
UN special rapporteur on torture on his investigation into the case of Assange - rendall
https://www.republik.ch/2020/01/31/nils-melzer-about-wikileaks-founder-julian-assange
======
rendall
I can't really understand how someone could read the article and not be moved
and chilled. Can someone who persecutes Assange please really just, here,
anonymously if you must, please make a case for doing this. You think it's ok
to do this... why? What is the end goal? No one can report governmental
crimes? That's the world you want, for you and your family?

~~~
openasocket
I don't support the behavior alleged in this article, but I do genuinely
believe Wikileaks was acting very unethically. It's one thing to release
classified documents describing corruption or illegal/immoral behavior by the
government, it's another to blindly release any classified documents you can
get your hands on without any concern for others. In one dump of classified
documents on the War in Afghanistan, it included the identities of many
civilians assisting the US military. Those named have since been targeted by
the Taliban. And this is a consistent pattern. Their leaks routinely include
social security numbers, credit card numbers, private medical information, the
list goes on. That information is not in the public interest and has caused
great harm to innocent people. And I'm hardly alone in saying this. Edward
Snowden, the Sunlight Foundation, and Amnesty International have criticized
this practice.

EDIT: Quoting from Assange's indictment:

"After agreeing to receive classified documents from Manning and aiding,
abetting, and causing Manning to provide classified documents, the superseding
indictment charges that Assange then published on WikiLeaks classified
documents that contained the unredacted names of human sources who provided
information to United States forces in Iraq and Afghanistan, and to U.S. State
Department diplomats around the world. These human sources included local
Afghans and Iraqis, journalists, religious leaders, human rights advocates,
and political dissidents from repressive regimes. According to the superseding
indictment, Assange’s actions risked serious harm to United States national
security to the benefit of our adversaries and put the unredacted named human
sources at a grave and imminent risk of serious physical harm and/or arbitrary
detention."

~~~
chrismeller
Sooo... the guys he was leaking evidence of war crimes against claim that he
endangered people he leaked information about.

While that may actually be true, I’m curious why you would trust that
statement from the US Government (the “indictment”) while ignoring the other
(that’s “classified”).

If you trust that there’s doubt as to why things were classified and that they
may have been hiding things, why would you also trust that they claim people
have been endangered? Again, not saying it’s not true, just that blindly
taking the word of US prosecutors seems short sighted.

~~~
darawk
Nobody is trusting anything. It should be obvious that these leaks endangered
these people. All you have to do is look at them to see that. If you publish
the names of civillian collaborators with the US, they're going to get
targeted. You don't need classified intel to know that.

~~~
4bpp
I made this point in a more lengthy fashion in a parallel comment [0], but it
seems really odd to me you would ignore the circumstance that the lion's share
of the work towards endangering those civilians was done by the US, by
recruiting them to be collaborators in a hostile country. Why does the US
government have more moral license to endanger Afghan civilians than
Assange/Wikileaks?

[0]
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22205463](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22205463)

~~~
darawk
The US government decision to invade Afghanistan involved a number of other
factors. Whether or not you agree with that calculation is subjective. The
difference between that and what Assange did is that Wikileaks could have
taken the time to redact these names, as they were immaterial to the point
they were trying to make.

If this was a tradeoff between "not expose abuses by the US government" and
"name these civillians", I think your point would be reasonable. But there was
no tradeoff. Wikileaks was just lazy about it.

~~~
missosoup
Wikileaks asked the DoD to help redact the documents. DoD refused and later
put out a statement claiming that Assange lied about asking for help. This
statement was shown to be false.

Due to the limited time window for release, the choice was either to release
as-is or to never release at all.

Calling Wikileaks lazy is myopic. They didn't have the resources to redact the
documents in the time window they had to work with, and they asked for help.
The US govt knew exactly what would happen if they refused to help. It was a
calculated move to maximise collateral damage and help drive the narrative
that you now subscribe to. They didn't give a single fuck about the collateral
damage, their response was focused on discrediting and prosecuting the source
of the leak to send a message to anyone else considering exposing their
wrongdoings.

The US govt acted like a bunch of insidious cartoon villains, and gaslighting
its citizens about how this situation played out.

------
korethr
Let's assume that the general impugning of Assange's character over the past
years is true. Let us further assume that the statement made by one of the
comments below, that the completely unredacted nature of Wikileaks' releases
is irresponsible and unnecessarily puts others in danger.

Even with all that, the events described in this article make me deeply
uncomfortable. I don't have to like Assange to think that this kind of thing
sets a dangerous precedent. When criminal prosecution is a thing for "the
little people" and a tool twisted to dispose of those inconvenient to those in
power, that is the kind of injustice which fuels riots and revolutions. I
really don't want it to have to come to violence to stop corruption; that will
just as likely end badly for all involved.

