James Ashby might now complain of having been sexually harassed by text-message by Assange, who could then be extradited home for questioning, found guiltless and let go.
He might thereafter run for the Senate in Victoria as a Democrat, and revive that party’s fortunes.
I think it has possibilities. Ashby would be wise to try this on. It might help abate his prison sentence for what he did to Slipper, which Burnside can plausibly argue was treason, which of course it is, and get his gaol term down to fifteen years or even less, and Pyne’s down to thirty.
My friend Jen Robinson is flying to Ecuador soon, she tells me, to plead her worried client’s cause. If they take him in it’s likely, though not absolutely certain, the Cameron-Clegg government would let him go. They are tremendously on the nose for having ruined the economy and punished the lower orders and smashed up the universities and they do not greatly wish to bestir the Left and the Tory libertarians and the Assangist Muslim majority to march on Downing Street or mass in Trafalgar Square by allowing the Swedes to beat him to death or claim he has hanged himself in his cell or the Americans to torment him for fifty or sixty years as they will Bradley Manning in a tiny bright freezing cell with no clothes on and loud bad music playing and no books to read. With Pilger, Bianca, Geoffrey, Kiley, Sting and Coogan on his side, and JK Rowling too perhaps, it will be hard to be against him and retain the Liberal Democrat vote.
They will probably let him go to Ecuador. But they would certainly let him go to Australia, and we should ask for him .
Or the good Ashby fabricate one of his charges in return for a reduced sentence, as I have shrewdly here advised.
Discuss.
Name:
Have you forgotten the matter of an extradition order to take Assange to Sweden? Cameron-Clegg can rightly claim that their hands are tied.
Ecuador is possible, if it grants asylum; Australia is not.
BTW, he is in effect renouncing Australian citizenship by claiming asylum, and it would be against the non-refoulement laws to send him to Australia!
Are you on Gillard’s staff? If you aren’t, this attitude is very puzzling.
You know full well the girls are as guilty of conspiracy as Ashby.
Very disappointed in you.
This reply is very puzzling. You know quite well that I am not on Gillard’s staff or anyone else’s staff for that matter.
The British Supreme Court heard arguments from Robertson and others for days, and ruled that Assange be extradited.
The substance or lack of it in the Swedes’ case is yet to be determined. Assange may well be found “not guilty” but the order is that he be extradited.
That is my point, a legal one I’ll grant you, but hardly a matter of controversy.
Why should he be questioned in Sweden?
If he had flown here and offered a skype interview, would we fly him back? If he had not been charged?
Why would we?
Q1 – Because they have succeeded in getting an extradition order.
Q2 – Probably not;
If Sweden had sought his extradition from Australia – that seems a hypothetical too far.
Q3 Don’t know; as for why should we, damn the Swedes, damn their Ikea and damn their Volvos. But that is not the issue.
If I were he, I’d probably do what he has done. But that is not the issue either.
There’s no reason the Brits should object to Assange living in Ecuador after he’s been released from Sweden, should he choose to travel via the UK.
There’s no reason the Swedes can’t interview him in the Embassy.
He’s clearly innocent. It has already been proved.
The only reason why they want him in Sweden is either to kill him or deliver him up to a lifetime of American torture like Bradley’s.
What do you think is the reason?
Do not lie.
I think the extradition is for the purpose of being prosecuted for the offenses listed on the EAW, as established by the High Court of England and Wales when they confirmed the validity of the EAW.
As you said the other day, anyone who wants to kill Assange can do so in London when he leaves the Embassy.
The problem with cooking up legal schemes to save him is that it lowers everyone to the level of the people who’ve cooked up legal schemes to entrap the poor fellow.
What if we tried to extradite the accusers for perjury or bring a defamation case against them. Would it be credible?
I’ve asked the question before in a roundabout kind of way to people who thought changing the constitution to offer more protection to Australians abroad would be a good thing. And the answer seems to be that our ability to influence outcomes beyond our own borders depends less on legal powers than diplomatic will. In this case the will to influence Sweden to drop the whole thing, or at least interview him in the Ecuadorian Embassy before things get any worse.
I would rather lower myself a little and save Julian’s life.
You would, it seems, prefer him dead.
Tastes vary.
That is an unfair reply to a fair post. Why so cantankerous today, Bob?
As if anything we do or say here will affect the issues!
Bob I think that’s unfair. I’m not saying anything like that I want him dead.
If that is your presumption as to what anything less than unequivocal support for your idea entails then I think you’ve misinterpreted me.
I’m just trying to be more cognisant of the practical things we can do not only to save Julian Assange but to simultaneously defend both his character and his life. Or maybe you think that’s the wrong goal to have?