[Computer]

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange to be extradited to Sweden WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange is to be extradited to Sweden to face sex crime allegations after losing his appeal at the Supreme Court. Lawyers for Assange asked the UK's highest court to block his removal, arguing that the European arrest warrant issued against him is "invalid and unenforceable". However a panel of seven Supreme Court judges, who heard the case in February, decided that the warrant was valid, ending a marathon battle in the UK courts over the issue. They struggled to agree and finally decided by a majority of five to two. The Swedish authorities want Assange, 40, to answer accusations of raping one woman and sexually molesting and coercing another in Stockholm in August 2010 while on a visit to give a lecture. Assange, whose WikiLeaks website has published a mass of leaked diplomatic cables that embarrassed several governments and international businesses, says the sex was consensual and the allegations against him are politically motivated. In November 2011, the High Court upheld a ruling by District Judge Howard Riddle - who sat at Belmarsh Magistrates' Court, south London, in February 2011 - that the Australian computer expert should be extradited to face investigation. The Supreme Court rejectioin of his appeal marks the end of his lengthy legal battle in the UK, but it will still be open to him to ask the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg to intervene. Special arrangements are being made by the Supreme Court for today's ruling because of the worldwide interest of press and media in the judgment. The High Court declared that it would not be unfair or unlawful to extradite Assange. But his QC argued in the Supreme Court that the Swedish public prosecutor who signed the arrest warrant could not issue a valid document because she lacked impartiality and independence. Assange, who is on bail living with friends, attended the two-day hearing in person. Dinah Rose QC, for Assange, said his latest appeal raised the single issue of law as to whether the Swedish public prosecutor constituted a "judicial authority" capable of issuing a valid warrant under the provisions of the 2003 Extradition Act. It was common ground that if she did not, there was no legal basis for extradition. Ms Rose suggested it was obvious that a public prosecutor whose function it was to investigate and prosecute an individual "cannot exercise judicial authority in relation to that individual". As a matter of fundamental legal principle dating back hundreds of years, a judicial authority had to be impartial and independent both of the executive and the parties in a case. Clare Montgomery QC, for the Swedish Prosecution Authority, urged the judges - Lord Phillips, Lord Walker, Lady Hale, Lord Brown, Lord Mance, Lord Kerr and Lord Dyson - to reject the Assange appeal. She argued that the High Court was plainly correct to accept that the term "judicial authority" had a wide and autonomous meaning, and it was not restricted in the way contended for by Ms Rose. Since the start of the European Arrest Warrant (EAW) scheme it had been the practice of a number of prominent member states to issue EAWs through public prosecutors. Ms Montgomery argued: "There is no conceivable breach of fundamental rights involved in such a process."

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worl...to-Sweden.html

[ZoddGutts]

Finally justice will be served.

[jaxword]

Guess he finally ran out of money/powerful friends to protect him.

[markot]

Guess he finally ran out of money/powerful friends to protect him.

Or the system worked the way its supposed to and he exhausted his final avenue of appeal?

[elongation]

Terrible outcome for Assange and for this notion of "human rights". Should be interesting to see whether the whole ordeal plays out as Assange and his lawyers fear. You gotta feel sorry for the guy on some level.

[Mael]

Finally justice will be served.

Not a moment too soon!

[jaxword]

Or the system worked the way its supposed to and he exhausted his final avenue of appeal?

If by "the way its supposed to" you mean "a tool of revenge," then yes, the system worked.

You have to seriously be in denial to not realize this has been a smear campaign against Assange from the start (not that he's a very good person to begin with and practically gave them the ammo).

[Glass Rebel]

Finally justice will be served.

almost got me

[subversus]

americah fuck yea

[IrrelevantNotch]

If by "the way its supposed to" you mean "a tool of revenge," then yes, the system worked. You have to seriously be in denial to not realize this has been a smear campaign against Assange from the start (not that he's a very good person to begin with and practically gave them the ammo).

