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Comment by willvarfar | Hacker News Reader

Someone accused of rape should not be given refuge to wait it out.

Its easy for armchair conspiracists to imagine this whole thing an elaborate ruse to extradite Assange to the US, but Assange was being questioned in Sweden before he fled from there and on bail in the UK prior to 'fleeing' to the Ecuadorian embassy. It seems a very roundabout way for the Americans to get at him.

Occams Razor Assange is fleeing justice and abusing the trusting conspiracists trust in promoting the whole American extradition narrative.

PS: so the downvotes roll in :(

Really, are these girls secretly American agents? And the Americans, rather than use two girl agents that had intimate access to Assange, chose to burn them by asking them to escalate to the Police when Assange wouldn't be treated for STDs?

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You're absolutely right, Assange should face his accusers in court. That's obvious. The problem is that Sweden and the UK are complicit in America's desire to seize Assange and put him in prison without even the possibility of a fair trial, and the first step in that process is his extradition to the US from either the UK or Sweden. That is what's interfering with the case and what Assange is fleeing from, not the rape allegation.

If the UK and Sweden were to agree that Assange wouldn't be extradited to the US I imagine he'd be on the next flight to Stockholm. It's the extradition order that's blocking these two women getting justice, not Assange himself.

What extradition order?

The Swedes have asked the UK to extradite him to Sweden.

The US hasn't asked either the UK nor Sweden to extradite him to the US. Is there even a court case against him in the US?

The extradition to the US seems to be Assange's own narrative. Why didn't the US reach out to get him on the streets of London?

The US gov has charges against Assange lined-up. They're just waiting for the opportunity to bring him in.

http://www.mediaite.com/tv/assange-why-is-doj-wikileaks-inve...

I don't think that's true and your link doesn't support there even being any charges against him, let alone there being a plan to extradite.

http://www.svt.se/ug/julian-assange-riskerar-utlamning-till-...

Why would a nation give a warrant for communication data associated with a person, close down that persons bank accounts, and send investigators to interview people close to the person and request evidence? Those are the supporting evidence, and while it doesn't conclusively prove anything, some people would conclude that it is enough to warrant caution.

> The extradition to the US seems to be Assange's own narrative

This is the real issue. Whether or not he would likely be extradited if he were to return to Sweden.

Obviously Assange thinks he will otherwise he would have returned long ago.

If you think he would not be, then that should be the focus of your debate.

If Assange is facing charges in the US (and I don't think there's any evidence he is) then that's his problem. You don't get to avoid prosecution for a crime because it is politically or legally inconvenient for you.

It clearly is his problem, because he's been stuck in the Ecuadorian embassy for years. That sounds like his problem.

> You don't get to avoid prosecution for a crime because it is politically or legally inconvenient for you.

You clearly do, if the alternative for the people who want to prosecute you is to violate international norms and storm an embassy.

> The problem is that Sweden and the UK are complicit

The UK isn't that complicit, because he's been here for a while and the UK has done fuck all.

Since when has "fuck all" cost £10m?

http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-31159594

You prove my point. They spent £10m and he's still here.

If they really wanted him in the US they'd have spent a tenth of that and had him renditioned.

Legally an embassy is a tiny parcel of sovereign land that belongs to the country it's an embassy of, so strictly speaking, he's in Ecuador.

This is not true.

It isn't true because there's no such thing as international law, but it is true because it's a norm.

It's an unrealistic demand, which Assange is fully aware of. The Swedish constitution makes it illegal for politicians to interfer with the judicial system.

Our laws do also, by the way, make it impossible for us to extradite him to the US without the consent of the UK, so it seems awfully convenient that he claims that he would trust an illegal guarantee by the Swedish government but not that it would follow it's own laws. That is, unless the UK is the problem - but then why the hell did he go there in the first place, and stayed there?

This keeps getting claimed. No, Sweden is a sovereign nation and its extradition treaties are bilateral - that means they interpret them as they wish.

If they think the demands for extradition are not fulfilled, they can say so, and that's the final word. There's nothing the US or UK can do but complain, there's no court they can apply to to overrule such a decision (because of course, the UK or US governments would certainly not allow themselves to be overruled by any independent court in a matter like this).

The national courts can overrule the government and say that an extradition is illegal, even if government wants to extradite. But the converse is not true: if the court thinks that an extradition would be permissible, the government can still stop it. They can even promise this beforehand, preempting the need for a court ruling. See sovereignty, again.

At worst this would be "impolite". The government of course loathes to do something like this, because then they have to answer for all the cases they did not intervene in with the courts and the civic service's many rulings. They would like to wash their hands of unpopular decisions. But they do in fact intervene quite a lot.

