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Comment by Muzza | Hacker News Reader

> Though I back his politics 100%, he has every responsibility to face his accusers in a fair trial.

With Sweden's looney toons laws, I strongly disagree.

This is getting really tired now.

Assange and his legal team have tried every possible angle. Sweden has very different laws to say the US. This is not unexpected. The English courts have determined that Sweden's justice system is fair and balanced. Assange attempted to avoid extradition by arguing Sweden didn't have the right to issue an arrest warrant, not that he was going to get an unfair trial.

This is an act of total desperation. It does nothing to further his innocence. If the US wanted him they would have extradited him from the UK already - Britain has a long history of being more than happy to comply with US extradition requests. It's why Roman Polanski refuses to visit the UK from France.

This is all about accusations of sexual assault and rape which Assange is totally unwilling to face.

Assange stayed in Sweden for 5 weeks to be interrogated and only left Sweden after asking permission to do so from the Swedish Prosecutor.

Saying this is all about avoid accusations of sexual assault seems to contradict the actual facts.

And now they would like him back to ask some more questions.

Assange cannot have his cake and eat it. It is somewhat hypocritical for Assange to seek asylum on the grounds of human rights whilst denying the women who are accusing him of obtaining due process through the law (most countries agree that due process is in itself a fundamental right).

If the prosecution is politically motivated then seeking asylum is appropriate. How do we resolve this question? There are some circumstantial reasons to believe that it is politically motivated. However, we just don't know.

>"We just don't know"

And when faced with insufficient evidence of extraordinary affairs we resort to the status quo: due process in light of a sexual assault charge. The conspiracy theory being invoked is an extraordinary claim requiring extraordinary evidence that has yet to be forthcoming.

Assange hasn't denied Sweden the right to question him, for example, over the phone - they have refused to do so. Why must he be on Swedish soil to answer some questions?

Everything about these allegations are clumsy. While we may never know what has transpired, it should be a wake up call to the legal system - you can't just push the regular processes aside and treat a case exceptionally because the suspect is somewhat of a celebrity. The Swedish legal system has also failed these women, if indeed, they are victims.

When you know that the due process (which involves making sure he doesn't have the ability to later claim that due process wasn't followed) requires an in-person interview, then throwing up platitudes (that you know won't, can't be accepted, but which make you look entirely reasonable) is duplicitous at best.

Point me to any country in the world where a telephone interview of a suspect or person of interest in a crime is an acceptable totality of due process or investigation.

5 weeks is at least 5 times longer than all the time they reasonably needed to ask questions in person. They could still ask questions by phone or email or video.

> Assange cannot have his cake and eat it. It is somewhat hypocritical for Assange to seek asylum on the grounds of human rights whilst denying the women who are accusing him of obtaining due process through the law (most countries agree that due process is in itself a fundamental right).

Not if the law which he is accused of breaking is fucked up (to say the least).

For an individual to be unwilling to face the law in a country they are not a citizen sounds completely rational to me. Even in the US, with a pretty "fair and balanced" legal system by international standards, innocent people still end up in prison for decades, are executed, etc.

Then again, Julian Assange could very well be safe in a Swedish prison, relatively impervious to a drone strike.

For an individual to be unwilling to face the law in a country they are not a citizen sounds completely rational to me

Rational, maybe. Ethical? Not so much. I don't like the idea of a world where people are free to rape and sexually assault with impunity provided that they are not at home.

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