Yea, sure buddy. The guy who doesn't seem to give two shits about anyone but himself could never be a rapist. Nope. Not that guy.

[catfish]

americah fuck yea

man tried in england will be extradited to sweden.

America fuck yeah?

[fushi]

I think he looks better with long hair.

[elongation]

Yea, sure buddy. The guy who doesn't seem to give two shits about anyone but himself could never be a rapist. Nope. Not that guy.

So it's merely a coincidence that these allegations pop up out of nowhere when Assange and Wikileaks starts striking a nerve with the US government?

[IrrelevantNotch]

So it's merely a coincidence that these allegations pop up out of nowhere when Assange and Wikileaks starts striking a nerve with the US government?

Yep. Also there was no second shooter in the grassy knoll.

[captainnapalm]

man tried in england will be extradited to sweden. America fuck yeah?

The American overlords have spoken. Little worker ant countries follow. Unless you buy the conspiracy that British bankers and the Royal bloodline run the US, in which case the British overlords have spoken.

[catfish]

The American overlords have spoken. Little worker ant countries follow. Unless you buy the conspiracy that British bankers and the Royal bloodline run the US, in which case the British overlords have spoken.

all sounds a bit conspiracy for me

also lol at 'worker ant countries'

[Mael]

The American overlords have spoken. Little worker ant countries follow. Unless you buy the conspiracy that British bankers and the Royal bloodline run the US, in which case the British overlords have spoken.

British bankers and the Royal bloodline are lizardmen?

[captainnapalm]

all sounds a bit conspiracy for me also lol at 'worker ant countries'

The net really closed in on him after Wikileaks. And from what I've heard there is very little substance to these sexual assault claims. But yeah, all very conspiracy-like. Who knows.

[SmartBase]

Guess it won't be too long now until the Americans have him. /conspiracy

[jaxword]

Yea, sure buddy. The guy who doesn't seem to give two shits about anyone but himself could never be a rapist. Nope. Not that guy.

You dismiss his credibility but you'll happily believe the author of "7 steps to legal revenge."

Logical.

[sangreal]

Terrible outcome for Assange and for this notion of "human rights". Should be interesting to see whether the whole ordeal plays out as Assange and his lawyers fear. You gotta feel sorry for the guy on some level.

Why would you consider this a human rights issue, let alone feel sorry for the guy. He was under investigation in Sweeden and fled the country (he originally promised to return, but refused when the time came). This is pretty much why the extradition system exists.

The net really closed in on him after Wikileaks. And from what I've heard there is very little substance to these sexual assault claims. But yeah, all very conspiracy-like. Who knows.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2010...assange-sweden

Miss A says she spent Wednesday night on a mattress and then moved to a friend's flat so she did not have to be near him. She told police that Assange had continued to make sexual advances to her every day after they slept together and on Wednesday 18 August had approached her, naked from the waist down, and rubbed himself against her.

This alone would probably be sexual assault in any country.

[IrrelevantNotch]

You dismiss his credibility but you'll happily believe the author of "7 steps to legal revenge." Logical.

Typical conspiracy theorists carving out their opponent's arguments for them. Tsk, tsk.

[Mael]

Why would you consider this a human rights issue, let alone feel sorry for the guy. He was under investigation in Sweeden and fled the country (he originally promised to return, but refused when the time came). This is pretty much why the extradition system exists.

Nah you don't understand!
It's part of the human bill of right to flee the country when you're accused of rape!

[Hagi]

Nah you don't understand! It's part of the human bill of right to flee the country when you're accused of rape!

Hey you can't blame the guy for trying it seems to have worked pretty well for Polanski.

[elongation]

Why would you consider this a human rights issue, let alone feel sorry for the guy. He was under investigation in Sweeden and fled the country (he originally promised to return, but refused when the time came). This is pretty much why the extradition system exists.

