Julian Assange is declared not eligible to be released early because of the COVID-19 pandemic

(April 5) The Australian Associated Press has reported that Julian Asssange the imprisoned Wikileaks publisher is not eligible to be released early on account of the COVID-19 pandemic as are some other prisoners since he is not serving a criminal sentence.

 

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Some prisoners to be released

UK Justice Secretary Robert Buckland said on Saturday that some low-risk prisoners with a few weeks from release will be let go but with monitoring devices. The move is designed to lower prison populations during the COVID-19 pandemic and help prevent a possible rapid spread through prisons.

Buckland said in a statement: “This government is committed to ensuring that justice is served to those who break the law. But this is an unprecedented situation because if coronavirus takes hold in our prisons, the NHS could be overwhelmed and more lives put at risk.”

Assange not in jail on a criminal sentence

The prisoner release applies only to those convicted of a criminal offense who are near the end of their sentence and who are a low risk to the population. Assange is only being held in a custodial sentence as he is forced to await the outcome of a US extradition request. Assange has been forced to remain in Belmarsh prison which holds many high-risk inmates convicted of the most serious crimes.

If extradited Assange would face charges under the US Espionage Acts. He released many secret files revealing details of aspects of the US military campaigns in Afghanistan and Iraq. Many were damaging to the reputation of the US military. Assange also faces a charge of hacking into a computer. If convicted Assange could be jailed for up to 175 years. The appended video shows one of the tapes Wikileaks released showing an attack by a helicopter in Baghdad that killed two who worked for Reuters among others

Assange failed in an earlier bid to be released

Assange has argued that he was at risk of catching coronavirus in Belmarsh prison where he is in custody. Assange has had a history of illness including respiratory infections. Edward Fitzgeral Assange's lawyer said that although there were no confirmed cases of COVID-19 at the prison currently that 100 prison officers were off work and that was a very real risk that Assange faced a fatal risk if kept imprisoned at Belmarsh.

However, Judge Vanessa Baraitser of the Westminster Magistrates Court said: "As matters stand today, this global pandemic does not as of itself provide grounds for Mr Assange's release."

Conclusion

Assange's full extradition hearing is due to resume for three weeks in May. Witnesses will be called and cross-examined. The ruling is expected by August at the latest. All this time Assange is condemned to remain in a high security prison with the risk of being infected by COVID-19. The situation could even be worse in that court hearings could be delayed by the COVID-19 pandemic. At a recent hearing there have been complaints about Assange's treatment at Belmarsh as reported on an appended video.

The court considers that Assange could flee if released. However, surely he could be fitted with a device to monitor his movements, be required to check in every so often, and monitored closely. This would ensure Assange would be there to attend his hearings without subjecting him to the risk of contracting COVID-19 in prison. Instead he is subject to continual punishment when he is not even charged with any crime in the UK.

Previously published in the Digital Journal

US withheld key evidence against Assange from his legal team during his extradition hearing

(December 13, 2019)The Trump administration's efforts to extradite Julian Assange the Wikileaks founder to the US from the UK are facing several questions including Assange's health as well as withholding crucial evidence against him from his legal team.

Assange's health:

The journalist John Pilger tweeted: "Do not forget Julian #Assange. Or you will lose him. I saw him in Belmarsh prison and his health has deteriorated. Treated worse than a murderer, he is isolated, medicated and denied the tools to fight the bogus charges of a US extradition. I now fear for him. Do not forget him."

Nells Melzer the UN Special Rapporteur on Torture condemned Assange's treatment and cited its negative effects on his health: "“It was obvious that Mr. Assange’s health has been seriously affected by the extremely hostile and arbitrary environment he has been exposed to for many years,” the expert said. “Most importantly, in addition to physical ailments, Mr. Assange showed all symptoms typical for prolonged exposure to psychological torture, including extreme stress, chronic anxiety and intense psychological trauma.“The evidence is overwhelming and clear,” the expert said. “Mr. Assange has been deliberately exposed, for a period of several years, to progressively severe forms of cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, the cumulative effects of which can only be described as psychological torture. " The UK simply ignores such warnings.

Assange kept in prison after his sentence served

Even though Assange's prison term has been served he is still held in prison until his extradition hearings are over: " Wikileaks co-founder Julian Assange is to remain in prison when his jail term ends because of his "history of absconding", a judge has ruled. He was due to be released on 22 September after serving his sentence for breaching bail conditions.But Westminster Magistrates' Court heard there were "substantial grounds" for believing he would abscond again." It looks as if the UK legal system is out to punish Assange in line with the UK government.

