure and monopolising power.

* * * * *
Assange and WikeLeaks unmasked not diplomatic reticence in the interests of the smooth functioning of government, but duplicity to justify lost wars in which tens of thousand died. Recent history shows that this official secrecy, frequently aided by "embedding" journalists with armies, works all too well.

In Iraq, in the months before the US presidential election in 2004, foreign embassies in Baghdad all knew and reported that US soldiers were only clinging to islands of territory in a hostile land. But the Bush administration was able to persuade US voters that, on the contrary, it was fighting and winning a battle to establish democracy against the remnants of Saddam Hussein's regime and the adherents of Osama bin Laden.

State control of information and the ability to manipulate it makes the right to vote largely meaningless. That is why people like Julian Assange are so essential to democratic choice.

Much more at the link. Another good one by B.J. Sachs at Counterpunch.

Wikileaks UPDATES (2010-12-23): More Re- Manning, Lamo, Moore, & More

A couple of good tweets from the last 24 hrs.:

@GregMitch: I'm live-blogging WikiLeaks news & views again, on day 25 of "Greg Mitchell Held Hostage."

and

@ggreenwald: Simultaneously advocating government transparency and individual privacy isn't hypocritical or inconsistent; it's a key for basic liberty.

For those who prefer their news re- what WL has brought us in cartoon form, The 12 Days of Wikileaks provides a partial list and is accompanied by a transcript with links to the stories mentioned.

The EFF has posted a frightening reminder that the drive to throttle WL continues and of the ease with which the powerful can silence dissidents: "Wikileaks Mirror Taken Down: Host Buckles Under Demands from Upstream Provider." SiteGround required removal of the WL files on the user's site as a condition to reinstatement of his account because, it said, "a future DDOS attack might violate its terms of use" (emphasis supplied). Of course, any such attack would most likely be mounted by the US government or others embarrassed by WL's publications. EFF notes, "your speech online is only as free as [your] weakest intermediary"; and "[i]f intermediaries are willing to use the potential for future DDOS attacks as a reason to cut off users, they can cut off anyone for anything."

Excellent investigation of the conditions under which the Army private suspected of leaking the cables to WL is being held, at Firedoglake. The United Nations' top anti-torture envoy is now looking into a complaint that Manning is being mistreated; more at AP. FDL also has a great Manning-Wikileaks timeline. UPDATE: As of 2010-12-28, inconsistencies in Adrian Lamo's story about his contacts with Manning, unearthed through some great analysis at FDL, have continued to multiply; meanwhile, Wired's Kevin Poulsen continues to refuse to release the full texts of Lamo's internet chats with Manning. FDL has now also added a compilation of key Manning-related articles, here.

From The Guardian re- revelations of State Dept. preoccupation with screenings of Michael Moore's films in other countries:

After a leaked cable from US diplomats in Havana falsely claimed Cuba had banned Moore's documentary Sicko – when in fact it was shown on state television – another cable reveals US officials flying into a panic after hearing a rumour that a New Zealand cabinet minister was hosting a screening of Moore's film Fahrenheit 9/11. . . . the classified cable from the US embassy in Wellington in 2003 . . . breathlessly report[s] a series of calls to the New Zealand prime minister's office . . . .

More at the foregoing link and at MichaelMoore.com.

"According to Domain Name Wire, the [Bank of America] has been aggressively registering domain names including its board of directors' and senior executives' names followed by 'sucks' and 'blows.' For example, the company registered a number of domains for CEO Brian Moynihan: BrianMoynihanBlows.com, BrianMoynihanSucks.com, BrianTMoynihanBlows.com, and BrianTMoynihanSucks.com." Emphasis supplied; more here. Sounds like bank regulators should take a closer look, regardless of what WL may or may not be preparing to release.

WaPo reports that the CIA has launched a task force "to examine whether the latest release of [US Embassy Cables by WL] might affect the agency's foreign relationships or operations":

Officially, the panel is called the WikiLeaks Task Force. But at CIA headquarters, it's mainly known by its all-too-apt acronym: W.T.F.

* * * * *
To some agency veterans, WikiLeaks has vindicated the CIA's long-standing aversion to sharing secrets with other government agencies, a posture that came under sharp criticism after it was identified as a factor that contributed to the nation's failure to prevent the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.

Emphasis supplied; more at the link. Evidently, those intelligence agency veterans haven't actually bothered to read Assange's own writings.

Wikileaks plans to release a cache of documents concerning Israel within the next six months. More here.

Statement from the U.N. on WL here. It reiterates principles re- freedom of expression and access to info possessed by public officials vs. secrecy where there's a risk of substantial harm and journalistic responsibility, without making any factual findings or reaching any conclusions re- particular cases.