Uh what? He didn't flee Sweden at all. He was placed under house arrest in England for over a year and a half. He hasn't been charged for anything, he's simply under investigation by the Swedish authorities. And he and his lawyers fear that by being extradited to Sweden he could be easily extradited over the the US to face their secret court.

[jaxword]

Typical conspiracy theorists carving out their opponent's arguments for them. Tsk, tsk.

Tell us more about the typical conspiracy theorists, IrrelevantNotch.

[Vagabundo]

Guess it won't be too long now until the Americans have him. /conspiracy

If they do get their hands on him we'll know what happened. Won't be hard to follow the breadcrumbs.

[LongMuckDong]

Hey you can't blame the guy for trying it seems to have worked pretty well for Polanski.

Win an Oscar, Hook up with a minor... Polanski.

[captainnapalm]

This alone would probably be sexual assault in any country.

She voluntarily had sex with him and he comes on to her afterwards. Big surprise. No threat of violence whatsover. Most countries there would not be a chance of a sexual assualt conviction.

[Dynamite Shikoku]

Did wikileaks disappear or something? Havent heard anything for ages

[G.O.O.]

So, who's becoming a lawyer in this thread ?

I really hope Sweden doesn't send him to the US. Especially considering what they've done to Manning.

[Frankfurter]

Uh what? He didn't flee Sweden at all. He was placed under house arrest in England for over a year and a half. He hasn't been charged for anything, he's simply under investigation by the Swedish authorities. And he and his lawyers fear that by being extradited to Sweden he could be easily extradited over the the US to face their secret court.

Actually, if I were Assange I'd feel safer in Sweden than in the UK (from the extradited-to-the-US POV). Anyways, I'm not up to date on the matter, but I'd guess that the US would like to charge Assange for stuff that could get him the death penalty? If so, he can't be extradited from the UK or Sweden anyway.

[Jason Raize '75 - '04]

Though the English-speaking world had lost interest in the details of the accusations against him, furious debate had continued in the country where Assange would be questioned and possibly charged. Much of this was due to the argument Assange's legal team had mounted against extradition - that Sweden's politically appointed judges, in-camera sex crime trials and freewheeling prosecutors were at variance with EU standards, and neither process nor eventual trial was fair.

That line of argument hasn't gone down well in Sweden, where many people are getting tetchy about the country's reputation as an authoritarian madhouse. Yet by mid-year, the case was increasingly in question. Anna Ardin, one of the complainants, had added an accusation of physical sexual coercion, though she had earlier told a newspaper that Assange was ''not violent''. Tweets indicating a continued relationship with Assange vanished from the record, and were retrieved by bloggers; a leaked police file had a witness recalling one complainant saying she had been railroaded into making an accusation by the police and others.

When the leaked police report went into wider circulation, it did not take long for people to notice that the name of the initial investigating officer, Irmeli Krans, was familiar from somewhere else. In fact she was one of the links listed on the blogroll of Anna Ardin, the first complainant and organiser of Assange's visit to Sweden in August last year. That was unusual, though of itself not impossible - Stockholm is, in many ways, a small town. But the links rapidly proved beyond coincidence, many of them unearthed by Sweden's libertarian Flashback mega-blog.

Krans and Ardin were not merely connected online, they were both members of the Social Democratic Party and had run together as candidates for the city council elections some months before. Connected through gay and lesbian networks in the party, Krans had visited Club Febber, the fetish nightclub that Ardin set up on Gotland, a residential island off the Swedish coast. Ardin had also commented on Krans's blog a year earlier, on a post about racism and sexism, criticising ''women who claim they're not oppressed and therefore think it's OK to trash feminists''. Responding to the post, Krans noted: ''Usually I only get negative posts on this blog … but this post puts its finger on the matter, and speaks for itself.'' ''Thanks for the props,'' Ardin replied. ''The cultural elite often think it is OK to be a little racist and sexist.''