US is withholding evidence from Assange's legal team

As the US is withholding evidence against Assange, it will be exceedingly difficult to mount an adequate argument against Assange being extradited, The withholding of such evidence is contrary to US law. No doubt much of Assange's legal team's defense will be based on the fact that they do not have all the evidence against him,

It could be argued that the US is not acting in good faith in relying upon secret evidence. Assange is hardly being afforded a fair hearing. If he is extradited he is likely to face an unfair trial in the US. If the UK goes along with this charade it can only tarnish the credibility of the UK justice system.

UN's Melzer claims Assange would not have a fair trial in the US

Melzer urges that Assange not be extradited to the US: "Given the strongly perceptible public and official prejudice held against Mr. Assange in the United States, there are serious reasons to doubt that he would receive a fair trial before an impartial judicial body as required under human rights law. I underscore my most serious concern that, if Mr. Assange were to be extradited or otherwise surrendered to the United States... he would be exposed to a real risk of torture or other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.”

Previously published in the Digital Journal

A Spanish court is investigating a security firm suspected of spying for the US on Assange while he was in Ecuadorean embassy in London

The Spanish National Court is investigating a Spanish security firm, Undercover Global, suspected of spying on Julian Assange for the US while Assange was inside the Ecuadorean embassy in London UK. The investigation was made public this Wednesday.

The investigation was triggered by a newspaper report El Pais

The El Pais report claimed: "... Undercover Global owner David Morales allegedly directed the surveillance and was personally responsible for making a deal with the CIA. Morales is reported to have asked employees to keep his firm's collaboration with the US secret. Undercover Global installed microphones in several parts of Assange's quarters, using things like the embassy's fire extinguishers. The firm also put surveillance systems in the embassy's female toilets, a place where Assange's lawyers would meet amid fears that conference rooms were bugged. A streaming system was also allegedly installed, which would allow US officials to directly access Assange's meetings in real time."

The court document was dated August 7. The company and Morales are also being probed for bribery and money laundering according to the document. The court claimed it had opened the investigation after a complaint was made by Assange's lawyers. Perhaps the El Pais report contributed to the complaint. The court said: “Meetings which Assange held with his lawyers, as well as medical visits and those of other nature were recorded.” The recorded information was then made available both to Ecuadorean and US intelligence services. Morales is also said to have made frequent trips to the US to personally deliver hard drives containing the recordings.

Morales said to have paid to ensure there were no negative reports

The court said that Morales paid $22,000 a month in cash to the head of security at the embassy to make sure that there were no negative reports about the Undercover Global operations that could result in the firm losing its contract.

Morales arrested last month

Morales was actually arrested on Sept. 17 but has been conditionally released according to judicial sources. Morales must report to a judge every 15 days and has had his passport confiscated.

Background

Assange had taken refuge in the London Ecuadorean embassy in 2012. He claimed to be fleeing what he called a politically motivated extradition order to be returned to Sweden to answer questions on an alleged sexual assault. Assange stayed in the embassy right up until April of this year when Ecuador allowed UK police to drag him out. He was then sentenced to serve 50 weeks in a maximum security UK jail for breaching his bail conditions when he sought asylum in the embassy.

Assange is also subject to a US extradition request. In the US he faces a total of 18 charges. Most relate to obtaining and disseminating classified information by publishing military documents through the Wikileaks website. The appended video showing a helicopter attack that killed two Reuter's personnel is one example of his publications.

Observations

The fact that the US chose a firm which is suspected of bribery and money laundering shows the lack of any oversight of those responsible for making such decisions. The choice of such a firm is liable to end up sullying the reputation of the US beyond that of choosing to spy on Assange. Ecuador comes out looking even worse as it has been shown to hire security officials who can be bribed.

The fact that meetings of Assange with his lawyers were recorded and delivered to US authorities should make it abundantly clear that Assange cannot face a fair trial in the US. The UK courts must surely deny the US extradition order. If they do not it would be a travesty of UK justice.

The UK seems already be treating Assange unjustly by retaining him in jail while he awaits his extradition hearing: "The WikiLeaks founder would have been released from HMP Belmarsh on 22 September, Westminster magistrates court heard on Friday, but he was told he would be kept in jail because of “substantial grounds” for believing he would abscond again."

Previously published in the Digital Journal

Security company guarding Ecuador's London Embassy alleged to have spied on Julian Assange

(Sept. 29) The private Spanish security company UC Global SL hired to protect the Ecuadorian London embassy while Julian Assange Wikileaks founder sought refuge there is alleged to have spied on him for the US Central Intelligence Agency.