That the government claims "we must not meddle with the judiciary" as some holy principle is darkly ironic in this case. Because if you don't think it was political that Marianne Ny revived the case after it had been firmly dismissed by the previous prosecutor, how naive are you?

"bilateral" means "interpret as they wish" ?

Basically, yes. Like a gentleman's agreement, there's no one around to interpret it for you or punish you if you "misinterpret" it - other than the other party, obviously.

I don't think that girls are agents, but I definitely believe that US has jumped on the bandwagon as soon the opportunity arose. Remember that prosecutor dismissed the case initially and then changed the mind later (presumably after a phone call from the above)? And all the insisting on him coming personally to Sweden is suspicious. First of all, he's not even officially charged yet, he's just wanted for questioning. Why can't he be questioned in the embassy? Why Sweden needs him personally present? Wouldn't it be logical that after all this time he was tried in absentia, with layers to represent him? Remember that this is Sweden, not US. Even if he gets convicted, he'd probably go away with a suspended sentence, or a few months in super-nice Swedish prison, where he'd probably have better conditions than he has now living in the embassy. Why wouldn't he go for it, serve his time and then walk away as a free man, if it was just that? Makes no sense for him to go through all of this, if the threat is not real...

With your fancy words, you're missing the central point: everybody should be presumed innocent until proven otherwise.

By what process could his guilt possibly be provable if he refuses to leave the embassy?

In most court systems, the defendant is not required to say anything. So (in theory) he can just be tried in absentia. He can even have lawyers representing him.

At least to me (but I'm not a lawyer), the current system violates european human rights. Either he is charged with a crime, in which case the court case should have started years ago (and ended), or he is not officially charged with a crime, in which case he should be free to go where ever he wants until he is charged. The current situation is absurd.

He is free to go wherever he wants until he is charged. It's just that if he goes outside the Ecuadorian embassy, he will be charged.

IANAL, and I'm definitely not current on how the Scandinavian legal system works. I'm hoping someone can summarize this:

Why can't he be charged while he's still in the Embassy?

I understand that enforcing any judgement rendered by a court becomes a hang up because of his asylum, but that's a separate concern.

Because in Sweden, procedurally, you do not get charged until you are in custody. Largely because they don't want to make it a separate concern as you put it.

I'm my opinion this goes against european human rights. As soon as Sweden asked for him to be extradited from England, the clock starts ticking. After two years, they violated his right to a speedy trail and he is free to go.

I'm really sad that his hasn't gone to the European Court of Human Right to decide against Sweden (or England, because it is actually England that is keeping him locked up).

Note that I do not have a high opinion of Assange, and it is quite possible that according to Swedish law he did rape those women. But he should have been entitled to a trial in absentia.

So if as a regular citizen I commit 2 rapes (and they know who I am) if I am able to disappear for 2 years, then I'm free? That's convenient.

Nope. At least in Sweden you have to disappear for 10 years.

So he only has another 4 years to go

No, you get convicted in absentia (assuming there is enough evidence that you did it) and then you are essentially forever a wanted criminal who still has to do some jail time.

Rather extradited – to Sweden or the US, the latter maybe via Sweden … that seems to be the real issue, not the rape accusations (although rape accusations are known as a powerful weapon to destroy enemies – although that does of course not rule out that Assange is actually a rapist under Swedish law).

I think it's quite difficult to sustain the argument that the rape accusations aren't the real issue when he's twice fled jurisdiction on the day it became certain he would be charged with rape if he didn't. If the US had wanted to try to extradite him through legal means, the US had ample opportunity to arrange it during the period Assange was calmly reporting to the UK police every day whilst his legal team tried to thwart the European Arrest Warrant on technical grounds. If they wanted to try to extradite him through illegal means they could have done so at many points during Assange's life and a high profile court case would actually be a major inconvenience.

Fleeing at convenient timing is evidence that the threat of getting arrested and extradited was real. It says nothing about the validity of the sexual assault claims.

Not relevant, because he doesn't.

He refuses to go anywhere that makes him extraditable to the US. The Swedish, in turn, say roughly "our general rules are such that we can't guarantee that, and an exception isn't practically possible". Which makes sense, it's arguably better to have plain and simple rules than ones that cover every last edge case.

Personally, I think the Swedish should bend their laws. Globalisation is proceeding, and I think there'll be more country-straddling cases in the next century than there were in the past century. If that assumption is correct, writing rules to cover stances like Assange's is more reasonable than it has been.

Sweden shouldn't have to bargain or compromise with someone accused of a crime just because that person is picky about what countries they set foot in for their own reasons.

