Reading the complaint against him, it's very hard to see how anyone could justify his actions. I'm sure there'll be much posted in this thread shortly though calling him a hero.
Lets assume Sweden drops the rape case against him. Then he would certainly be extradited to the USA. A country where the harshest penalty is the death sentence, a country that imprisons people for life without a due process and a country that tortures its prisoners.
Afaik the rape accusations in Sweden boil down to "he had sex with a woman w/o using a condom", but that could be wrong.
EDIT: Read up on the issue and the accusation is that he had unprotected sex with a woman while she was asleep.
He spent weeks in UK before going to the Ecuadorian Embassy. Why didn't the UK extradit him to the US?
Afaik the rape accusations in Sweden boil down to "he had sex with a woman w/o using a condom",
...while said woman was sleeping, and when the evening before she had categorically refused to have sex without a condom, AFAIK.
Sweden, meanwhile, has a history of black bagging political asylum seekers and illegally handing them over to the CIA.
If I was Assange, I know where I would take my chances.
The one extradition case we have seen play out, to a country famed for its liberal criminal justice policy (Sweden) from a country famed for the rule of law (UK) gave him many opportunities to test the process through the courts. That was even through the European Arrest Warrant process which is supposed to streamline extradition processes.
If, and it is an if, Assange were to be subject to an extradition request from the US he would be able to challenge it through the courts. He wouldn't face the death penalty as European countries don't extradite under those circumstances. Similarly prison conditions can be argued and again European courts can require commitments from the US regarding conditions and treatment before they would approve an extradition.
The Gary McKinnon case is illuminating into the thinking behind extradition from Europe to the US.
Finally it is also worth saying that Assange has probably also shot himself in the foot if he ever did face extradition to the US. He was bailed in the UK (where there is a presumption of bail) and this able to flee to the embassy. If he were arrested again facing extradition to the US he would be much less likely to be granted bail and so unable to claim political asylum on a much more sympathetic case.
It is illuminating about why Assange might feel safe in the UK compared to a country that his own leaks have demonstrated continued to host CIA rendition flights for years after the government said they would stop after being caught illegally black-bagging political asylum seekers and handing them to the CIA.
UK courts actually do stand up against US extradition requests. In Sweden, on the other hand, it is not clear that the government will abide by Swedish law.
So not only would Swedish courts be an appeal process the UK's would as well.
Plus it is worth making the point that it is inconceivable that the USA would "black bag" Assange. Kidnapping a high profile Australian citizen from a European country while he was still being protected by the UK legal system is beyond international incident territory, the repercussions would be immense. If the US wanted to illegally abduct him making him the focus of the international media and several legal systems is a really bad precursor.
If anything they want to put him on trial and make an example out of him, not apply car batteries to him in some Egyptian hell hole. A trial means a legal means of getting him before a US court, which means following established extradition processes.
What is relevant is that there are good reasons why Assange might genuinely believe it likely to happen, which means there is good reason that his asylum in the Ecuadorian embassy was requested in good faith rather than "just" to avoid a Swedish court case with a low risk of conviction and short sentences were he to be convicted (he'd have been out a long time ago if he had been extradited and convicted in Sweden).
If I was from Sweden, went to the US, shoplifted, and got an extradition request because I committed a crime, I would not need to fear for my life nearly as much as Assange needs to. His is the kind of case where he "accidentally" ended up a plane to the US and "accidentally" disappeared after he arrived, and then six months later the FBI say they found his body halfway across the country in a forest mauled to pieces by an "unknown predator".
Frankly, the probability of the USA torturing or executing a celebrity journalist from a Western country isn't particularly high anyway, especially not when it involves extradition from a European country, but of course asking countries to rewrite their statute book to offer him a special personal guarantee it won't happen is a good way of deflecting a rape charge.
Which of the two is known to have continued to cooperate in illegal extradition flights long after its own government told the US to stop it (we know thanks to Wikileaks), and have had a history of illegally black-bagging political asylum seekers and handing them to the CIA to be shipped off and tortured? (that would be Sweden, if it wasn't clear)
> His jurisdiction-hopping simply doesn't square with someone fearing US power rather than Swedish courts (cf. Snowden)
If you are going by this, then it also doesn't make sense that he's prepared to spend years holed up in an embassy to avoid a case based on allegations that 1) has extremely low conviction rates even before considering that at least one of the women is refusing to cooperate with police, 2) where the punishment generally would be much less time than what he's so far spent holed up in an embassy in a relatively low security Swedish prison. If all is above board, then had he returned to Sweden he'd have been free a long time ago.
As I've said many times before before, I don't think that Sweden has been pushed by the US here, but I do think Assange genuinely think they do, and I can see why he'd be worried, especially given the strange behaviour of the prosecutor.