 

The report

According to a recent article: "A report in Spanish newspaper El Pais said the company, UC Global SL, allegedly handed over audio and video to the CIA of meetings Assange held with his lawyers.The company is being investigated over the claims by Spain’s High Court, the Audiencia Nacional, said the report."

Assange has himself filed a criminal complaint in which he accuses the company of violating his privacy and also the secrecy of his client-attorney privileges. Given that the company is alleged to have provided audio and video of Assange's meeting with his lawyers to the CIA this creates even more doubts about whether Assange will ever be able to receive a fair trial should he ever be extradited to the US.

El Pais newpaper said that UC Global SL did not respond to requests for comments on its claims.

Background

While on bail in 2012 while facing extradition hearings to be sent to Sweden to answer questions on sex charges Assange sought and was granted refuge in the Ecuadorean embassy in London. He feared that his extradition to Sweden was a step on the way to being extradited to the US. However, this April Assange was forcibly removed from the embassy and turned over to UK authorities.

In June this year the US formally requested his extradition from the UK on 18 charges including the unauthorized disclosure of national defense information. What really irritates the US is that Assange revealed some of the misdeeds of the US military including the famous video of a Baghdad attack by Apache helicopters that killed among others 2 Reuters personnel. Reuters at the time reported: "Classified U.S. military video showing a 2007 attack by Apache helicopters that killed a dozen people in Baghdad, including two Reuters news staff, was released on Monday by a group that promotes leaking to fight government and corporate corruption."

The US formally requested his extradition in June on 18 charges, including computer misuse and the unauthorised disclosure of national defence information. Assange is accused also of working with whistle-blower and former US army intelligence operative Chelsea Manning.

Assange at present

Assange was jailed for 50 weeks in Belmarsh prison in London for violating his bail conditions. Although he was due to be released next he will remain in custody right up until the US extradition hearing that does not take place until February of next year.

An article at the end of May reports: "On the eighth of April, shortly before London police forcibly carried WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange out of the Ecuadorian embassy, a doctor named Sondra S Crosby wrote a letter to the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights requesting that the office look into Assange’s case. Today, following a scorching rebuke of multiple governments by UN Special Rapporteur on torture Nils Melzer, mass media outlets around the world are reporting that Julian Assange has been found to be the victim of brutal psychological torture." In spite of all this and Assange's continuing ill health he remains in jail. Instead of joining in with those who are demanding his release and criticizing his treatment many in the mainstream press continue with an attempt to smear his character. Whatever Assange's faults he deserves praise not further punishment for his revelations about misdeeds by the US military.

Previously published in the Digital Journal

Full hearing on Assange's extradition to the US to be at earliest the end of next February

The full hearing and decision on the case to extradite Julian Assange to the United States will not happen until after February 24 of next year or the end of February 2020 at the earliest.

The Westminster Magistrate’s Court ruled on the issue Friday.

Tristan Kirk, courts reporter for the London Evening Standard reported on the decision. He said he had to argue his way into the court room after a security guard barred the media from entering the public hearing which lasted under 30 minutes. The full hearing will last five days.

The Magistrate's Court hearing

As Ben Brandon , the lawyer representing the US went through a summary of the accusations against Assange that included that he had cracked a US defense account network password, Assad interjected that he had not broken any password whatsoever. Assange said to the court that 175 years of his life were at stake according to Sky News. Presumably he means that this is what his total sentence could be. He told the presiding judge whom he addressed as Lady Arbuthnot that Wikileaks was nothing but a publisher.

Mark Summers an Assange lawyer told the court that there were a multiplicity of profound issues surrounding the Assange extradition case and said: “We say it represents an outrageous and full-frontal assault on journalistic rights,”

British official signs US extradition request

Sajiiid Javid, the UK Home Secretary signed the US extradition order on Wednesday and said the next day: "I want to see justice done at all times and we’ve got a legitimate extradition request, so I’ve signed it, but the final decision is now with the courts.”

The two sides in the extradition battle will now have about 8 months to prepare their cases

Assange will stay in Belmarsh prison until the end of March 2020

Assange addressed the court through a video link with Belmarsh prison. Assange is serving a 50-week sentence as a punishment for skipping bail on a Swedish sexual assault investigation. He was wanted for questioning in Sweden. Assange thought that the Swedish extradition was a ploy to have him extradited from Sweden to the US. In June back in 2012 Assange fled for refuge to the Ecuadorean embassy to avoid extradition to Sweden and as mentioned he thought then to the US. However, after a new government took power in Ecuador the UK police were allowed to enter the embassy and arrest Assange on April 11 this year.