IF there are US charges against him and IF the US tries to extradite then I'm sure he'll have an opportunity to fight it.

Can you suggest that as a general principle?

The current rules for extradition do have their reasons. You may not want Germany to be able to enforce its strict rules about nazi speech all over the world, or Turkey to be able to imprison people who've offended Erdogan.

Haggling over extradition is not unusual. For example, the US has promised not to use capital punishment in order to extradite people from countries that forbid capital punishment.

There is no request for extradition over which anyone could haggle. There is no concrete evidence that the US is going to make such a request.

If there would be a request, as you say yourself, Sweden doesn't necessarily have to honor it, for example if Assange faces capital punishment. Assange could probably fight extradition in court also.

In any case this is nothing here to suggest that this is anything more than a smokescreen thrown up by Assange to distract from the fact that he's a rapist fleeing prosecution.

Sweden asked Britain to extradite him, and Assange is haggling: "I'll come if you'll let me go wherever I please afterwards". That "if" may be insincere but IMO it counts as haggling.

> Sweden shouldn't have to bargain or compromise with someone accused of a crime just because that person is picky about what countries they set foot in for their own reasons.

What is your opinion about what countries should or should not have to do based on? Your feelings about countries in general, or a specific empathy for Sweden?

> IF there are US charges against him and IF the US tries to extradite then I'm sure he'll have an opportunity to fight it.

You're absolutely sure? Why haven't you called Assange yet? I'm sure he'd be happy to know what you know.

There is no way to prove someone's guilt unless he's in Guantanamo? Every day HN teaches me stuff.

Leaving aside the contempt for your own professed ideal demonstrated by the implicit suggestion that the complainants are guilty of perjury, wouldn't it be nice if we had some sort of mechanism, oh, say, call it a court, we could use to assess against a legal standard of guilt?

Oh wait, there is. But Assange has chosen to (illegally) run away from a valid investigation.

If you want to discredit someone publicly, publish articles of him with connection to keywords "rape" and "child pornography". Then let the media do its own work.

Are you saying that rape should not have any statute of limitations, that extradition should work worldwide and unconditionally, both, or neither?

It is possible to be in favour or at least not opposed to a statute of limitations and think that this statute shouldn't apply in this case.

Many countries don't have statutes of limitations. The UK certainly doesn't have a statute of limitation on rape (recent celebrity controversies passim).

Right of political asylum is a tricky concept. Such persons are indeed protected by one legal system from the prosecution from an other legal system. Neither system are required by international standard to back off, but tax payers of both systems are paying for it and thus has some right to question the sanity of it.

As for armchair Occams Razor/conspiracists theorist, the published line of events goes as:

First month in Sweden. Initial questioning only, followed by conversations between lawyer and prosecutor. Assange explicit asked if he could leave the country and got "yes" back. While in UK he had a previous schedule talk in Sweden which got suddenly surrounded by a massive police force. Following this was the international arrest order.

So I ask, what secretly American agents? What elaborate ruse? A ordinary investigation suddenly jumped from "this is barely worth anyones time" to "international arrest warrant and massive police forces". Assange theory is that an external diplomatic force, ie US, meddled with the investigation. The other theory being presented is that this unprecedented chain of events is just normal procedure.

You're attacking strawmen. People are free to believe whether Sweden/Assange have ulterior motives, but either way the Swedish prosecutor has behaved improperly. For example see the UN report here: http://www.ohchr.org/EN/NewsEvents/Pages/DisplayNews.aspx?Ne...

It's a bit of a stretch to claim Sweden is illegally detaining him in the embassy by virtue of demanding he leave the embassy.

That's a UN group of legal experts disagreeing with you.

No. Anyone can be accused of rape, accusations should not matter.

Accusations should be investigated by the justice system, not dismissed just because the person is famous.

They should face those accusations by being interviewed by the persecutor, and if the prosecutor believes there is a case to answer, they should face those accusations in court.

The Swedish police have had the option to interview Assange in London for three years, all expenses paid. They have chosen instead to temporize and delay, and thereby leave the investigation without closure. Note that the Swedish police have conducted foreign interviews in the past, but for some reason seem intent on drawing out this particular process.

They've asked to, multiple times. The Ecuadorian embassy won't let them.

"Last month, Ecuador’s prosecutor-general rejected a previous request from the Swedish prosecutor to question Assange in London. That office, in a letter to Swedish authorities, said it will interview Assange and asked for a list of questions the Swedish prosecutor wants the Ecuadorian prosecutor to ask the Wikileaks founder."

(http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2016/02/swe...)

It seems they've finally come to an agreement that looks acceptable to both Ecuadorian and Swedish courts. Provisionally the date has been set for Oct 17th.

