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The Sweden charges and investigation were an obvious pretext to have him extradited to the USA. The UN special investigation concluded as much. So this is just

The Sweden charges and investigation were an obvious pretext to have him extradited to the USA. The UN special investigation concluded as much. So this is just like accusing a Russian dissident fleeing Russia that they didn't attend some fake trial in Belarus.

ben_w 5y ago
Given that he is in fact being extradited to the US from the U.K., the US trying to get him from the UK to Sweden does nothing to achieve this end and actually makes it slightly harder for them to ultimately extradite him owing to the weaker political connection that Sweden has with the USA relative to what the UK has with the USA. (The U.K. like to think it has a “special relationship” with the USA, Sweden isn’t in Five Eyes and is not a member of NATO). Do you have a link to the original UN report, because the newspapers reporting on the report are very obviously engaging in a game of telephone with what it actually says. I don’t know which newspapers are closer to the truth, but they’re sufficiently dissimilar that some of the claims I have encountered must be outright false.
- simiones 5y ago
  Here is official correspondence between the UN special rapporteur and the Swedish Foreign Ministry on this topic - this was easier to find for me than the official report, but I think it contains the relevant claims: https://spcommreports.ohchr.org/TMResultsBase/DownLoadPublicCommunicationFile?gId=24838 https://spcommreports.ohchr.org/TMResultsBase/DownLoadPublic... In particular, section 3 - Reported arbitrariness of the preliminary investigation - raises 11 ways the judicial proceedings were highly problematic, each with numerous instances of such behavior. Quoting a few of the more egregious ones, an order for his arrest was issued a few hours after two women first contacted the police about the possibility of compelling an HIV test for Assange; an official statement hadn't even been collected from one of the women yet; no statement from Assange had been requested or collected before emitting the arrest warrant; official statements made by the accusers were modified post factum in the police databases; and that both the investigating officer and an attorney for the two accusers (who sought to reopen the case after it was first closed) were both friends of a former Swedish minister of justice "at the time when Swedish security police unlawfully kidnapped and handed over two persons to CIA-custody and subsequent torture". This final collaboration may be exactly one of the reasons why Sweden would have been preferred as the extraditing state vs the UK. It's also important to note that, unlike Swededn, the UK is a common law country where the mechanisms for protecting individual rights are significantly different from the civil law system in Sweden.
  - ben_w 5y ago
    Thanks. I’ve only had time to skim-read it, but even this is already five times better than all the news articles I’ve seen combined. The style and the first three pages definitely explains the differing reports, in particular the beginning of page 3.

ben_w 5y ago

Given that he is in fact being extradited to the US from the U.K., the US trying to get him from the UK to Sweden does nothing to achieve this end and actually makes it slightly harder for them to ultimately extradite him owing to the weaker political connection that Sweden has with the USA relative to what the UK has with the USA. (The U.K. like to think it has a “special relationship” with the USA, Sweden isn’t in Five Eyes and is not a member of NATO). Do you have a link to the original UN report, because the newspapers reporting on the report are very obviously engaging in a game of telephone with what it actually says. I don’t know which newspapers are closer to the truth, but they’re sufficiently dissimilar that some of the claims I have encountered must be outright false.

simiones 5y ago
Here is official correspondence between the UN special rapporteur and the Swedish Foreign Ministry on this topic - this was easier to find for me than the official report, but I think it contains the relevant claims: https://spcommreports.ohchr.org/TMResultsBase/DownLoadPublicCommunicationFile?gId=24838 https://spcommreports.ohchr.org/TMResultsBase/DownLoadPublic... In particular, section 3 - Reported arbitrariness of the preliminary investigation - raises 11 ways the judicial proceedings were highly problematic, each with numerous instances of such behavior. Quoting a few of the more egregious ones, an order for his arrest was issued a few hours after two women first contacted the police about the possibility of compelling an HIV test for Assange; an official statement hadn't even been collected from one of the women yet; no statement from Assange had been requested or collected before emitting the arrest warrant; official statements made by the accusers were modified post factum in the police databases; and that both the investigating officer and an attorney for the two accusers (who sought to reopen the case after it was first closed) were both friends of a former Swedish minister of justice "at the time when Swedish security police unlawfully kidnapped and handed over two persons to CIA-custody and subsequent torture". This final collaboration may be exactly one of the reasons why Sweden would have been preferred as the extraditing state vs the UK. It's also important to note that, unlike Swededn, the UK is a common law country where the mechanisms for protecting individual rights are significantly different from the civil law system in Sweden.
- ben_w 5y ago
  Thanks. I’ve only had time to skim-read it, but even this is already five times better than all the news articles I’ve seen combined. The style and the first three pages definitely explains the differing reports, in particular the beginning of page 3.