

Sex, Lies and Julian Assange - Matti
http://www.abc.net.au/4corners/stories/2012/07/19/3549280.htm

======
chrisacky
Just read the article (it takes about 30 minutes). This was the best account
that I've read of the entire situation and has now educated me on to the
"dragnet" that surrounds Julian Assange.

The TL;DR summary is that everything points to Sweden having being coerced at
every juncture (by the US), and the Swedish police failing constantly.

\----------------

I'd never actually been clear on what the "sexual assault/rape/molestation"
charges were with Assange, but from the transcript, these charges were filed
after two women Anna Ardin and Sofia Wilen went to the police to seek advice
if they could compel Assange to take a STD test since they did not use a
condom during sex.

It's unclear from the transcript, but from what I have read, these two women
knew that he was sleeping with both of them. Both of the women went to the
Klara police station in central Stockholm, however, it is mentioned that Ardin
had gone along primarily to support Wilen.

Ardin had been frequently in the company of Assange. She had previously
described him as such a "cool man" (Twitter). They also arrived and left
together at a Crayfish party (equivalent of a cocktail party). Ardin was
sharing accomodation with Assange and had refused an offer from someone else
for temporary accomodation.

The day after the accusation of rape and molesation Ardin sent a SMS saying :
"I've just spent some time with the coolest people in the world".

SMS text messages were also exchanged between Sofia and Ardin, which showed
that the two of them knew of the relationship between each other and Assange.

Ardin responded to a friend who was looking for Assange : "He's not here. He's
planned to have sex with the cashmere girl every evening, but not made it.
Maybe he finally found time yesterday?"

The Swedish police, totally railroaded the investigation. Interviews have been
leaked with Assange, and Wilen commented _initially_ "that she became so
distraught she refused to give any more testimony and refused to sign what had
been taken down.".

Assange went freely for interview to the police station and was released
without immediate charge, and was free to travel. Almost immediately there
after, another warrant was issued for his arrest.

Eventually, it was also upgraded to a "Red Notice". To put it into context, a
red notice for such a trivial charge with a previously willful and responsive
person is unusual.

> The president of Syria does not have a Red Notice alert. Gaddafi in Libya,
> at the same time Julian's arrest warrant was issued, was not subject to a
> Red Notice but an Orange Notice. It was an incredibly... it was incredibly
> unusual that a red notice would be sought for an allegation of this kind.

It's alleged (from the transcripts), that Sweden has frankly always been the
United States' lap dog and it's not a matter we are particularly proud of. The
Swedish Government has... essentially, whenever a US official says, "Jump",
the Sweden Government asks, "How high?"

Assange's legal team are clearly trying to point out that US is coercing all
of this behind the scenes so that he can then be extradited from Sweden and
face trial for conspiracy to commit espionage.

> The burden should be on the United States Government to say, "We are not
> planning to prosecute Julian Assange". If they just gave that assurance, I
> can guarantee you that Julian Assange would go to Sweden tomorrow.

~~~
rprasad
> _Eventually, it was also upgraded to a "Red Notice". To put it into context,
> a red notice for such a trivial charge with a previously willful and
> responsive person is unusual._

A "Red Notice" is just an Interpol request for a member country to issue an
arrest warrant for a person wanted in another member country, with the
expectation that the person will be extradited to the country seeking the
arrest. (Interpol does not have the power to issue arrest warrants on its
own.)

~~~
belorn
Interpol requests like that are rare event reserved for server international
crimes. The total number for 2011 was just 7 000 requests, which was
substantial larger than for 2010 which was the year the Julian Assange notice
was requested. To take it into context, a brutal murder where you have
witnesses to it and the murder "suspect" flee the country, you still do not
request a red notice. In the Swedish police words (asked by reporters),
requesting help from Interpol is only done in exceptional cases where such
expenses and laboure can be justified.

------
belorn
Small cited section from the article: "You only need to look at the way that
Red Notices are used around the world. Red Notices are normally the preserve
of terrorists and dictators. The president of Syria does not have a Red Notice
alert. Gaddafi in Libya, at the same time Julian's arrest warrant was issued,
was not subject to a Red Notice but an Orange Notice. It was an incredibly...
it was incredibly unusual that a red notice would be sought for an allegation
of this kind."

And the allegation is accusation of sexually assault of the lowest degree. The
lowest. Accusations. If Anders Breivik fled out of jail from Norway, he would
be unlikely to receive the same high international legal attention that
Assange got. It things like that this that causes people to loose trust in the
legal system, especially the Swedish legal system.

~~~
mootothemax
_Red Notices are normally the preserve of terrorists and dictators._

The Wikipedia page says that red notices are: _Requests (provisional) arrest
of wanted persons, with a view to extradition._ :

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interpol_notice>

From the page, I can't work out what other notice would have been appropriate
in its place. I do, however, have a massive headcold today, so please let me
know if I've missed something obvious :)

~~~
belorn
The appropriate method is to issue an arrest, then using informal channels to
the UK police asking for assistance. Interpol notices are for extreme rare
exceptions. If one would to be used for any common crime where the accused has
left the country, the list would become useless. We would end up with a list
somewhere around 200 000 - 1 000 000 people, not 7,678.

It somewhat like bringing in tanks, bombers, and a nuclear missile in handling
a shop lifter running away from the store. It might work, but appropriate
action it is not. Equal to the law it is clearly not.

------
damian2000
How solid is the claim in this video that US Grand Jury #10GJ3793 is for
wikileaks? FYI there's a link here to something associated with it as well...

[http://www.forbes.com/sites/andygreenberg/2012/07/15/wikilea...](http://www.forbes.com/sites/andygreenberg/2012/07/15/wikileaks-
grand-jury-witness-publishes-first-account-of-prosecutors-questioning/)

------
Draiken
Amazing how legal systems are made to bend at the will of biased government
interests. If the leaks from Assange were from North Korea or any US "enemy",
he'd be getting diplomatic immunity or any other kind of law bending to
protect him. The worst thing is, it's not just the US. The US just has more
power to do so. This world is damned.

------
youngtaff
What all this stuff ignores is that it would easier for the US to get him
extradited from the UK than it would be for them to get him from Sweden.

------
nirvana
The charge is that he had consensual sex with these women and prosecutors
decided it was "rape" because they didn't use protection. Weeks after the
fact, when they wanted him for other reasons. They aren't even claiming that
it wasn't consensual.

Thus the only thing I wonder about this case is how can anyone pretend like
this is a legitimate warrant?

Everyone consented, there was no crime. Forget about who Assange is, or that
this came up after he became very famous, or that the US might be trying to
extradite him. None of that matters- there isn't even an alleged crime
here[1].

[1] I'm using the word "crime" here in the moral sense. There are lots of
things that are not crimes but that are against the law. Since governments are
not beholden to morality, laws that cause the violation of rights are
themselves crimes. So, something simply being illegal doesn't make it a crime.

~~~
michael_nielsen
Please don't write a (top-level) comment if you don't have time to read the
article.

EDIT: The parent comment has now been edited to remove the original starting
sentence: "I don't have 46 minutes to spare on a strong headline, but I will
say this...".

~~~
nirvana
I did read the article. I saw nothing in it that contradicts my position. I
haven't seen any statements from others that contradict my understanding of
the facts.

Your comment doesn't provide me any understanding of your disagreement with my
position.

~~~
michael_nielsen
Your original comment began by stating "I don't have 46 minutes to spare on a
strong headline, but I will say this...".

You have since edited that out. So you appear to have read the article after
writing your comment.

On your last sentence: I didn't comment on your position one way or the other.

