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Glaring legal anomalies prove Assange case was never about law


Jonathan Cook Blog
Mon, 27 May 2019 00:00 UTC
Assange
© AP Photo / Frank Augstein
It is astonishing how often one still hears well-informed, otherwise reasonable people say about Julian Assange: "But he ran away from Swedish rape charges by hiding in Ecuador's embassy in London."

That short sentence includes at least three factual errors. In fact, to repeat it, as so many people do, you would need to have been hiding under a rock for the past decade - or, amounting to much the same thing, been relying on the corporate media for your information about Assange, including from supposedly liberal outlets such as the Guardian and the BBC.

At the weekend, a Guardian editorial - the paper's official voice and probably the segment most scrutinised by senior staff - made just such a false claim:
Then there is the rape charge that Mr Assange faced in Sweden and which led him to seek refuge in the Ecuadorian embassy in the first place.
The fact that the Guardian, supposedly the British media's chief defender of liberal values, can make this error-strewn statement after nearly a decade of Assange-related coverage is simply astounding. And that it can make such a statement days after the US finally admitted that it wants to lock up Assange for 175 years on bogus "espionage" charges - a hand anyone who wasn't being wilfully blind always knew the US was preparing to play - is still more shocking.

Assange faces no charges in Sweden yet, let alone "rape charges". As former UK ambassador Craig Murray recently explained, the Guardian has been misleading readers by falsely claiming that an attempt by a Swedish prosecutor to extradite Assange - even though the move has not received the Swedish judiciary's approval - is the same as his arrest on rape charges. It isn't.

Also, Assange did not seek sanctuary in the embassay to evade the Swedish investigation. No state in the world gives a non-citizen political asylum to avoid a rape trial. The asylum was granted on political grounds. Ecuador rightly accepted Assange's concerns that the US would seek his extradition and lock him out of sight for the rest of his life.

Assange, of course, has been proven - yet again - decisively right by recent developments.

Comment: First they came for Assange: The implications of his persecution for journalism and democracy
Powerful governments like the United States do not seek to enlighten the public and let them make their own decisions. Edward Bernays, the "father of American propaganda," said as much decades ago when he wrote the following:
The conscious and intelligent manipulation of the organized habits and opinions of the masses is an important element in democratic society. Those who manipulate this unseen mechanism of society constitute an invisible government which is the true ruling power of our country. ... We are governed, our minds are molded, our tastes formed, our ideas suggested, largely by men we have never heard of."
For that "manipulation" of the public to continue unimpeded, journalists must be transformed from vanguards of truth and the public's "right to know" into obedient stenographers of the official government narrative. Assange, more than anyone else, has threatened this attempted transformation by leading an organization that "opens governments," and by challenging the upward flow of information to "bishops and kings, not down to slaves and serfs." It is for that reason, above all else, that he has been treated the way he has and why - if extradited - the full fury of the American oligarchy and its empire will likely be unleashed upon him.


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Cow Skull

Twisted logic: Florida governor blames Palestinians for Israel's occupation of their homeland


Middle East Eye
Tue, 28 May 2019 00:00 UTC
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis
© Chris Urso/ Times
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis
A US governor has blamed Palestinians for Israel's ongoing occupation of their land, just weeks before the United States plans to unveil the economic portion of its "deal of the century" peace plan.

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, a longtime supporter of Israel and a member of Donald Trump's Republican Party, made his comments during a trade delegation visit to Israel this week.

"If you look at this whole conflict, to me, the biggest problem has been that Palestinian Arabs have not recognised Israel's right to exist as a Jewish state," DeSantis said during a news briefing at the Hilton Tel Aviv on Monday morning.

"That kind of denialism poisons really everything," he continued.


Comment: Speaking of denialism: 1967 war: How Israel came to occupy and oppress the whole of Palestine


DeSantis's visit to Israel comes as Washington intends to unveil the economic portion of the "deal of the century" to solve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict next month in Bahrain.

Comment: Although far from unusual, it's still rather nauseating to watch the obsequiousness of US politicians eager to ingratiate themselves with Israel.

More on Trump's 'deal of the century':

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MIB

Russia-gate as Count Dracula

Ann Garrison
Consortium News
Mon, 20 May 2019 20:53 UTC
War With Russia? book
"Russiagate, like Count Dracula, will never end because new political blood will be fed to this vampire . . . The Russiagate fable - fraud - has become a kind of theocratic cult, and it has millions and millions and millions of self-interested and unwitting followers."

That was Stephen F. Cohen's comment after Special Counsel Robert Mueller concluded that there was no evidence to convict President Donald Trump or any of his campaign staff of colluding with Russia to steal the 2016 presidential election. He was speaking to nationally syndicated radio host John Batchelor in one of their broadcasts on Radio WABC-AM, New York City, which have been archived on the website of The Nation for the past five years.