Excellent editorial at El Pais regarding its decision to publish info from the cables. Here are a few quotes; but the whole thing's well worthwhile:

We must not lose sight of the fact that the important thing about the WikiLeaks revelations are the revelations themselves . . . .

* * * * *
I believe that the global interest sparked by the WikiLeaks papers is mainly due to the simple but very powerful fact that they conclusively reveal the extent to which politicians in the advanced Western democracies have been lying to their citizens.

* * * * *
Tens of thousands of soldiers are fighting a war in Afghanistan that their respective leaders know is not winnable. Tens of thousands of soldiers are shoring up a government known around the world to be corrupt, but which is tolerated by those who sent the soldiers there in the first place. The WikiLeaks cables show that none of the Western powers believes that Afghanistan can become a credible nation in the medium term, and much less become a viable democracy . . . .

* * * * *
Even the least attentive observer cannot fail to be shocked by the maneuvers to shut down three investigations by the High Court that affected the United States . . . . It was equally aggressive in trying to derail Spanish judicial inquiries into torture at Guantánamo, the CIA's kidnapping of suspected Islamic militants, and the killing by US troops in Iraq of a Spanish cameraman in 2003. . . . We have also seen how US diplomats in Berlin warned the German government of the serious consequences of bringing charges against CIA agents accused of kidnapping Khaled El-Masri, a German citizen who was abducted and taken to Afghanistan where he was tortured. El-Masri was then dumped in Albania when it was realized they had the wrong man. Kidnapping and torture are serious crimes. For US diplomats to pressure an ally to prevent suspects from being investigated is unacceptable, and trashes the idea that those diplomats are just doing their job.

* * * * *
I am aware that publishing this information contrary to the wishes of my government has involved certain risks. But I am also aware that by publishing this detailed account of what our governments get up to in our name has made a contribution to the empowering of voters, and will hopefully strengthen their will to improve our democracy.

* * * * *
Our obligations definitely do not . . . include protecting governments and the powerful in general from embarrassing revelations.

Emphasis supplied; more at the link.

Wikileaks UPDATES (2010-12-14)

Assange, who has been in isolation in Oscar Wilde's old cell, has been ordered released on bail. He's had no access to the internet or even newspapers other than The Daily Express. He won't actually be released until the cash for bail has been delivered, which could take several days. Meanwhile, Swedish officials are appealing his release, and the hearing on that may take place within 48 hours (see Mitchell's blog for links re- all of the foregoing) – meaning, among other things, that Assange will go through yet another hearing without having had the opportunity to participate fully in the preparation of his own defense (unless authorities relent and decide to give him fuller access to news and other resources). UPDATE: Apparently to the surprise of everyone other than British officials, it's they, not the Swedes, who are appealing the decision to release Assange on bail. This is odd because, while the Swedes' basis for wanting him held seems slight enough, the Brits have none at all.

Meanwhile, Glenn Greenwald says the leaker of the cables, Bradley Manning, is being subjected to inhumane treatment, even torture. Manning may be the only card US officials have: they probably have no legal basis for prosecuting Assange or Wikileaks unless they can extract a "confession" from him that Assange/Wikileaks conspired with or at least actively encouraged Manning to obtain the leaked cables.

If the US gets possession of Assange, the investigation/prosecution could keep him and Wikileaks occupied for a long, long time (à la Clinton).

But maybe it would be worth it to offer a trade?

Wikileaks.org is back online, "less than 10 days after domain name service provider EveryDNS terminated the whistleblower organization's domain name, citing stability concerns." More at ComputerWorld (which has been the source for a number of good articles on this story).

Naomi Wolf has another great article at HuffPo; a sample: "Anyone who works in supporting women who have been raped knows from this grossly disproportionate response [to the allegations of sexual misconduct against Assange] that Britain and Sweden, surely under pressure from the US, are cynically using the serious issue of rape as a fig leaf to cover the shameful issue of mafioso-like global collusion in silencing dissent. That is not the State embracing feminism. That is the State pimping feminism."

I'd been wondering how energetically Sweden usually pursues alleged sexual miscreants. A quick search today indicates that (notwithstanding the title of a recent NYT article proclaiming, "[i]n Sweden, sex assault gets little tolerance"), although the laws are indeed stricter and women may report sexual misconduct more often, when it comes to prosecution of sex crimes – not so much. On the contrary, in a 2009 article, The Local reported Sweden's National Council of Crime Prevention had found that "less than 13 percent of the 3,535 rape crimes reported in 2007 resulted in a decision to start legal proceedings . . . . [and] Amnesty [International] slam[med] the Swedish judicial system and the prevalence of attrition [i.e., the phenomenon of alleged offenses never reaching court] within it, concluding that, 'in practice, many perpetrators enjoy impunity.'" (Emphasis supplied.) Dave Lindorff says Swedish authorities have submitted only one other request in 2010 for Interpol's assistance in capturing the suspect of a sex crime, and in that case, the suspect was wanted on multiple charges including sex crimes against children (he unfortunately cites no source). [UPDATE: In a new article the following day, Naomi Wolf confirms my impression.]