Except that he stayed in Sweden for months knowing there was an investigation against him and being free to leave, then left on the day he was advised they intended to interview him under caution with intent to charge him. The former makes no sense whatsoever if you fear conspiracies to render you to the US. The latter makes a lot of sense if what you're really trying to avoid is a reputation-damaging trial.
And yes, his reputation isn't exactly unblemished, but making the story about conspiracies against him certainly has a lot more appeal to his natural supporters than making the story about that tearful woman opposite him in the courtroom, even if that tearful woman's testimony amounts to nothing.
It's so braindead I can't even begin to respond.
What is braindead about it? Sweden and other EU countries are extremely hesitant when it comes to extradition based on "political crimes", therefore the US prosecutors already changed the inducement to computer fraud etc.
I live in a EU country where our government looks the other way when our citizens are being illegally detained by the CIA. There is at least one case where one of our citizens was tortured for years w/o court date.
When the US found out that he was not a terrorist, they asked our foreign minister what should happen to him. He told them to keep him, so he was tortured for a couple more years.
The whole world looked the other way when the US forced down a diplomatic plane to search for Snowden.
Chelsea Manning was sentenced to a life in prison under circumstances that can't be called due process.
What is so outlandish about thinking that Assange would be extradited?
Conveniently we know of the latter thanks to Wikileaks, seeing as the Swedish government kept quiet about it.
I don't think Assange's case is a US conspiracy, but I also am not that surprised if Assange does genuinely believe it, and the bizarre behaviour of the Swedish prosecutor (which my personal theory is down to domestic politics - both the prosecutor and the appointed attorney for the women have a history of pushing for radical tightening of the application of Swedish laws on rape and sexual abuse) certainly would give him more reason to hold on to such a belief.
Putdowns of the rest of the community are particularly tedious.
Who would you call a hero? Have you watched the Manning videos?
[0] Julian Paul Assange (born 3 July 1971) is an Australian computer programmer, publisher and journalist. He is editor-in-chief of WikiLeaks, an organisation which he founded in 2006. source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Julian_Assange
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/July_12,_2007_Baghdad_airstrik...
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Afghan_War_documents_leak
[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iraq_War_documents_leak
EDIT: s/awarder/awarded
He has evaded prosecution for rape for years
Innocent until proved guilty please, whether you or I like him or not.
Being prosecuted doesn't mean guilty. Calling being questioned being prosecuted isn't that far off the mark. And neither term implies guilt.
Yes, because he has evaded it.
Sexual Assault
They were sitting in bed talking and he took off her clothes. They had sex again and she realised that he had only put the condom over the tip of his penis, but she let it pass.
They went to sleep and she awoke with the sensation of him entering her. She immediately asked 'Are you wearing anything?' and he replied 'You'.
She told him 'You better not have HIV' and he replied 'Of course not'. She felt it was too late, he was already in her so she let him continue, she was too tired to tell him once more, she had been nagging him about using a condom all night.
She never had unprotected sex before. He said he wanted to come inside her, he did not say when he would but he did. A lot leaked out of her afterwards.
She told him 'What if I get pregnant?'. He answered that Sweden is a good place to have kids. She jokingly told him that if she became pregnant he would have to pay her student loans.
On the train to Enköping he had told her that he had slept in Anna Ardins bed after a party. She asked if he had sex with Anna but he said Anna liked girls, that she was a lesbian.
Now she knows that he did the same thing with Anna. She asked him about how many he has had sex with, he responded that he didn't keep count. He said that he had HIV tested himself 3 months earlier and that he had sex with a woman after that and that she was tested and not positive.
She said sarcastic things to him in a joking tone, she believes that she was trying to de-dramatize what had happened, he in turn did not seem to care. When he was told the size of her student loans he said that if he was to pay her loans then she would have to give birth to a baby.
They joked that the child would be named Afghanistan. He also said that he ought to keep abortion-pills with him that would in reality be sugar-pills.
His phone rang and he had a meeting with Aftonbladet (swedish newspaper) on tuesday at 12. She explained that he would not make it to that meeting, so he pushed his whole schedule ahead by one hour.
After that he rode a bicycle with her on the back down to the train station. She paid his ticket to Stockholm. Before they separated he told her to keep her phone on. She asked if he was going to call and he said he would.
She took the bike home, showered and changed sheets. Since she didn't make it in time for work she called in sick and stayed home. She wanted to clean up and wash everything. There was semen on the sheets and she thought it was disgusting. She also went by the drugstore and bought 'dagenefterpiller' (abortion pills).
After she had discussed with her friends she realized that she had been the victim of a crime. She went to Danderyd hospital and from there to Södersjukhuset (another hospital). There she was examined and also tested using a so called 'rape-kit'.
edit: pdf of the original complaint (in swedish): http://www.nnn.se/nordic/assange/docs/memoria.pdf