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Assange Case Exposes the Hypocrisy of the British Government printable version

19 Aug 2012: posted by the editor - United States, United Kingdom, Sweden, Ecuador

By Memet Uludag—Irish Anti War Movement
It was the year of 1998, the former Chilean military dictator, mass murderer and torturer Pinochet had arrived to UK, a country he called his “most favoured country in the world”. No wonder why he would choose Britain as his favourite place. He was kept there under a very comfortable house arrest, effectively under the protection of the British government. Court trials, endless diplomatic debates and meetings with his favourite person, Thatcher, kept Pinochet in Britain safe and well until he was allowed to return to Chile in 2000 and to die in his comfortable military hospital bed some years later.

In 1999, during his arrest in Britain, former UK Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and former US President George H. W. Bush called upon the British government to release Pinochet and not to extradite to Spain.

The military dictator ultimately avoided having to answer to the court in Spain for his crimes against humanity.

Today, another British government is in the middle of another extradition case, and somehow they seem to be extremely keen to apply the “rule of law”.

Julian Assange is now effectively under the protection of the Ecuadorian government in the embassy building in London. But the British government is really keen to deal with this matter and send him to Sweden.

The UK Foreign Office has warned, in a note, that it could lift the embassy’s diplomatic status to fulfill a “legal obligation” to extradite Assange to Sweden. There is now a significant danger of police entering the embassy building to arrest Assange.

Wikileaks has seriously exposed the US government’s (and it’s allies such as UK) foreign policy and dirty secrets of their wars, thus making Assange probably one of the most hated man by US and UK governments.

They are furious that the leaks have exposed their machinations to ordinary people and are hounding Assange and attacking the Wikileaks website. US Vice president Joe Biden called him a “high tech terrorist”. According to the same Mr. Biden, Mubarak was not a dictator.

The US and the UK governments feel the pressure of their failed war in Afghanistan. We now know much more about the human right abuses in the hands of invading forces in Iraq and their dirty dealings.

The Wikileaks founder is being “hounded because he and Wikileaks represent openness and transparency that has exposed not only the lies and deception that lay behind the Iraq war, but also the brutality of that war. Wikileaks has shone light on the murky world of the great and powerful, in particular, inside the US state apparatus. Wikileaks has also shown the real and inhumane side of the brutal conflict in Iraq.
Something the powers-that-be believe we, the international public, should not see. Because of Julian Assange’s search for truth and transparency he is being persecuted.

As Eamon McCann of Belfast Telegraph wrote: “There might be innocents among us still unaware of Tanaiste Eamon Gilmore’s belief that telling truth in politics is preposterous had WikiLeaks not published the cable from 2008 quoting his private assurance to US diplomats that he didn’t mean a word of his public opposition to a re-run of the Lisbon treaty referendum and could be trusted to renege on his party’s policy in good time for the next poll.”

This time, the truth really hurts these governments. They can’t handle it, they can’t deal with it. Only if they could make it all disappear, only if they could prove that Assange is the bad guy and make him the enemy of the “free” and “democratic” states. Only if they could go on with their secrets forever.

But these wishes do not always easily come through. However much the British government barks loud, it is not an easy situation for them. Protests are organised in front of the Ecuadorian embassy in support of Assange.

Assange is now a world renowned name and it will not be an easy matter for Britain, both politically and diplomatically, to raid a foreign embassy and forcefully arrest Assange.

The coming days will be interesting. We need to show our support to Assange and to Wikileaks and expose the double standards and lies of these powerful governments who are running a dirty show around the world.

Think for one moment what would happen if the Ecuadorian government had threatened the British embassy in Quito with a police raid and cancellation of diplomatic status... ALL HELL WOULD BREAK LOOSE...

Tags: Julian Assange, political asylum

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