Freeing Julian Assange: the Final Chapter

[newthinking]

Freeing Julian Assange: the Final Chapter

by John Pilger



One of the epic miscarriages of justice of our time is unravelling. The United Nations Working Group on Arbitrary Detention — — the international tribunal that adjudicates and decides whether governments comply with their human rights obligations — has ruled that Julian Assange has been detained unlawfully by Britain and Sweden.

After five years of fighting to clear his name — having been smeared relentlessly yet charged with no crime — Assange is closer to justice and vindication, and perhaps freedom, than at any time since he was arrested and held in London under a European Extradition Warrant, itself now discredited by Parliament.

The UN Working Group bases its judgements on the European Convention on Human Rights and three other treaties that are binding on all its signatories. Both Britain and Sweden participated in the 16-month long UN investigation and submitted evidence and defended their position before the tribunal. It would fly contemptuously in the face of international law if they did not comply with the judgment and allow Assange to leave the refuge granted him by the Ecuadorean government in its London embassy.

In previous, celebrated cases ruled upon by the Working Group — Aung Sang Suu Kyi in Burma, imprisoned opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim in Malaysia, detained Washington Post journalist Jason Rezaian in Iran, both Britain and Sweden have given support to the tribunal. The difference now is that Assange’s persecution and confinement endures in the heart of London.

Continued:
http://www.counterpunch.org/2016/02/05/freeing-julian-assange-the-final-chapter/

[struggle4progress]

1. It's the usual bullshizz one has come to expect from Counterpunch, the pseudo-left

magazine offering endless large-size servings of garbly-gook that never manages to help anybody think clearly

To describe the Assange case as the "epic miscarriage of justice of our time" shows a frighteningly idiotic blindness or perhaps a moronic tendency to demagoguery: there's never any shortage of genuine refugees, of genuine victims of arbitrary detention and torture, of genuine innocents condemned to death for the pettiest of reasons -- and Assange is not among those, whatever one might choose to believe about the Swedish allegations or however one might rate Assange's work so far

Pilger's overblown language is fundamentally amoral, because it obscures the genuine refugees, victims, and innocents behind a giant cartoon of St Julian the Blessed Martyr

The radical insight, that creating a just and peaceful world essentially requires a complete restructuring of the world, far too often produces people like Pilger, who would lead us into the swamps to howl meaninglessly at the moon. The real work needed is far more tedious, requires far more dedication and energy, as well as far more careful work and study -- and it is much less satisfying to the emotionally self-indulgent than Pilger's noise

Objectively, the Counterpunch crowd are our enemies, because they lead us uselessly into a cul-de-sac

[Zorro]

2. You nailed it

[cprise]

5. More rambling from the circular firing squad

that sounds an awful lot like a defense of imperialism and tedious CIA feminists.

[zalinda]

3. It's about time.

Whether you like Assange or not, the fact that he shone a light on the inner workings of governments, especially our government is one of the reasons we are here at this crossroads, between real Democracy or the continued establishment politics.

Assange, Snowden, Manning are the ones that have made the news and made out to be villains. There are many more who have tried to alert us to the corruption with our government, but they have basically been silenced.

Believe it or not, we need people like this to let us know about corruption, not only in governments, but big companies, small companies, groups and people who think laws and regulations are made for some one else.

When we punish people for speaking out, we are essentially doing harm to ourselves, just look at Flint, Michigan.

Z

[noretreatnosurrender]

4. Agree

I totally agree with you.