Comment by zahllos | Hacker News Reader

Comment by zahllos | Hacker News Reader

Parent Full thread

> That’s not really how I see it. The case is shocking in that it has revealed that some rights that we thought that we had, cannot be enforced in law.

I don't know what right this is, but in the UK there's no right to do anything with classified information. Directly the opposite: the official secrets act makes it a crime to share it, distribute it, etc. The only real legal option you have if you find some classified information lying on a train (say) is to hand it to the police.

There's no exemption for journalism and it doesn't matter if you have been 'notified' under the act (that just changes the penalties) or if you are British or not (You're on UK soil, UK law applies). Classified information belonging to foreign allied governments would definitely fall under the OSA.

If that's shocking, ok, but that's the law and has been since the last time the OSA was updated.

I am not a lawyer, but I don't think sharing classified information unredacted would count as a political defence in the UK. I suspect that definition refers to political views and activities that don't break UK laws, e.g. I would expect the US would not be allowed to extradite someone purely for their belief that the US should become a communist state. However if they hacked the computers of th US fed, then they'd be fair game.

The treaty itself is problematic and the US recently refused the Saacoolas extradition. So the next time a British citizen is on the line we should refuse as well. But I also agree: this particular case is about the least troubling extradition ever.

It's not supposed to be possible to extradite someone for political crimes, such as espionage. It doesn't matter if the acts in question are considered crimes in the UK. What matters is that the acts are political in nature.

This is a traditional carve-out included in almost every extradition treaty the US has signed for over a hundred years, and it's included in the US-UK extradition treaty. However, the UK court ruled that despite this protection, which is supposed to exist and which is written into the treaty, the UK Parliament has not incorporated the protection into UK law.

So as it stands, the traditional protection against extradition for political crimes no longer exists in the UK, at least for people facing extradition to the US. However, the protection still applies for people facing extradition from the US to the UK, because the treaty has force of law in the US.

Hmmm, I see. I would have considered a political exemption to cover issues of political dissent, but I suspect espionage to be a gray area where it very much depends on political sensitivities. I.e. the US probably wouldn't try to extradite a UK citizen working for the UK intelligence community to not ruffle feathers, and the US simply outright won't extradite its own spies regardless. Sure, probably not fair, but there you are. Assange though is neither a US, nor a UK citizen, has definitely annoyed the US and crucially his acts if committed against the UK would count as crimes locally, which is usually one test for extradition in many treaties (haven't checked if it applies to the UK-US one).

For example, searching around, it looks like the US has asked spies to be extradited before and succeeded: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/10/us/politics/china-spy-esp...

I'm still not sympathetic even if he has a political defence, however. Wikileaks has published at least one classified UK document, which means he can be charged under the OSA in the UK anyway under the onwards disclosure clause (I don't know if they'll do this. Probably not, I would guess, due to lack of evidence. I do know there is a consultation ongoing to revamp the OSA partially in response to Snowden: press: https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-57998950, law commission review: https://www.lawcom.gov.uk/project/protection-of-official-dat... consultation: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/...). I think he would have stood a better chance of avoiding extradition pretty much anywhere else than the UK, including Sweden, which is why I am not sympathetic (if you're going to spit in the eye of the US, the UK is probably not one of the places to be when you do it). I'm also... perplexed, to put it charitably, as to why he'd avoid the Swedish extradition, as I think he would have had a better chance of avoiding extradition from Sweden to the US than the fight he currently has (where he has pretty much zero chance).

> I suspect espionage to be a gray area

Espionage is not a gray area. It is one of the core political crimes.

It should be noted, however, that Assange is not a spy. He's a journalist, and the fact that the US government is trying to redefine journalistic activity as espionage is incredibly alarming.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com