------
simion314
A short summary for the people that won't read and just want to comment, UN is
not demanding freedom for Assange, they want the human rights to be respected
and all the illegalities committed so far by authorities are exposed.

I see some people debating if Assange is guilty of X or Y but the main point
is that he did not had and will not have a fair trial.

~~~
clSTophEjUdRanu
Can someone explain how Assange's trial is unfair when it hasn't taken place
yet?

~~~
abdullahkhalids
> He will not receive a trial consistent with the rule of law. That’s another
> reason why his extradition shouldn’t be allowed. Assange will receive a
> trial-by-jury in Alexandria, Virginia – the notorious «Espionage Court»
> where the U.S. tries all national security cases. The choice of location is
> not by coincidence, because the jury members must be chosen in proportion to
> the local population, and 85 percent of Alexandria residents work in the
> national security community – at the CIA, the NSA, the Defense Department
> and the State Department. When people are tried for harming national
> security in front of a jury like that, the verdict is clear from the very
> beginning. The cases are always tried in front of the same judge behind
> closed doors and on the strength of classified evidence. Nobody has ever
> been acquitted there in a case like that. The result being that most
> defendants reach a settlement, in which they admit to partial guilt so as to
> receive a milder sentence.

~~~
ithkuil
That sounds interesting. Can you provide some links to more in-depth
information about the use of Alexandria, Virginia and the skewed jury
composition? I tried to Google a bit but so far was unable to find much more
than just news snippets mentioning a few high profile intelligence related
trials that reference said court. Am I just unlucky?

------
Synaesthesia
Sad day when torture by the west of a journalist goes uncondemned. This guy is
a hero, he has committed no crime other than honest reporting.

~~~
DavidVoid
>This guy is a hero, he has committed no crime other than honest reporting.

Just because you like his reporting doesn't mean he's innocent of any crimes
he's been accused of, especially not when those crimes are unrelated to his
reporting.

That's like saying Kobe Bryant was innocent of sexual assault just because he
was a great basketball player.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kobe_Bryant_sexual_assault_cas...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kobe_Bryant_sexual_assault_case)

~~~
cassianoleal
The UN Special Rapporteur on Torture interviewed for the article makes a
pretty convincing picture that Assange was unlikely guilty of any of the
crimes he's been accused of. He also makes it quite clear that he didn't think
of himself to be above the law, having tried to submit himself to the justice
system on several occasions.

~~~
Fjolsvith
> The UN Special Rapporteur on Torture interviewed for the article makes a
> pretty convincing picture that Assange was unlikely guilty of any of the
> crimes he's been accused of.

Then if he's not guilty, let it be shown so at trial, and not at the say of
the UN Special Rapporteur on Torture.

~~~
tremon
That's not how it works. Do we need to establish a trial before we can show
your innocence in this case too?

If he is guilty, then let it be shown so at trial. In absence of such a trial,
he is not guilty. But such a trial will not happen, and was probably never
intended to happen. Yet it shows how effective the media campaign against him
has been:

 _The Swedish state spent almost a decade intentionally presenting Julian
Assange to the public as a sex offender. Then, they suddenly abandoned the
case against him on the strength of the same argument that the first Stockholm
prosecutor used in 2010, when she initially suspended the investigation after
just five days_

------
tremon
_Four democratic countries joined forces – the U.S., Ecuador, Sweden and the
UK – to leverage their power to portray one man as a monster so that he could
later be burned at the stake without any outcry. The case is a huge scandal
and represents the failure of Western rule of law. If Julian Assange is
convicted, it will be a death sentence for freedom of the press._

------
at_a_remove
You know, every time I read something on Assange, I see all of these hot takes
based on incorrect information and part of me is starting to think that one
should have to take some kind of quiz on the actual facts of the case and
receive a passing grade before commenting.

The other part of me is kind of impressed on the hatchet job done on his
reputation that has led to such conveniently incorrect "knowledge" of the
situation.