Now, a month later, Democratic elites are still roaming the streets of Washington and the Halls of Congress in search of fresh blood. On May 16, The Washington Post reported that House Democrats had begun a marathon public reading of the "Mueller Report" for citizens who don't have time to read the whole thing but might listen to the audio. There's no there there, but they won't let go. Are they serious? Or just mortified, like most vampires, by the light of day? Whichever, they're likely to lose again in 2020, because poll after poll says that Americans don't care; Russia-gate is nowhere near the top of their list of concerns.

Cohen is Russian studies professor emeritus at Princeton and NYU. His latest book, "War with Russia? From Putin & Ukraine to Trump & Russiagate," is a series of essays published in The Nation and text elaborations of the radio broadcasts.

Cohen says that Russia-gate has deeply damaged at least four U.S. institutions: the electoral system; the presidency; the "intelligence community;" and the media, meaning most of all the influential "legacy" media; The New York Times, The Washington Post, and the major television and cable news networks. Whichever side of the partisan divide they're on, Americans know they've been lied to by one or more of them. Will they find reason to widely trust any of these institutions again? Will any Washington officials and their staffers, and their allied power brokers and intelligence agents, trust any others from here on?
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Attention

China considering cutting exports of rare earths as retaliation in trade war

Jason Rogers, David Stringer and Martin Ritchie
Bloomberg
Wed, 29 May 2019 20:00 UTC
rare earth metals chart
© Bloomberg
Beijing is gearing up to use its dominance of rare earths to hit back in its deepening trade war with Washington.

A flurry of Chinese media reports on Wednesday, including an editorial in the flagship newspaper of the Communist Party, raised the prospect of Beijing cutting exports of the commodities that are critical in defense, energy, electronics and automobile sectors. The world's biggest producer, China supplies about 80% of U.S. imports of rare earths, which are used in a host of applications from smartphones to electric vehicles and wind turbines.

The threat to weaponize strategic materials ratchets up the tension between the world's two biggest economies before an expected meeting between Presidents Xi Jinping and Donald Trump at the G-20 meeting next month. It shows how China is weighing its options after the U.S. blacklisted Huawei Technologies Co., cutting off the supply of American components it needs to make its smartphones and networking gear.

"China, as the dominant producer of rare earths, has shown in the past that it can use rare earths as a bargaining chip when it comes to multilateral negotiations," said George Bauk, Chief Executive Officer of Northern Minerals Ltd., which is producing rare earth carbonate from a pilot-scale project in Western Australia.
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Arrow Up

Vice-president of India: 'We want permanent seat at the UN Security Council'


RT
Wed, 29 May 2019 20:40 UTC
narendra modi

Democratically-speaking, the second most powerful man on Earth
India must have a permanent seat on the UNSC to ensure proper representation of the country on the international stage, the vice president stated, as New Delhi continues to promulgate the council's reform.

"We must renew our efforts to gain a permanent membership of the UN Security Council by further enhancing support from world nations and building a sustained dialogue in favor of UNSC reforms," Shri M. Venkaiah Naidu said on Tuesday. "India has emerged as the fastest growing economy with global powers acknowledging India's growth story."

At present, there are five permanent members of the Security Council - China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom, and the US - which all have veto powers to cast aside any resolution which could compromise world stability and security. In addition to the victorious powers in World War II, the chamber also has ten seats for non-permanent members that are elected by the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) for two-year terms to better represent their geographic regions. These states, however, lack the veto powers awarded to permanent members of the council.

Comment: Give India Britain's seat?

Comparing populations: 60 million vs 1.3 billion...

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Magnify

Huawei to 'reassess relationship' with FedEx after delivery service diverted packages to US

Brian Heater
Techcrunch
Tue, 28 May 2019 00:00 UTC
Huawei Fedex

“The recent experiences where important commercial documents sent via FedEx were not delivered to their destination, and instead were either diverted to, or were requested to be diverted to, FedEx in the United States, undermines our confidence."
Huawei is understandably reexamining a number of relationships in the wake of a recent U.S. trade ban. While various component and software providers, including Google and ARM, have suspended dealings with the Chinese hardware giant, the latest issue comes from an altogether different source.

The company told Reuters this week that it's reassessing its relationship with FedEx after the delivery company misrouted a handful of packages. Huawei says the packages contained documents, rather than specific technologies covered by the current Trump ban.

"The recent experiences where important commercial documents sent via FedEx were not delivered to their destination, and instead were either diverted to, or were requested to be diverted to, FedEx in the United States, undermines our confidence," a rep for the company said. "We will now have to review our logistics and document delivery support requirements as a direct result of these incidents."