Assange was recently transferred to the medical wing of Belmarsh

A recent article reports: "Julian Assange has been moved to a medical wing in Belmarsh prison over concerns for his "significantly deteriorated" health, WikiLeaks has claimed. The website said there are "grave concerns" for its founder as he has "dramatically lost weight" during his seven weeks in prison, and his condition has made it difficult for him to talk."

Assange seems to have recovered enough to participate by videolink in the recent hearing.

Previously published in the Digital Journal

US Department of Justice makes a formal request to have Julian Assange extradited to the US

(June 12)The US Dept. of Justice has formally submitted a request to extradite Julian Assange from the UK. This follows on an earlier provisional request that the UK retain Assange until this formal request was made.

Request built around late May indictment of Assange

In that indictment the US charged Assange with 17 offences under the Espionage Act. If convicted of all the charges, Assange could face up to 170 years in prison. The UK has held Assange since April 11 when the Ecuadorean Embassy in central London allowed police to enter and arrest him. He had been there since 2012. For breaching his bail provisions Assange was sentenced to 50 weeks in jail.

US has waited years to extradite Assange

Assange had fled to the Ecuadorean embassy to avoid being extradited to be questioned on a rape investigation in Sweden. He was not charged with anything. Assange thought the extradition was meant to allow him to be further extradited to the US

The extradition request faces obstacles

Many think the Assange's crimes are actually ground-breaking journalism in which he acted as a whistle blower revealing many dirty deeds of the US in Iraq and Afghanistan including the killing of a Reuter's journalist and driver in an Apache helicopter attack of which video is appended.

Another problem with extradition is the fact that the US has the death penalty and also a number of US officials have been attacking him publicly for years. The attacks raise doubts about whether Assange could face a fair trial in the US and the UK cannot extradite someone to where the person could face the death penalty.

So far Wikileaks has not issued a statement on the new request nor have Assange's legal team.

Assange in medical wing of the Belmarsh prison

Assange was unable to attend a recent court hearing in London on the US request for extradition as his lawyer claimed he was too ill to attend and that he had been relocated to the prison medical ward. Wikileaks issued a statement claiming that Assange's health had significantly deteriorated during his seven year stay in the Ecuadorean embassy.. During his seven weeks in prison it has gotten even worse. The hearing has been adjourned until June 12. This time it will be held inside the prison so perhaps Assange will be able to attend.

Wikileaks reports that the hearing has been postponed until June 14.

Previously published in the DIgital Journal

Assange's belongings left in UK Ecuador embassy to be sent to the US

(May 14)Assange's lawyers said yesterday that Ecuador will turn over all the possessions Assange left in the Ecuadorean embassy when he was arrested in London.

Police can search Assange's room

Ecuadorean public prosecutors will allow police to search the room Assange occupied for about seven years to seize his personal belongings. The belongings include computers, mobile phones, memory sticks and other electronic devices among other items. In response to a request from the US Department of Justice for cooperation into its investigation into Assange the belongings will be sent to the US.

Assange's lawyers respond

Aitor Martinez, Assange's Madrid-based lawyer said that turning over the material was an "absolute violation of the right of defence, because they will hand over to the US all his communications with his lawyers, which are confidential."

Assange's lawyer in Ecuador, Carlos Poveda said that he had never been informed of the public prosecutor's decision. He said he was appealing the permission to seize Assange's belongings, asking that it be suspended. Should the appeal not be granted, Poveda asked that Assange be present when the room is searched.

However, Assange at present is in a London jail for fifty weeks after being found guilty of jumping bail. Judicial sources in Ecuador say that the public prosecutor's office has not made the decision public because it is part of an international cooperation document. Apparently, that includes not informing Assange's lawyer,

Assange facing extradition from the UK to the US

A US indictment charges Assange with conspiracy for working with Chelsea Manning a former US Army Intelligence Officer to try and crack a password stored on US Dept. of Defense computer back in March of 2010. Manning managed to pass on hundreds of thousands of classified documents to Wikileaks many of which revealed for the first time including the killing of two Reuters journalists in a helicopter attack. If convicted, Assange could face up to five years. However, his team of lawyers will fight the extradition process and this could take years.

Sweden reopens its investigation into rape complaints

Swedish prosecutors have decided to reopen its investigation into complaints about alleged rape in 2010. Assange fled to the Ecuadorean embassy so that he would not be extradited to Sweden to answer questions on the complaints. Assange feared that the extradition was simply designed to get him to Sweden and he would then be extradited to the US.

The editor of Wikileaks tried to collect Assange's belonging about a week ago but as you can see he was not allowed in to the embassy to do so.