~~~
nsajko
I think you have to give an example now.

~~~
theobeers
One clear example is the idea that Assange tried to evade the Swedish justice
system in the rape case. This is taken for granted by many people. But it
turns out to be totally false—unless Melzer is lying about the documentation
that he’s seen.

------
yesenadam
"...if investigative journalism is classified as espionage and can be
incriminated around the world, then censorship and tyranny will follow. A
murderous system is being created before our very eyes. War crimes and torture
are not being prosecuted. YouTube videos are circulating in which American
soldiers brag about driving Iraqi women to suicide with systematic rape.
Nobody is investigating it. At the same time, a person who exposes such things
is being threatened with 175 years in prison. For an entire decade, he has
been inundated with accusations that cannot be proven and are breaking him.
And nobody is being held accountable. Nobody is taking responsibility. It
marks an erosion of the social contract. We give countries power and delegate
it to governments – but in return, they must be held accountable for how they
exercise that power. If we don’t demand that they be held accountable, we will
lose our rights sooner or later. Humans are not democratic by their nature.
Power corrupts if it is not monitored. Corruption is the result if we do not
insist that power be monitored."

~~~
nonbirithm
> YouTube videos are circulating in which American soldiers brag about driving
> Iraqi women to suicide with systematic rape.

Is there a citation for this? All I could find was allegations of sexual
assault in the US military (which is also completely horrendous), but no
videos on YouTube.

~~~
tyingq
There are many, just a Google search away from "Iraq rape us military".

Here is one:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mahmudiyah_rape_and_killings](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mahmudiyah_rape_and_killings)

~~~
nsajko
This case was prosecuted, with convictions; but Melzer says "Nobody is
investigating it.".

I am not saying he is wrong, but he seems to be in the habit of casting
aspersions without giving examples.

------
lolc
Shameful. A damning verdict on the state of due process! If you work in the
exposed institutions, please help restore legitimacy by aiding discovery in
any way you can.

Thank you Nils Melzer for investigating the persecution of Julian Assange, a
messenger being murdered. We owe our freedom to people who dare speak truth in
the face of torture.

~~~
contingencies
Well put.

------
hendi_
German version: [https://www.republik.ch/2020/01/31/nils-melzer-spricht-
ueber...](https://www.republik.ch/2020/01/31/nils-melzer-spricht-ueber-
wikileaks-gruender-julian-assange)

------
shadowgovt
It's weird that the UN special rapporteur considers the process in a large,
high-visibility, international legal case to be torture. His explanation of
the torture Assange has suffered basically sems to sum up to massive anxiety
brought about by the uncertainty of the process. That makes sense (the process
is ill-defined and where the law draws lines here is up for debate), but by
that definition isn't every prisoner awaiting their day in court on serious
charges being "tortured?"

~~~
SalientBlue
>On top of that come the surveillance measures, the insults, the indignities
and the attacks by politicians from these countries, up to and including death
threats. This constant abuse of state power has triggered serious stress and
anxiety in Assange and has resulted in measurable cognitive and neurological
harm.

>Why is a man who is neither dangerous nor violent held in solitary
confinement for several months when UN standards legally prohibit solitary
confinement for periods extending beyond 15 days?

It is much more than 'uncertainty of the process'. Every prisoner awaiting
their day in court is not held in solitary confinement for months.

~~~
shadowgovt
The death threats from politicians are individual American Congesspeople, who
have no more power to act on that threat than the average American citizen.
It's a threat that's worth taking about as seriously as any random online
post.

------
nsajko
This Melzer guy is doing journalism no favor by spinning narratives of
malicious prosecution by Sweden by taking things out of context and without
any evidence.

Also, he seems to be wrong about "manipulation of evidence" by Swedish police:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22204121](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22204121)

~~~
usdgknsdg
> Also, he seems to be wrong about "manipulation of evidence" by Swedish
> police:
> [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22204121](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22204121)

If you trust claims of a more or less random person writing a comment on this
site.

------
ogre_codes
It is really hard at this point to come away from reading anything about
Assange or Snowden at this point and not feel you are being manipulated in
some way or another. None of the agencies which are involved are beyond
suspect, nor are Assange or Snowden without major faults/ issues.

About the only really clear winner in this whole disaster is Russia.
Regardless of how this all plays out and what people believe, the US looks
like shit here (to a large extent rightfully) and they walked away with piled
of top secret and confidential US information.

This is perhaps the greatest espionage victory since WWII and it was largely
self-inflicted.

~~~
jessaustin
Or, you know, we could have just _not_ murdered lots of innocent people...

------
nsajko
It is really absurd how quickly rational comments on this thread that do not
support the "Assange and everybody who supports him is an infallible saint and
all the world's judicial systems, governments and press are in league to get
them" narrative get downvoted to the bottom.

See
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22204566](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22204566)
and
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22204121](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22204121)
, for example.

~~~
rendall
nsajko, I do see you're getting downvoted pretty bad. I'm sorry to see it.

I think that it may be because your posts don't address the specific points
made in the article, and in fact repeat insinuations that the Rapporteur
specifically addresses and debunks.