Slate has a good defense of Anonymous' DDoS attacks here, as a form of civil disobedience.

The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights is concerned about the actions taken by Mastercard, Visa, and others against Wikileaks and says they could be interpreted as an attempt to censor free speech. Iceland may ban the credit card companies.

The Guardian has a profile of Assange. Near the end, it mentions that OpenLeaks' spokesman, Daniel Domscheit-Berg, says the new organization "'will act only as the receptacle for leaked documents – the leaker will be able to designate which media organisations can publish the details." According to Forbes, if the designated organization doesn't publish the leaked info, the documents will be sent to other publishers. "Resource constraints, as Assange told [the author, Andy Greenberg] last month, have forced WikiLeaks to choose only its 'highest impact' material for publication. But those constraints have also politicized WikiLeaks and forced it to make subjective decisions about its targets, Domscheit-Berg argues. 'We want to be a neutral conduit,' he says.' That’s what’s most politically sustainable as well.'"

Good description of some of the legalities re- extradition here. In short, it suggests it might be easier for the US to extradite Assange from Sweden, but Sweden may need Britain's consent to send him to the US.

In case you hadn't heard, US officials have instructed employees and contractors not to look at the published cables; and now apparently the Air Force is blocking its personnel's access to the websites of the newspapers publishing the cables. UPDATE: Hey, US Air Force, employees, and contractors: there are over 2,000 WL mirror sites listed here.

Here are some good sources for additional info:

Greg Mitchell's blog at The Nation (you may have to click around a bit to get to the current day);
Wikileaks Infopool;
The UK Guardian's daily update on the content of new releases (they've also had the best analysis I've seen from among the traditional media outlets); and
Foreign Policy's Wikileaked blog.

For previous posts with my selection of highlights re- this story, click here.

Daniel Ellsberg Arrested

The most famous whistle-blower of the Vietnam era hailed the leading figures behind the WikiLeaks document dump as heroes today, before heading off to chain himself to the White House fence as a protest against efforts to prosecute them.

On the day WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange made bail to win release from the London prison where he has been held on sexual assault charges, Pentagon Papers leaker Daniel Ellsberg defended Assange and his alleged source, Army Pfc. Bradley Manning. Manning is being held in a military prison at Quantico, Va.

"I see Bradley Manning as a patriot, and I’m sure Julian Assange is an Australian patriot," Ellsberg said in a press conference today. "To call them terrorists is not only mistaken, it’s absurd and slanderous. Neither of them are any more terrorists than I am, and I’m not."

Afterwards, the 79-year-old Ellsberg headed to the White House to be chained to its snowy gates as part of a protest organized by Veterans for Peace, which also organized the press conference along with GetUp!, an Australian activist group. Ellsberg was one of dozens arrested, the Associated Press reported.

More at the National Journal.

Wikileaks Update

Wired has finally released the full, alleged Manning-Lamo chat logs, and as Glenn Greenwald points out, it seems clear that the portions previously withheld are by no means limited to personal info about Manning or matters of national security, as Wired had claimed. On the contrary, the logs show Lamo to be deceptive and unreliable, and more importantly, contain substantial exculpatory evidence, including but not limited to evidence that Assange took precautions to ensure that he would not know who his leaker was (which could make it tough for the US to prove collusion).

Meanwhile, the hearing on Assange's appeal from the order approving his extradition to Sweden has concluded, but it's expected to be days or weeks before the new ruling issues (see The Guardian).

Assange Loses Swedish Extradition Appeal

Details here.

The Swedish extradition effort is based on allegations of sexual misconduct by two women who do not want to press charges and after the first Swedish investigation concluded that the case should be dropped.

It's generally believed that Sweden will hand Assange over to the U.S.

Neither Assange nor Wikileaks has yet been charged with violating any law of any nation. Assange is being extradited for "questioning" by Swedish authorities.

Before leaving Sweden for London, he'd lingered in Sweden for two months in case they wanted to talk with him further. After arriving in London, he offered repeatedly to speak to Swedish authorities there.

Wikileaks has ceased operations due to financial strangulation by Bank of America, Mastercard, PayPal, and other companies, which have been refusing to process donations to WL (more here).

Meanwhile, Bradly Manning has now been jailed for 525 days (see Bradley Manning Support Network), with no trial in sight.