Previously published in the Digital Journal

Julian Assange has spent 3 years in Ecuadorean embassy in London

As of June 19, Julian Assange, the founder of Wikileaks has spent three years now in the Ecuadorean embassy in London. He sought asylum in the embassy to avoid being extradited to Sweden to face questioning on sexual assault accusations.

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Assange fears that once he is in Sweden he will be transferred to the U.S. to face charges for Wikileaks revelations. Wikileaks shares documents, often classified, that it obtains from whistle blowers, including a large number of U.S. diplomatic cables that contained information embarrassing to the U.S. and many of its allies. The appended video of a helicopter attack in Iraq that killed two Reuters' journalist is one of its many releases. Most recently the site has released numerous Saudi cables that the kingdom warns are fake and should not be distributed. While Wikileaks did not directly reveal its source, it makes reference to a recent report that the Saudis had suffered a breach of its computer networks by a group called Yemeni Cyber Army. Wikileaks published more than 60,000 cables and plans to release half a million more in the coming weeks. Wikileaks has also released material from whistle blowers on extrajudicial killings in Kenya, dumping of toxic wastes in the Ivory Coast, and Guantanamo Bay detention camp procedures.

In 2011, a European warrant for Assange's arrest was ordered even though the investigation of the assault accusations is still at the preliminary stage. Assange denies the accusations and says the goal of the whole process is to have him extradited to the U.S. when he arrives in Sweden. In March, Swedish director of public prosecutions, Marianne Ny, agreed to question Assange at the embassy. But the appointment for Wednesday was cancelled since the prosecutors did not have permission yet to enter the premises from Ecuador. Assange blamed the cancellation on the prosecutors and called it a "public relations exercise".

A UK government waste website claims that the round the clock surveillance of the Ecuadorian embassy over the three years has cost 11.4 million pounds or almost 16 million euros. These funds are sufficient to fund 9.5 million meals for those in need and a year's schooling for 20,000 children. However, even supporters of Assange question the figures since the salaries of the police would have been paid in any event.

Assange's room in the embassy has an office and living area. He has a treadmill for exercise since he cannot go outside. There is no outdoor area at the embassy. He has a microwave and sun lamp. He also has a shower. Most of his time is spent on the computer. Ecuador asked that the UK allow Assange to go outside for exercise without risking his asylum, but the UK government refused. At present there are no charges against Assange in the United States. Ecuador has said that Assange can remain at the embassy as long as he wishes.

AdSense bans ads from antiwar site because of Abu Ghraib prison torture photos

The antiwar site, antiwar.com, has been informed by Google Adsense that all ads on its website have been disabled. The site claims that this is because it has a page that has photos of the abuse by US troops at Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq.

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The page of Abu Ghraib photos had been up for 11 years and during all that time Google Adsense had been running ads on the site. The page can be found here and has had two million hits since posted. The letter sent to the site can be found here.

The author of the editorial at the antiwar.com site, Eric Garris, sees the timing of the removal of the ads as significant since Washington is now expanding its presence in Iraq saying: "..as Washington gets ready to re-invade Iraq, and in bombing, killing, and abusing more civilians, they suddenly decide that their "anti-violence" policy, which prohibits "disturbing material," prohibits any depiction of violence committed by the U.S. government and paid for with your tax dollars...To say this is an utter outrage would be an understatement: it is quite simply the kind of situation one might expect to encounter in an authoritarian country where state-owned or state-connected companies routinely censor material that displeases the government.As some commentators point out this response rather jumps to conclusions — the facts hardly support that strongly.

One commentator claimed to have had a site with the same issue after 10 years with no problem and the site had nothing to do with politics. The letter sent to the antiwar site makes clear that the photos violate AdSense policy:As stated in our program policies, AdSense publishers are not permitted to place Google ads on pages with violent or disturbing content, including sites with gory text or images.

The photos of events at Abu Ghraib surely violate this policy. It is understandable that advertisers would not want their ads beside those photos. Of course Islamic State recruiters might think that it was an ideal place for them to place ads. Google's own AdSense blog violated its own policy rules by showing explicit sexual material from the French video website Imineo.com and was roundly criticized for doing so.

Compliance with policy is obviously not closely monitored so that notices such as antiwar.com received are no doubt the result of a complaint or complaints. This complaint could have come from the government or from someone else at the urging of government, or it could just be an individual who has it in for the site and wants to deprive them of revenue. The site has not removed the link to the photos and is using the disabling of ads as a fundraising issue since they receive significant funds from their ad revenue. The commentator mentioned earlier suggested that the site could simply ask that the ads be removed from the offending page with the photos and be reinstated everywhere else. There is an appeal process as mentioned in the letter. The site is libertarian to a degree and so tries to tie this event to big government censorship. However in this case it is a corporation Google, that owns AdSense, that is doing the "censoring" and using its power, not the government. In the first quarter of 2014 Google earned $3.4 billion or 22 percent of its total revenue from AdSense.

