UK approves extradition of Julian Assange

MannDude

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-61839256

What do you all think?

Wikileaks founder Julian Assange’s extradition to the US has been approved by UK Home Secretary Priti Patel.

Mr Assange has 14 days to appeal over the decision, the Home Office said.

It said the courts found extradition would not be "incompatible with his human rights" and that while in the US "he will be treated appropriately".

Mr Assange is wanted by the American authorities over documents leaked in 2010 and 2011, which the US says broke the law and endangered lives.

The Wikileaks documents related to the Iraq and Afghanistan wars.

The Australian is being held at Belmarsh prison in London after mounting a lengthy battle to avoid being extradited.

Extradition allows one country to ask another to hand over a suspect to face trial.

Responding to the home secretary's order, Wikileaks confirmed it would appeal against her decision.

Mr Assange's wife, Stella, said her husband had done "nothing wrong" and "he has committed no crime".

"He is a journalist and a publisher, and he is being punished for doing his job," she said.

Media company Wikileaks is a whistle-blowing platform that publishes classified material provided by anonymous sources.

dosai

Exposing war crimes is a crime. Sad.

chimichurri

https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/us-gave-verbal-pledge-death-penalty-assange-sources/story?id=62414643

US gave verbal pledge of no death penalty for Assange: Sources

Old news from 2019, but given this extradition approval, let's see how this turns out now...

bikegremlin

deank

He is still alive?
Was my first thought.

Mason

@deank said:
He is still alive?
Was my first thought.

Surprising, right? Figured he woulda been Killary'd by now for dicking around in the 2016 election and jerking off Donny Jr.

shallow

Can you get a good pork pie in US prison tho?

skorupion

@shallow said:
Can you get a good pork pie in US prison tho?

Does a Nutraloaf count?

chris

Surprising, right? Figured he woulda been Killary'd by now

She's just broken her email server in anticipation of his arrival 🤣

shallow

@chris said:

Surprising, right? Figured he woulda been Killary'd by now

She's just broken her email server in anticipation of his arrival 🤣

She should call Jar and demand a black Friday deal for some MXRoute.

chris

She should call Jar and demand a black Friday deal for some MXRoute.

Poor Jar, I can't believe you want him Epstein'd 🤣

CamoYoshi

@skorupion said:

@shallow said:
Can you get a good pork pie in US prison tho?

Does a Nutraloaf count?

"Play the game, Civvie"

shallow

@skorupion said:

@shallow said:
Can you get a good pork pie in US prison tho?

Does a Nutraloaf count?

Although nutraloaf can be found in many United States prison facilities, its use is controversial. It was mentioned by the U.S. Supreme Court in 1978 in Hutto v. Finney while ruling that conditions in the Arkansas penal system constituted cruel and unusual punishment. Prisoners were fed "grue", described as "a substance created by mashing meat, potatoes, oleo [margarine], syrup, vegetables, eggs, and seasoning into a paste and baking the mixture in a pan". The majority decision delivered by Justice Stevens upheld an order from the 8th Circuit Court that the grue diet be discontinued.

It is pitch black. You are likely to be eating grue.

Aractus

@MannDude said: What do you all think?

It'll be blocked, or it certainly should be. The American guy that actually handed over all the US military documents, or rather the lady, Chelsea Manning got a commuted sentence/presidential pardon. Yet they want to persecute the Australian guy that published the documents? Yeah, that'll go down like a led balloon over here if it happens. Albo needs to grow a pair of balls and actually call out the US and UK governments over their unjustified hostile treatment of one of our own. Read Barr's Op-Ed here.

Two years ago at my local ALP branch, I moved a motion urging the party to support dropping extradition proceedings against Julian Assange. Maroubra ALP is not inner city. It might be regarded as a bastion of the right. The motion was carried, near unanimously. After the debate, one member came up and said: “I think Assange is probably a narcissistic bastard but he’s ours.”

That about sums it up - whether people love him or hate him they see this treatment as unjust, and just because the Americans and the Poms want to kill freedom of the press and freedom of speech doesn't mean that we agree with them at all. He exposed American war crimes, anyone should be allowed to publish that without fear of extraterritorial judicial reach of a foreign government. What's next, are we going to export all those people that want to remember Tiananmen Square to China to face criminal prosecution for spreading information that Communist China has determined is wrong and dangerous? Well perhaps not us, but the UK probably would.