Comment: See also: Till Trump do they part: Top tech firms cut ties with Huawei, Chinese drop iPhones

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Briefcase

Huawei files motion to have National Defense Authorization Act declared unconstitutional for 'targeting company without opportunity of rebuttal'


CGTN
Wed, 29 May 2019 09:08 UTC
huawei
© Global Look Press / Geisler-Fotopres / Christoph Hardt
China's telecom giant Huawei has hit back at the U.S. ban by filing a motion on Tuesday to ask the court to declare a law which places bans on the company equipment "unconstitutional."

The 2019 National Defense Authorization Act, enacted last summer, has directly and permanently targeted Huawei "without opportunity for rebuttal or escape," Song Liuping, Huawei's chief legal officer said in a statement issued on Monday.

"The law provides Huawei with no opportunity to rebut the accusations, to present evidence in its defense, or to avail itself of other procedures that impartial adjudicators provide to ensure a fair search for the truth," Liu said. "The ban is a quintessential bill of attainder and a violation of due process."

Comment: Recent developments in the ongoing US / Huawei spat:

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Popcorn

George Galloway: My encounter with a Quiet American (and a not so quiet American)

George Galloway
RT
Wed, 29 May 2019 19:45 UTC
woolsey bannon

James Woolsey, swamp creature, and Steve Bannon, 'economic nationalist'
In the wee small hours of the morning, last week in Kazakhstan, my wife and I encountered every hotel guest's worst nightmare.

Asleep in our night clothes we both woke to the sound of someone trying to enter our room. First, a gentle then ever-more forceful turning of the handle. Then, the unmistakable noise of a shoulder repeatedly thumping against our door - the strength of which we had no way of knowing.

With estimable alacrity Mrs. Galloway was out of bed like a shot and hurling anything and everything with wheels in front of the door. The barricade built, she was then on the phone to the front desk calling for help, not the easiest thing to communicate in the middle of the night in Almaty, as you can imagine.

Being 'the man of the house' I could really only offer brute force, with my two hands applying countervailing pressure on the door (which was beginning to literally bend) and my brute Scottish accent demanding the interloper cease and desist (or Scottish street words to that effect). Of course I looked through the spyhole in the door and could see enough to be sure that this was no nightmare, this was a clear and present human danger.

Comment: That's some tale!

Besides the specifically bizarre encounter, it's also generally bizarre that Americans even attend these events.

And not just 'dissidents' like Bannon, but establishment cronies like Woolsey. Yes, he was a guest speaker at one of the panels on 'Media in the Digital Age'!

james woolsey
Truly a sign of the times.

Here's the Eurasian Media Forum website. The line-up of speakers included a lot of Russian journalists working for Russian news agencies and media outlets, as well as journalists from former Soviet states. As in, The Enemy that 'meddled in our democracy'.

So, while bashing Russian media to American audiences, American experts are participating with them at international forums, discussing world affairs with their peers in a civilized manner. Who knew?!

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Bad Guys

Merkel says every Jewish institution in German must be guarded by police


i24News
Wed, 29 May 2019 19:11 UTC
merkel
© Tobias Schwarz/Agence France-Presse/File
Under the banner "Stand Up: Jew Hatred - Never Again!" German Chancellor Angela Merkel will join political and religious leaders at a rally against anti-Semitism at the iconic Brandenburg Gate in Berlin
"We have to deal with the ghosts out the past," Merkel said.

Days after a warning to Jews who wear skullcaps that they may not be safe when donning them publicly, Chancellor Angela Merkel suggested stationing police officers at every Jewish building or institution in Germany.

"Unfortunately there is to this day not a single synagogue, not a single day care center for Jewish children, not a single school for Jewish children that does not need to be guarded by German policemen," Merkel said in an interview with CNN's Christiane Amanpour.

Comment: Merkel's grip on power has been slipping for a while now over her stance on immigration. Is this an attempt to shore up part of her base?

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Crusader

Iran shattered US 'psyops' and dried up its 'capacity for war,' says head of Iran's Rev Guards


RT
Wed, 29 May 2019 19:51 UTC
US Navy ships
© Reuters / US Navy Handout / Jake Greenberg
Washington has unsuccessfully exhausted all of its avenues in trying to provoke conflict with Iran and its capacity to wage a successful war has dried up, the leader of Iran's elite Revolutionary Guards has said.

"Today, we are a great and invincible power because we have experienced and defeated all of the enemy's scenarios," Major General Hossein Salami said, according to Iranian broadcaster Press TV. He added that Tehran had resisted US efforts to destabilize Iran with political and economic measures and this had effectively eliminated Washington's pretext for military conflict.
We have been able to shatter enemy psyops and dry up the enemy's capacity for war.
The commander's comments came as National Security Advisor John Bolton arrived in the UAE late on Tuesday, ahead of meetings with Emirati allies on security in the region. Speaking on Wednesday, Bolton accused Iran of "almost certainly" being behind recent attacks on oil tankers off the coast of the UAE, however, he has given no evidence to support the accusation.
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