For instance, you say _... Assange is not above the law, or common decency,
just because of founding Wikileaks..._

Literally no one said that, and no one reasonable believes that. That's not
what this is about. The article makes the case that Assange is not guilty of
_anything_ under Swedish law. If you were to say, rather, "Despite what the
Rapporteur says, Assange is likely guilty because..." and then lay out an
excellent case why he is indeed, you would get up-voted, not downvoted.

But instead, your posts come off like you just have an ax to grind against
Assange and people who support him. It comes off like you're dismissing the
entire concern as invalid "because Assange is not above the law".

The people here are smart, engineer-types. They're going to look at evidence
and make up their own minds.

My 2¢ Good luck.

------
Traster
>Assange who is being persecuted. Second, he himself has been ill-treated to
the point that he is now exhibiting symptoms of psychological torture.

And then

>In summary: Julian Assange uncovered torture, has been tortured himself

This is one of the reasons I don't trust this rapporteur, because he seems to
make those claims interchangeably when they very clearly aren't the same
thing. Can you show signs of psychological torture without someone actually
torturing you? Yes. So either make the real claim - that someone has been
torturing him and explain why. Or make the PR claim - that he has shown
symptoms of psychological torture. But don't swing back and forth between two
very different things.

The guy literally repeats thoroughly debunked tropes from Assange's defence.

>Why would a person be subject to nine years of a preliminary investigation
for rape without charges ever having been filed?

Because the person they were investigating left the country and then put up
one of the most extensive appeals against extradition in history _and then_
fled to an embassy. If Assange had complied with the extradition those charges
would have been filed when he returned to Sweden within months of the
investigation being opened.

You know, you can't have it both ways, you can't claim it's terrible it's been
going on so long for a process that was deliberately dragged out.

~~~
roblabla
Did you read the article? Because it looks like you didn't.

> Because the person they were investigating left the country and then put up
> one of the most extensive appeals against extradition in history and then
> fled to an embassy.

No, he didn't. He asked not to be extradited to a foreign country where there
is a risk his human rights will not be respected - which is standard
international practice. He gave several dates where we would be available for
questioning. __He turned himself up to the police __for questioning. All of
those were denied to him.

~~~
Traster
Firstly, you're literally talking about the contention of his legal appeal
that I mentioned. Secondly, most extradition appeals don't go to the High
court, let alone the supreme court - which is why I mentioned that he
literally had one of the most extensive appeals in history.

I also find it hilariously comical to see the absurd level of legal recourse
Assange was afforded whilst people claimed that he is having his human rights
violated. Somehow we're now in a world where someone shouldn't be extradited
to _Sweden_ from the UK because they're going to have their human rights
violated. I'd love to hear the exact details of how exactly his rights would
be violated, but frankly I think it's going to be more Gish galloping.

~~~
nekopa
From the article:

>Now the supervisor of the policewoman who had conducted the questioning wrote
her an email telling her to rewrite the statement from S. W.

>On the basis of the revised statement from S.W., an appeal was filed against
the public prosecutor’s attempt to suspend the investigation, and on Sept. 2,
2010, the rape proceedings were resumed. A legal representative by the name of
Claes Borgström was appointed to the two women at public cost. The man was a
law firm partner to the previous justice minister, Thomas Bodström, under
whose supervision Swedish security personnel had seized two men who the U.S.
found suspicious in the middle of Stockholm. The men were seized without any
kind of legal proceedings and then handed over to the CIA, who proceeded to
torture them.

This may be how his right could be violated in Sweden.

------
nsajko
Some older articles:
[https://www.ohchr.org/EN/NewsEvents/Pages/DisplayNews.aspx?N...](https://www.ohchr.org/EN/NewsEvents/Pages/DisplayNews.aspx?NewsID=24665)

[https://www.democracynow.org/2019/11/22/nils_melzer_julian_a...](https://www.democracynow.org/2019/11/22/nils_melzer_julian_assange)

I am sad that US is trying prosecute Assange for espionage, but the attacks
from other sides on the Swedish prosecutors who tried to prosecute Assange
seem just as bad. Assange is not above the law, or common decency, just
because of founding Wikileaks. The implications of that for justice and
prosecutors worldwide are scary.

Also, I think that it really would have been better for him and Wikileaks to
just submit to Swedish investigation, especially if he is really innocent
regarding sexual offences and after he already got publicity on that front.