Of course big corporations such as Google often have cosy relations with government. The former CEO of Google, Eric Schmidt along with head of Google Ideas a Google-sponsored think tank , Jared Cohen, interviewed Julian Assange back in 2011 while he was under house arrest in the UK. Assange describes the meeting and also the relations of the two to the US government and its policy in a fascinating article in Newsweek. Jared was a former employee at the State Department. As Wikipedia notes:Google Ideas has come under scrutiny for its links with the US State Department and its 'regime change' activities.

Google has profited from its government connections. In 2004 Google took over Keyhole. This was a mapping technology startup that had been funded by the National Geospatial Intelligence Agency (NGA) and the CIA. Google further developed the technology that resulted in Google Maps, a version of which was sold to a number of federal and state agencies in multimillion dollar contracts. It also helped launch a spy satellite:In 2008, Google helped launch an NGA spy satellite, the GeoEye-1, into space. Google shares the photographs from the satellite with the U.S. military and intelligence communities. In 2010, NGA awarded Google a $27 million contract for “geospatial visualization services.”

There is no doubt that Washington is keeping its eye on antiwar.com and would be happy to see its demise, so it is possible that the AdSense move is meant to help kill the site, but it could be an action by someone who wants to see the site punished for publishing the Abu Ghraib photos. The site could simply appeal the decision or suggest that the ads at the one web page be removed as suggested in a comment. Maybe this will be done after the fund raising campaign has finished.

Michael Moore and Oliver Stone on Wikileaks and Free Speech

Washington - Award-winning documentary maker Michael Moore and film maker Oliver Stone write in the New York Times on WikiLeaks and free speech.

Michael Moore is a well known left-leaning documentary producer and film maker. Many of his documentaries are critical of U.S. policies. "Sicko" berates the United States health care system. Oliver Stone is also a well known film maker with several films on the Vietnam war. In a recent article in the New York Times the two discuss Wikileaks and free speech.

The two praise Wikileaks for having publicly revealed many of the uglier aspects of U.S. government actions. They also praise Ecauador's decision to grant asylum to Julian Assange long associated with Wikileaks.

The article points out that the Wikileaks releases included footage such as the Apache helicopter attack in Baghdad in which a number of civilians seemed to be killed without good reason. Releases also showed some of the details of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars that both the U.S. and other foreign governments would wish to remain hidden. An example that comes to my mind is the revelation that Pakistani authorities agreed to drone strikes.

Another revelation was the U.S. collusion with then President Saleh in Yemen to disguise the fact that the U.S. was responsible for bombing attacks. Leaks also reveal that Obama put pressure on other countries not to prosecute Bush-era officials for torture.

The U.S. response to these revelations, the article claims, has been ferocious. Leaders from both parties have called Assange a type of high-tech terrorist. The California Democrat Dianne Feinstein has demanded he be tried under the Espionage Act. Actually the article mentions only a few aspects of the reaction. Pressure was put on financial institutions to deny Wikileaks services a move that had the effect of drastically reducing donations.

Although Assange has yet to be charged with any crime an international warrant for his arrest was obtained. Assange voluntarily gave himself up but attempts to fight extradition failed.

Assange has asked several times that Swedish authorities come to Britain and question him there. This offer has never been accepted. I really do not understand why. The article mentions that Swedish authorities have traveled other countries on occasion to question suspects. The fact that Sweden insists that Assange travel to Sweden gives some credence to the view that Sweden is simply a way station on the way to facing charges in the U.S. The article points out another fact that points in the same direction.

Assange claims he would travel to Sweden if Sweden promised that it would not extradite Asssange to the U.S. Again, Sweden refuses to make any such commitment. The U.K. also has the power to pledge that Assange would not be extradited to the U.S. and also refuses to pledge this. Ecuador tried to obtain these pledges as a means of resolving the standoff and sending Assange to Sweden.

While officials deny any plan to ask for extradition of Assange a Grand Jury has been empowered in the U.S. and is investigating possible charges to be made against him. Surely this implies that the U.S. wants to gain custody of Assange. Here is a quote from The Age:

However, the Australian embassy in Washington reported in February that "the US investigation into possible criminal conduct by Mr Assange has been ongoing for more than a year".

The embassy noted media reports that a US federal grand jury had been empanelled in Alexandria, Virginia, to pursue the WikiLeaks case and that US government officials "cannot lawfully confirm to us the existence of the grand jury".