Were such connections sufficient for Krans to recuse herself from the case? There is no record that she raised the matter. Instead, immediately after Ardin and the other complainant, Sofia Wilen, walked into a central Stockholm police station on August 20 last year, Krans conducted an interview with Wilen. Contrary to police guidelines, the interview was neither taped nor transcribed. A half-hour into the interview, police had already consulted the prosecutor's office, and a rape investigation was opened. Krans was almost immediately removed from the case, but a leaked email reveals she subsequently queried whether rape charges had been laid. Two days later she attempted to access the interview file on the police computer but was refused access. A leaked email exchange between Krans and her superior indicates that she was attempting to revise the summary of Wilen's statement, because she had taken it down incompletely at the time.

By the most generous assessment, the initial handling of the case was a mess. An internal police inquiry would later find that Krans's conduct had not affected the case - even though Krans, a potential witness in any future trial, had subsequently broadcast an extraordinary stream of anti-Assange commentary on her Facebook page and over Twitter, complaining that the official accusation of ''minor rape'' was insufficient, and cheering on Claes Borgstrom, the complainants' lawyer.

Her Facebook account shows Harald Ullman, a member of the Stockholm police board, logged on to express his disbelief at her conduct. Krans's involvement in the interview with Wilen has certainly complicated its status as evidence - all the more so, since Wilen never verified it as a true record with her signature.

Yet there were also problems with the allegations against Assange by Anna Ardin herself. During her interview, conducted by phone - also against police guidelines on sex crime cases - the day after Wilen's interview, Ardin had given an account of her encounter with Assange, from which two misdemeanour ''annoyance'' charges were made. That day, the senior prosecutor quashed the rape investigation commenced the day before during Wilen's interview. Two days later, Claes Borgstrom had become both women's lawyer, and appealed the decision not to prosecute. Two days after that, on August 25, Ardin handed over to police a condom that she claimed had been the one used during her encounter with Assange 10 days earlier. As with everything in this case, the forensic report on this item eventually leaked. For a condom allegedly used in a sex act, it had little to give up, the lab report telling the investigation that no DNA had been recovered from it in an initial series of tests, though they did not rule out the possibility that some might be found. The police had also requested one other test, to see if the rip at the top of the condom was a tear or a blade cut. The delay in securing a potentially vital piece of evidence remained unexplained, as did the process by which Ardin's accusation changed from a misdemeanour crime of annoyance to a felony, sexual coercion. The question as to why Ardin would have kept a torn condom for a week when she had no initial intention of going to the police also remained unanswered.

http://www.smh.com.au/world/moment-o...001-1l2lt.html

Sweden has this law whereby even consensual sex, without a condom, is classed as rape

[Sealda]

US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is to visit Sweden on the 3rd of June. She plans to discuss Afghanistan, the Middle East, green power and internet freedom. This is part of a tour of Scandinavia by Clinton, and following her Stockholm visit she will travel on to the Caucus region.

http://sverigesradio.se/sida/artikel...rtikel=5124812

justaccordingtokeikaku.jpg

[pmj]

Sweden has this law whereby even consensual sex, without a condom, is classed as rape.

You'll have to expand on that. Surely you can't be saying that every Swedish citizen who has ever had unprotected sex is a rapist?

Also, coercion doesn't necessarily have to be violent.

[Kinyou]

So, who's becoming a lawyer in this thread ? I really hope Sweden doesn't send him to the US. Especially considering what they've done to Manning.

I hope that Sweden is better than that.

[robertsan21]

why would sweden send assange to US? he "raped" in sweden. the only thing that US has in this case is that they where probably the planner of this so called "Rape"

if anything we should send him back to Australia from where he comes from.

[scytheavatar]

Did wikileaks disappear or something? Havent heard anything for ages

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2012_Stratfor_email_leak

They became irrelevant basically, they have become little more than yet another tabloid. After the way Assange entrapped Manning for the USA diplomatic cable leak but then abandoned him it would be lunacy for anyone to release information on Wikileaks.