~~~
tremon
No, the attacks on the Swedish prosecutors are fully warranted. He submitted
to Swedish investigation multiple times. From the article:

 _In this case, things are constantly happening that shouldn’t actually be
possible unless you look at them from a different angle._

 _We have to stop believing that there was really an interest in leading an
investigation into a sexual offense_

 _Assange learned about the rape allegations from the press. He established
contact with the police so he could make a statement. Despite the scandal
having reached the public, he was only allowed to do so nine days later [..]
Assange appeared at the police station to make a statement. [..] At the
beginning of the conversation, Assange said he was ready to make a statement,
but added that he didn’t want to read about his statement again in the press.
[..] But that same evening, everything was in the newspapers again. It could
only have come from the authorities because nobody else was present during his
questioning. The intention was very clearly that of besmirching his name._

 _That is a further indication that Sweden was never interested in finding the
truth. [..] Swedish officials can travel to the UK, or vice versa, to conduct
interrogations or that such questioning can take place via video link. During
the period of time in question, such questioning between Sweden and England
took place in 44 other cases. It was only in Julian Assange’s case that Sweden
insisted that it was essential for him to appear in person._

 _Assange’s lawyers petitioned Sweden’s highest court to force public
prosecutors to either finally press charges or suspend the case. When the
Swedes told the UK that they may be forced to abandon the case, the British
wrote back, worriedly: «Don’t you dare get cold feet!!»_

Keep in mind, this is the UN's special rapporteur on torture, not some random
opinion. Further on in the article:

 _When a country like Sweden declines to answer questions submitted by the UN
Special Rapporteur on Torture, it shows that the government is aware of the
illegality of its behavior and wants to take no responsibility for its
behavior_

~~~
nsajko
So the prosecutor's and the police opinion are just "some random opinions"?

Melzer actually gives us absolutely no reason to think that any evidence were
forged, assuming one is not going to just take his word for it.

Imagine someone else was sought by Sweden for multiple counts of sexual
offence on different women, and then he (and his team of lawyers) used the
extradition process to wait for the statute of limitations to pass so he would
dodge even an investigation of the accusations.

> During the period of time in question, such questioning between Sweden and
> England took place in 44 other cases. It was only in Julian Assange’s case
> that Sweden insisted that it was essential for him to appear in person.

This "smells" bad, but really even that (without elaboration) does not excuse
the attacks on the Swedish justice system. I would like for someone from the
Swedish prosecutors' side to explain that, though. I think there very well
could be a reason for video-linked questioning to be appropriate in 44 cases,
but not in Assange's.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assange_v_Swedish_Prosecution_...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assange_v_Swedish_Prosecution_Authority)

[https://www.theguardian.com/media/2010/dec/17/julian-
assange...](https://www.theguardian.com/media/2010/dec/17/julian-assange-
sweden)

EDIT: Replying to children: The interview makes a narrative by presenting
things out of context, but what they are doing is actually quite inappropriate
in the case of the sexual assault allegations. Some examples:

* They present the potential victims as unwilling regarding charging Assange with rape. The first problem with this is that it implies that rape is a civil matter, when (as is well known) it is in fact a crime. Thus the potential victims are only relevant as witnesses, they would not be parties to the case except as witnesses (and maybe they could get some damages). The second problem is that the two women were in fact quite interested in getting Assange prosecuted: they got legal representation, and prevented the prosecutors from dropping the investigation.

* I do not think that it is necessarily suspicious that no DNA could be recovered from the condom. Especially in the context of the allegation, with Assange allegedly breaking the condom on purpose.

~~~
tremon
> Melzer actually gives us absolutely no reason to think that any evidence
> were forged

What makes you think that there was any evidence at all, to begin with?

 _I can only point to the order of events: A woman walks into a police
station. She doesn’t want to file a complaint but wants to demand an HIV test
[from Assange]. The police then decide that this could be a case of rape and a
matter for public prosecutors. The woman refuses to go along with that version
of events and then goes home and writes a friend that it wasn’t her intention,
but the police want to «get their hands on» Assange. Two hours later, the case
is in the newspaper. As we know today, public prosecutors leaked it to the
press – and they did so without even inviting Assange to make a statement. And
the second woman, who had allegedly been raped according to the Aug. 20
headline, was only questioned on Aug. 21._

 _Not a single trace of DNA from Assange or A. A. could be detected in the
condom that was submitted as evidence._

> I would like for someone from the Swedish prosecutors' side to explain that,
> though.

Yes, the UN special rapporteur wanted that too. He was ignored. What makes you
think you'll fare better?

~~~
SiempreViernes
> Not a single trace of DNA from Assange or A. A. could be detected in the
> condom that was submitted as evidence.

Uh, is it the condom that Assange is accused of not actually using that Melzer
is talking about?

~~~
mstef
no, it is not. you are mixing up the two cases, one were there was no condom
indeed with S.W., and the other case with the other woman A.A. where the
condom was allegedly damaged.