They have only asked once, and prior to that they left the offer open for two years. The Ecuadorian prosecutor has every right to intercede in the matter, especially if he is uncertain of the security situation. Interviews by proxy have also been used by Swedish authorities in the past.

Ecuador did not refuse. They are the ones who wanted Assange to be questioned in the embassy in the first place. But obviously there is a procedure for this to happen, and as another commenter says, a date has now been set. The Swedes, after years of refusing to come to London to question Assange, finally agreed after the UN ruled that Assange's stay is arbitrary detention and criticised Sweden for its handling of the case.

http://johnpilger.com/articles/freeing-julian-assange-the-la...

Suppose that you're accused of a crime in North Korea and somehow you manage to escape the country.

Will you still respect what you said in the comment and return to NK to stand trial ?

Replace North Korea with Iran, Iraq, Syria or any other country known to be a corrupt or totalitarian state...

Aka at least half of all the countries in the world...

As a foreigner, you wouldn't trust the justice system in those countries and you would be right to try to avoid the trial.

So you see, the validity of what you said depends a lot on the context.

Even if the Swedish investigation and the trial is totally fair, it is not really the issue.

The issue is the extradition treaty with the US - Sweden will have to make a choice - Assange or good relations with the U.S.

And this is were the deadlock is. Go to Sweden and get unfairly convicted (low probability) or get extradited to the US and get life in prison (high probability). Or both.

Sweden is not North Korea and countries don't extradite to the US all the time because the US justice system is atrocious by first world standards.

Should a Swedish court rule against extraditing Assange to the US, that will have exactly no impact on the relationship between the US and Sweden. No government can reasonably expect from another to break its own laws and it is certainly not in US interest for Sweden to go down that route. Not to mention that the US also reserves the right not to extradite to Sweden in individual cases.

> No government can reasonably expect from another to break its own laws and it is certainly not in US interest for Sweden to go down that route.

I feel and respect your desire for and belief in integrity on the part of the system, but it's extremely naive to believe that.

Maybe it's the fact that I've lived in many different cultures (including Sweden for a year btw!) or maybe it's my age, but what I've taken away from life so far is this:

There's the story which all people (should) believe and then there's the shit that happens.

We're being lied to since we're born - santa claus, tooth fairy, God, then justice, patriotism, news, terrorism, traitors and so on.

Wikileaks is one of the tools which shows us a glimpse of the shit that really happens.

Corruption, under-the-table deals, intimidations - including members of foreign governments, illegal detentions of foreign citizens, surveillance..

Always treat 'the System' with healthy skepticism - and that is because the information that it broadcasts is often false - due to incompetence on the part of the 'reporters' (usually) or due to hidden agendas that so many groups have.

The world is a combination of many chess games played at the same time - in some you're a pawn, in some you're a rook, in some you're the board ;).

What? Of course it has to be investigated if it's a credible accusation.

There's a well established process for determining guilt or innocence, but it involves showing up for your court dates.

> but it involves showing up for your court dates

Some countries, especially in the Civil Law area allow sentences in absentia.

There is a difference between an arrest warrant (häktning) and accusation (misstänkt).

Not guilty until proven?

And the stay at the embassy is for political reasons – and like a prison sentence (in a civilized country where prison sentences are about the loss of freedom and not the loss of living as a human being).

Definitely not guilty until proven but at the same time we have a duty to respect the legal process unless there is something truly amiss. So far I remain unconvinced by the arguments that he's fleeing persecution.

> Not guilty until proven?

There was no assumption of guilt in the parents post. There's an open accusation and it's absolutely normal that people get arrested for rape accusations. Rape is a serious crime and needs to be prosecuted.

The stay at the embassy is self-inflicted. Nobody but Assange chose to violate the conditions of his bail. Assange still is master of his own destiny and could end this at any point. He also enjoys a lot of freedoms that actual prisoners often do not enjoy, among them using the internet. Equating his self-chosen recluse with a prison sentence is unfair to all actual prisoners.

I find few reasons to disagree with you, especially the possible Internet access is a very important point. Thanks!

http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/julian-assange-affidavit-states-rap...

As I had recalled earlier there was some damning evidence, if true, supporting the case that it is a conspiracy.

Supposedly the girls had denied rape allegations but later retracted or removed traces of the denials.

> there was some damning evidence, if true, supporting the case that it is a conspiracy

The evidence is an affidavit from Assange himself. Not many people would consider an affidavit from the accused "damming".

> Not many people would consider an affidavit from the accused "damming".

That's a kind way of saying "about as reliable as the idea Reiser was framed by the Russian mob."

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