[JessicaPadkin]

You'll have to expand on that. Surely you can't be saying that every Swedish citizen who has ever had unprotected sex is a rapist? Also, coercion doesn't necessarily have to be violent.

I understand that it's when someone has consented to sex with a condom specifically, and the other person deliberately deceives them. So it would be considered a type of rape, considering that the woman (in this case) consented depending on a condition that wasn't met. That doesn't seem too unreasonable to me though, to be honest... if a woman lies about using protection to a man in the same circumstance, then I can see the argument for classifying that as rape too.

Didn't one of the women allege that he had sex with her while she was asleep? Has he ever actually denied that? And just sayin', but it's perfectly reasonable to support Wikileaks without necessarily supporting Assange.

[leadbelly]

I don't know what is worse: people who find conspiracy in everything or people who always dismiss them like they have firsthand knowledge.

It's hard not to see an element of skulduggery in the case. It doesn't necessarily mean it is absolutely true, but how people can take everything at face value and not question anything is beyond me.

[KAOz]

I hope that Sweden is better than that.

Our government really isn't. They are so wanting to be noticed by the "big players" in the world, that they will gladly drop their pants and bend over for any little wish.

Was the same in World War 2. :P

Sweden has this law whereby even consensual sex, without a condom, is classed as rape

Erhm, no, that is pure bullshit. Condomless sex is not classed as rape by law here.
If a woman doesn't agree with going without a condom, and the guy does it anyway against her wishes, then it's classed as a type of rape.

[PantyPhantom]

Another political prisoner coming.

Next stop USA.

[tino]

Wikileak basically stop leaking shit anyway. So fuck him! I am glad Paypal didn't let me donate to him.

[el retorno]

What's gonna happen to his show in RT?

[radioheadrule83]

The stuff around Ardin's behaviour and the vendetta of the prosecutor would make any conviction unsafe if this were in the UK -- but Sweden isn't the UK, and I have to doubt that the fervor against him would be so strong were he not the proprietor of Wikileaks. Even if he's not later extradited to the US, his life will be in tatters if convicted - essentially, enough damage will be done, revenge done.

I hope he gets a fair trial.

[KHarvey16]

You know what they usually call a conspiracy that involves more than 10 people keeping a secret for more than a week? A failure.

Conspiracy theorists place more faith in human ability than anyone I know.

[wrowa]

Erhm, no, that is pure bullshit. Condomless sex is not classed as rape by law here. If a woman doesn't agree with going without a condom, and the guy does it anyway against her wishes, then it's classed as a type of rape.

Isn't that pretty much the same? I mean, how would you possibly prove that?

[Metal B]

Erhm, no, that is pure bullshit. Condomless sex is not classed as rape by law here. If a woman doesn't agree with going without a condom, and the guy does it anyway against her wishes, then it's classed as a type of rape.

How is this even possible without being a "normal" rape?

If she wants him to use a condom, but he doesn't want to and force or coerce her into having sex with her. Then this is "normal" rape.

If she wants him to use a condom, but he doesn't want to, says "Come on" and she agrees. Still later change her mind, then it is also rape?

[leadbelly]

You know what they usually call a conspiracy that involves more than 10 people keeping a secret for more than a week? A failure. Conspiracy theorists place more faith in human ability than anyone I know.

Yeah, the brain is incapable of keeping such information. A scientific study into the nature of keeping secrets concluded that the brain is hard-wired to release all secret information after one week. Failure to do so would usually result in the test subject imploding.

Not that I can know what the actual truth is, I can only speculate, but come on man, that is a total fallacy. As if humans really were totally incapable of keeping secrets.

[Mael]

Hey you can't blame the guy for trying it seems to have worked pretty well for Polanski.

I don't blame him for trying, I blame others saying that some sort of human right was somehow raped in the process.