José Steinsleger: Julian Assange: revenge yes, justice no

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No. If the Divine Providence or Manifest Destiny confirm their predictions, the Australian journalist Julian Assange (founder of WikiLeaks) can appear at any time in the United States (US) after Priti Patel, Minister of the Interior of the United Kingdom (UK), approved his extradition on June 17.

Two. It is confirmed, then, that for London there is only the unilateral universal jurisdiction of Washington, denounced on several occasions by Assange. Because that’s how it works british justice (sic): in the opposite sense to the naive respect that the paladin of the freethinkers George Owell, who called it English trait that transcended class and ideologies.

Three. Fake. In 1998, Augusto Pinochet was arrested in London at the request of Judge Baltasar Garzón, with the purpose of extraditing him to Spain and having him tried there for his misdeeds. On two occasions, the unappealable House of Lords, ruled in favor of extradition. But in March 2000, after being treated like royalty, the government center-left of Tony Blair invented an alibi for health reasons and the satrap returned to Chile, where he was never tried.

Four. The Assange case started in April 2010, when WikiLeaks spread the nauseating video collateral murder, recorded aboard a helicopter gunship in Iraq (July 12, 2007), and showing the killing of 12 civilians in Baghdad, including two Reuters journalists. Months later, WikiLeaks published in various prestigious newspapers more than 70,000 secret US military documents on its war in Afghanistan, and in October another 400,000 on Iraq, revealing 15,000 civilian deaths more than those calculated by the Pentagon, along with 250,000 diplomatic cables with assessments of world leaders and secrets about Iran’s nuclear and missile programs.

Five. In August 2010, at the request of the swedish justiceAssange was arrested in London for the alleged rape of a couple of young men who eventually dropped the charges. But in June 2012, smelling death in the air, he took refuge in the Ecuadorian embassy. President Rafael Correa granted him asylum and a citizenship card. Seven years later, the Ecuadorian government changed and in June 2012, at the express request of Washington, President Lenín Moreno withdrew his asylum and Assange was captured.

Six. It is interesting to point out that when Correa granted asylum, the United States offered asylum to the Ecuadorian journalist Emilio Palacio (opinion chief of The universe of Guayaquil), who had accused the president of dictator during the coup attempt (September 2010). Palacio accused Correa of ​​committing “…crimes against humanity for having ordered his troops to shoot at a hospital full of civilians and innocent people.” A fake at full lung Palacio showed no evidence of anything, and The universe received the prestigious Cabot Moors Award…

Seven. In the United States, Democrats and Republicans accuse the Australian journalist of being “an agent of a proto-fascist state (Russia, of course), and undermining democracy,” according to Neera Tanden, director of the progressive Center for American Progress, as well as having committed 17 alleged crimes according to the espionage law of… 1917. Read: the crime of having opened a breach in the empire’s political-media wall of silence.

Eight. The delivery of Assange had been agreed since 2017, when Donald Trump sent Paul Manafort (today imprisoned for corruption) “… to operate a barter with Lenín Moreno” (read pecuniary compensation and commercial agreements). On his side, the powerful Henry Jackson Society, from the UK (integrated, among others, by the ultra-conservative Priti Patel), accuses the founder of WikiLeaks of “…sowing doubts about the moral position of Western democratic governments with the support of autocratic regimes” (sic).

Nine. The banker Guillermo Lasso, current president of Ecuador, declared last June: We respect the ruling of the UK courts and as a country we will provide all the facilities that correspond in accordance with that ruling.. Thus, Assange’s extradition may take place tomorrow, next week or before the elections in November that will decide which faction of the extreme right in the United States retains the majority in the Senate. Trump wants him dead, and Joe Biden called him a technological terrorist.

Ten. If such were the case (to our knowledge, Yes or yes), Assange will face a mock trial, with two possible sentences: the death penalty or 175 years in prison. Such would be the fate of the founder of WikiLeakswhich currently continues to rot in London’s Bermash prison, which competes with Guantanamo in slow-motion torture and extermination techniques.

Eleven. However, hope is the last thing to be lost. We must not forget that Washington removed Nelson Mandela from its list of terrorists in July 2008. In other words, 14 years after the leader of the fight against apartheid and Nobel Peace Prize (1993) held the presidency of South Africa (1994-99).