Despite this, and apparently on the basis of still classified off-the-record discussions with US officials and private legal experts, the embassy reported the existence of the grand jury as a matter of fact. It identified a wide range of criminal charges the US could bring against Assange, including espionage, conspiracy, unlawful access to classified information and computer fraud.

As with many other actions that the U.S. does not want the public to have any information about such as drone strikes the government refuses to admit or deny the existence of this Grand Jury even though everyone knows that it exists! What is important is not so much the fate of Assange but the fate of organizations who attempt to inform the public about what governments are doing. Governments classify much that is not so much a matter of national security but a matter of misdeeds that the government wants to hide from the public.

Wikileaks wins legal case against credit card company in Iceland

  In Reykjavik the capital of  Iceland, the district court ruled that Valitor, formerly VISA Iceland, violated contract law. The company blocked credit card donations to Wikileaks. The news is reported via Wikileaks Twitter account.
   The court ruled as well that the donation gateway must be again opened within a period of fourteen days. If Valitor fails to comply it will face a fine of $6,200 daily.
    Julian Assange remarked: "This is a significant victory against Washington's attempt to silence WikiLeaks. We will not be silenced. Economic censorship is censorship. It is wrong. When it's done outside of the rule of law its doubly wrong. One by one those involved in the attempted censorship of WikiLeaks will find themselves on the wrong side of history." Iceland generally has supported Wikileaks. The article does not mention legal cases being pursued in other countries but perhaps there are.
   When donors were prevented from making donations through credit cards donations declined by over 95 per cent. In Iceland in June Datacell the Icelandic based company that processes donations for Wikileaks filed a case against Valitor for  "unlawfully suspending financial services".


   Olafur Sigurvinsson director of  Datacell said:. "I can support Al-Qaida, the Ku Klux Klan, buy weapons and drugs and all kinds of porn with my Visa card. There is nobody investigating this, but I cannot support a human rights organisation which is fighting for freedom of expression," One might be charged for some of those actions I expect but his point is no doubt correct. The U.S. government no doubt put considerable pressure on credit card companies not to process donations for Wikileaks.  For more see this article.

Wikileaks founder in hiding..

No doubt authorities would like to question him about his relationship to Bradley Manning who is alleged to have given Wikileaks numerous classified documents. Wikileaks is supposed to release another blockbuster video of an attack last year in Afghanistan but so far it has not appeared. This is from the Washington Post.

Wikileaks founder in hiding, fearful of arrest
Wikileaks founder Julian Assange has gone into hiding, fearful of arrest by U.S. authorities, an Icelandic parliamentarian confirmed Friday.

“He’s just been following events in the U.S., and State Department press conferences and so forth, and they have been trying to get hold of him," Birgitta Jonsdottir, a close supporter of Assange in the Icelandic Parliament, said. “And obviously Julian Assange does not necessarily want to have a chapter written about any leaks.”

Authorities are interested in locating Assange following reports that an Army intelligence analyst, Bradley Manning, recently transferred a huge volume of classified files to Wikileaks. Manning is now in military custody.

Meanwhile, Assange's whereabouts are “a mystery,” Jonsdottir told ABC World News for a segment to be broadcast Friday night, “but we’re in touch every day.”

Asked whether the Wikileaks founder was fearful of arrest, Jonsdottir said, “Yes, very much so.”

Jonsdottir also added to widespread speculation in recent days that Wikileaks was about to release a new video, this once showing an alleged “massacre” of Afghan civilians in a U.S. airstrike.

She called it “worse than the Iraqi one,” referencing the video Wikileaks previously released showing a U.S. helicopter attack on Iraqi citizens that caused an international uproar.

“Hopefully” it will be released “very soon,” Jonsdottir said. “But for security reasons we choose not to give the exact time when we expect to publish it.”

“We’ll see what happens,” she said, “but something’s coming soon.”

In a recent e-mail to supporters, Assange said “the Garani massacre, which we are still working on, killed over 100 people, mostly children.”

Jonsdottir said the Icelandic Parliament last night “unanimously” passed legislation that would create an “international safe haven” for national security whistleblowers.

Wikileaks wants U.S. to stop spying on its operations

Given that it is regarded as a threat by the U.S. government it is unlikely that this will happen. More likely the site will go broke first! The founder is trying to make Iceland a base for investigative journalism. That would be a great step forward. This is from rawstory.

Whistleblower site demands that US ’stop spying’ on its operations

By Muriel Kane


In an extraordinary editorial, the whistleblower site WikiLeaks has demanded that the United States "stop spying" on its operations.

