DailyPost 2832
WHAT AN ACTION, WHAT A CASE, WHAT A TRIAL AND WHAT A DEAL!
“Time has made him a martyr.” When asked about his biggest disappointment he said; “learning that even intelligent people can be cowards and courage is much rarer than intelligence.” He is none other than Julian Assange, controversial founder of Wikileaks, who has lived his life on the razor’s edge for the last 14 years, finally to be released as a part of a legal deal. What action did he take which snowballed into a case, becoming a sworn enemy of the American state. What charges have been against him, nature of the trial, without Julian, the accused, never landing on US soil, and finally being freed by a US court in Saipan, North Mariana Islands.
Julian Assange landed in a legal cesspool when in 2010 he released thousands of unredacted US documents on wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. It included the famed footage of a US helicopter firing on civilians. It embarrassed Washington no end. It was also alleged that this act would endanger the lives of US informants and operatives. This led to criminal cases against him. In 2018, US DOJ charged Assange with conspiracy to commit computer intrusion.8 This was in relation to his involvement with Chelsea Manning and Wikileaks. Seventeen additional offences were added in 2019 under US Espionage Act, *totalling to 18 charges.
There were allegations of sexually assaulting two women in Sweden. He claimed it to be politically motivated. But he was not able to challenge Sweden’s international arrest warrant. He found relief from the Ecuadorian government, which provided him political asylum in 2112 in the Ecuador embassy in London, where he lived for 7 years. This was to avoid extradition to Sweden, where he was to be tired in sexual assault case. In April 2019, he was ordered to leave the Ecuadorian embassy for “discourteous and aggressive behaviour.” The British police arrested him inside the embassy. He faced charges for not surrendering to courts for extradition to Sweden. He was found guilty of breaching bail too. Swedish arrest warrant was withdrawn in 2017 and in 2019 Swedish prosecutors dropped investigation in the rape allegation.* Now the extradition to the US also loomed large.*
He was arrested for failing to surrender for which he was sentenced to 50 weeks’ imprisonment. Assange was incarcerated in HM Prison, Belmarsh in London from April 2019 to June 2024. This was the time when the US government’s extradition effort was being contested in British courts. Lots of backroom parleys started in 2022, to end this saga. The present political dispensations in both Australia and the US had a major role to play. It was the executive which showed the way. Silent diplomatic moves made the difference. It led to one of its kind legal deals. As a part of the deal Assange agreed to plead guilty on one of the charges, and America agreed not to push for the other 17. The legal formality was completed recently at US Court in Saipan. Assange could manage a legal shortcut without landing on US soil, seems the long incarceration went in his favour.
JULIAN ASSANGE’S LEGAL SAGA IS ONE OF THE MOST COMPLEX BETWEEN GOVERNMENTS.
Sanjay Sahay
Have a nice evening.