Wikileaks Update (2011-01-15): Swiss Banker Leaks Data Re- Tax Evasion; Tunisia; J. Waters Re- J. Lennon; & More

Greg Mitchell is still blogging the Wikileaks story more or less continually at The Nation. He's also written a great article on it here, and The Nation's put together an illustrative slide show here. Best way to find Mitchell's current and prior WL-related blog posts is through this page. Among Mitchell's news today:

[From The Guardian:] "Swiss whistleblower Rudolf Elmer [formerly with [Julius Baer Bank] plans to hand over offshore banking secrets of the rich and famous to WikiLeaks: He will disclose the details of 'massive potential tax evasion' before he flies home to stand trial over his actions." [Can't wait!] UPDATE: Reuters reports that Elmer will deliver two CD's full of info to WL tomorrow (Jan. 17). Elmer's being tried in Switzerland for breaching bank secrecy; but unlike Manning and Assange, he has not been detained and can travel freely. Further UPDATE: The hand-off to Assange has occurred; more at The Globe and Mail.

Scott Shane's new piece at NYT puts him in the camp of those giving a good deal of credit to WikiLeaks for [the] Tunisia revolt. . . . [H]e says the cables "helped fuel the anger on the streets that culminated Friday with Mr. Ben Ali’s flight after 23 years in power," adding, "the diplomats’ disgusted and lurid accounts of the kleptocratic ways of the president’s extended family helped tip the scales, according to many Tunisian commentators."

[Per John Waters, who's about to open a show inspired by John Lennon,] "I think [Lennon would] be thrilled with WikiLeaks. . . . I think the internet has always been potentially a force for freedom of speech and it's proving itself right now. And Lennon would have been just loving that."

Here are some kids' WL-related cartoons; the one shown at right is by #pranav_waghmare.

Award-winning journalist John Pilger has written brilliantly in WL's and Assange's defense; a few excerpts:

On 18 March 2008, a war on WikiLeaks was foretold in a secret Pentagon document prepared by the "Cyber Counterintelligence Assessments Branch." US intelligence, it said, intended to destroy the feeling of "trust" which is WikiLeaks’ "center of gravity." It planned to do this with threats of "exposure [and] criminal prosecution." Silencing and criminalizing this rare source of independent journalism was the aim, smear the method. . . .

* * * * *
"So, Julian, why won’t you go back to Sweden now?" demanded the headline over Catherine Bennett’s Observer column on 19 December, which questioned Assange’s response to allegations of sexual misconduct with two women in Stockholm last August. "To keep delaying the moment of truth, for this champion of fearless disclosure and total openness," wrote Bennett, "could soon begin to look pretty dishonest, as well as inconsistent." Not a word in Bennett’s vitriol considered the looming threats to Assange’s basic human rights and his physical safety, as described by Geoffrey Robertson QC, in the extradition hearing in London on 11 January.

In response to Bennett, the editor of the online Nordic News Network in Sweden, Al Burke, wrote to the Observer explaining that "plausible answers to Catherine Bennett’s tendentious question" were both critically important and freely available. Assange had remained in Sweden for more than five weeks after the rape allegation was made — and subsequently dismissed by the chief prosecutor in Stockholm – and that repeated attempts by him and his Swedish lawyer to meet a second prosecutor, who re-opened the case following the intervention of a government politician, had failed. And yet, as Burke pointed out, this prosecutor had granted him permission to fly to London where "he also offered to be interviewed – a normal practice in such cases." So it seems odd, at the very least, that the prosecutor then issued a European Arrest Warrant. The Observer did not publish Burke’s letter.

This record-straightening is crucial because it describes the perfidious behavior of the Swedish authorities – a bizarre sequence confirmed to me by other journalists in Stockholm and by Assange’s Swedish lawyer, Bjorn Hurtig. Not only that; Burke catalogued the unforeseen danger Assange faces should he be extradited to Sweden. "Documents released by WikiLeaks since Assange moved to England," he wrote, "clearly indicate that Sweden has consistently submitted to pressure from the United States in matters relating to civil rights. There is ample reason for concern that if Assange were to be taken into custody by Swedish authorities, he could be turned over to the United States without due consideration of his legal rights."

* * * * *
For example, in December 2001, with the "war on terror" under way, the Swedish government abruptly revoked the political refugee status of two Egyptians, Ahmed Agiza and Mohammed al-Zari. They were handed to a CIA kidnap squad at Stockholm airport and "rendered" to Egypt, where they were tortured. When the Swedish Ombudsman for Justice investigated and found that their human rights had been "seriously violated," it was too late.

Much more worth reading here.

Finally, here's the unedited version of Colbert's interview of Assange:


From Colbert Nation.