"Over the last few years, WikiLeaks has been the subject of hostile acts by security organizations," founder Julian Assange writes. "We've become used to the level of security service interest in us and have established procedures to ignore that interest. But the increase in surveillance activities this last month, in a time when we are barely publishing due to fundraising, are excessive."

On Tuesday evening, followers of the WikiLeaks Twitter feed were startled to read, "WikiLeaks is currently under an aggressive US and Icelandic surveillance operation." This was followed a few minutes later by "If anything happens to us, you know why: it is our Apr 5 film. And you know who is responsible." A succeeding message warned, "We have airline records of the State Dep/CIA tails. Don't think you can get away with it. You cannot. This is WikiLeaks."

Friday's editorial finally fills in the background of those cryptic messages. Assange apparently believes that his group is under close surveillance by US intelligence because of its planned release of "a classified U.S. military video showing civilian kills by U.S. pilots" under the command of General David Petraeus.

Most of the incidents that he cites, however, have occurred in Iceland, where WikiLeaks representatives have been holding discussions with members of the Icelandic parliament about the possibility of turning that nation into a haven for investigative journalism.

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"We have discovered half a dozen attempts at covert surveillance in Reykjavik both by native English speakers and Icelanders," Assange writes. "On the occasions where these individuals were approached, they ran away. One had marked police equipment and the license plates for another suspicious vehicle track back to the Icelandic private VIP bodyguard firm Terr."

Assange also notes that when he flew from Iceland to Norway last week to speak at an investigative journalism conference, "two individuals, recorded as brandishing diplomatic credentials checked in for my flight at 12:03 and 12:06 under the name of 'US State Department'. The two are not recorded as having any luggage."

In addition, "a WikiLeaks volunteer, a minor, was detained by Icelandic police on a wholly insignificant matter. Police then took the opportunity to hold the youth over night, without charge--a highly unusual act in Iceland. The next day, during the course of interrogation, the volunteer was shown covert photos of me outside the Reykjavik restaurant 'Icelandic Fish & Chips', where a WikiLeaks production meeting took place on Wednesday March 17--the day before individuals operating under the name of the U.S. State Department boarded my flight to Copenhagen."

It is important to note that there has so far been no outside confirmation of Assange's charges, and the Icelandic government has already denied his suggestion that it might be aiding in the surveillance. According to IceNews, "An assistant to the Minister of Justice said the ministry and its staff would like to distance themselves from the Wikileaks editor’s allegations and said that any such action, if it took place, would have been a police matter." The Reykjavik chief of police, however, insists "that Icelandic police have not been working with the American secret services."

The Australian-born Assange launched WikiLeaks in January 2007, and it has been a thorn in the side of governments ever since. In late 2008, for example, Raw Story reported on an attempt by the German intelligence service to force WikiLeaks to remove files revealing its bungled false flag operation in Kosovo.

Two years ago, Wired.com reported, "When online troublemaker Julian Assange co-founded Wikileaks, the net's premiere document-leaking site last year, some were skeptical that the service would produce anything of interest. Now, after 18 months of publishing government, industry and military secrets that have sparked international scandals, led to takedown threats and briefly gotten the site banned in the United States, Assange says Wikileaks is just getting started changing the world."

Last week, Wikileaks released a March 2008 document (pdf) suggesting that the United States was concerned about "the possibility that current employees or moles within DoD or elsewhere in the U.S. government are providing sensitive or classified information to Wikileaks.org" and was considering an attempt to "damage or destroy" the site by exposing or taking legal action against its sources.

The introduction to the document comments dryly that "as two years have passed since the date of the report, with no WikiLeaks’ source exposed, it appears that this plan was ineffective." If Assange's current charges are justified, however, it would seem that the US government has continued to regard WikiLeaks as a genuine threat -- one which might be intensified if Assange's hopes to establish a "journalism haven" in Iceland are realized.

"In my role as WikiLeaks editor, I've been involved in fighting off more than 100 legal attacks over the past three years," Assange wrote last month. "To do that, and keep our sources safe, we have had to spread assets, encrypt everything, and move telecommunications and people around the world to activate protective laws in different national jurisdictions. We've become good at it, and never lost a case, or a source, but we can't expect everyone to make such extraordinary efforts."

"That's why I'm excited about what is happening in Iceland, which has started to see the world in a new way after its mini-revolution a year ago," he continued. "Not surprisingly, the foreign press has developed an interest in the proposal. All over the world, the freedom to write about powerful groups is being smothered. Iceland could be the antidote to secrecy havens, rather it may become an island where openness is protected -- a journalism haven.