USA
“For freedom of the press Drop the charges against Assange”
Rashida Tlaib, Democratic congresswoman, is collecting signatures in the US Congress to prevent a dangerous precedent
(2 May 2023) upg. Journalist Julian Assange has been stewing in the British maximum security prison Belmarsh for three years. He must wait there for a decision on extradition to the USA. One does not have to sympathise with Assange, one can even have bad feelings. But it is about what he has actually done. And that is nothing different from what newspapers like the ”New York Times” or the “Washington Post” have already done. This is what the Democratic member of the US House of Representatives, Rashida Tlaib, says.
A letter for which she is collecting signatures in Congress and which she wants to hand over to the US Attorney General Merrick Garland was recently made public by “The Intercept”.1
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Dear Attorney General Merrick Garland,
We write you today to call on you to uphold the First Amendment’s protections for the freedom of the press by dropping the criminal charges against Australian publisher Julian Assange and withdrawing the American extradition request currently pending with the British government.
Press freedom, civil liberty, and human rights groups have been emphatic that the charges against Mr. Assange pose a grave and unprecedented threat to everyday, constitutionally protected journalistic activity, and that a conviction would represent a landmark setback for the First Amendment.
Major media outlets are in agreement: The “New York Times”, “The Guardian”, “El Pais”, “Le Monde”, and “Der Spiegel” have taken the extraordinary step of publishing a joint statement in opposition to the indictment, warning that it “sets a dangerous precedent, and threatens to undermine America’s First Amendment and the freedom of the press.”
The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), Amnesty International, Reporters Without Borders, the Committee to Protect Journalists, Defending Rights and Dissent, and Human Rights Watch, among others, have written to you three times to express these concerns. In one such letter they wrote:
“The indictment of Mr. Assange threatens press freedom because much of the conduct described in the indictment is conduct that journalists engage in routinely – and that they must engage in in order to do the work the public needs them to do. Journalists at major news publications regularly speak with sources, ask for clarification or more documentation, and receive and publish documents the government considers secret. In our view, such a precedent in this case could effectively criminalize these common journalistic practices.”
The prosecution of Julian Assange for carrying out journalistic activities greatly diminishes America’s credibility as a defender of these values, undermining the United States’ moral standing on the world stage, and effectively granting cover to authoritarian governments who can (and do) point to Assange’s prosecution to reject evidence-based criticisms of their human rights records and as a precedent that justifies the criminalization of reporting on their activities.
– A Story of Persecution Verso Books
2023, ISBN 978-1-83976-623-7
Nils Melzer: “Assange is demonised to distract from his revelations”
Melzer is one of the world's most respected human rights lawyers. Over the past twenty years, he has advised the Red Cross, NATO and various government agencies on international law, targeted killing and cyber warfare. As UN Special Rapporteur on Torture and Other Degrading Treatment, Melzer investigated the Wikileaks founder’s ordeal for over two years and published his findings in the book “The Case of Julian Assange – History of a Persecution”.
In an interview on the publisher’s website, he says: “The facts show: Assange was quite deliberately demonised to distract the public from his explosive revelations – of war crimes, corruption and the impunity of the powerful.” For this, Assange is now being “systematically persecuted, abused and destroyed – not in a distant dictatorship, but in the middle of democratic constitutional states in Europe”.
release of Julien Assange from the British high-security Belmarsh prison.
(Picture KEYSTONE/AFP/FABRICE COFFRINI)
Leaders of democracies, major international bodies, and parliamentarians around the globe stand opposed to the prosecution of Assange. Former United Nations Special Rapporteur on Torture Nils Melzer and the Council of Europe’s Commissioner for Human Rights Dunja Mijatovic have both opposed the extradition. Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has called on the U.S. government to end its pursuit of Assange.
Leaders of nearly every major Latin American nation, including Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador, Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, and Argentinian President Alberto Fernández have called for the charges to be dropped.
Parliamentarians from around the world, including the United Kingdom, Germany, and Australia, have all called for Assange not to be extradited to the U.S.
This global outcry against the U.S. government’s prosecution of Mr. Assange has highlighted conflicts between America’s stated values of press freedom and its pursuit of Mr. Assange.
The “Guardian” wrote “The US has this week proclaimed itself the beacon of democracy in an increasingly authoritarian world. If Mr. Biden is serious about protecting the ability of the media to hold governments accountable, he should begin by dropping the charges brought against Mr. Assange.”
Similarly, the “Sydney Morning Herald” editorial board stated, “At a time when US President Joe Biden has just held a summit for democracy, it seems contradictory to go to such lengths to win a case that, if it succeeds, will limit freedom of speech.”
As Attorney General, you have rightly championed freedom of the press and the rule of law in the United States and around the world. Just this past October the Justice Department under your leadership made changes to news media policy guidelines that generally prevent federal prosecutors from using subpoenas or other investigative tools against journalists who possess and publish classified information used in news gathering. We are grateful for these pro-press freedom revisions and feel strongly that dropping the Justice Department’s indictment against Mr. Assange and halting all efforts to extradite him to the U.S. is in line with these new policies.
Julian Assange faces 17 charges under the Espionage Act and one charge for conspiracy to commit computer intrusion. The Espionage Act charges stem from Mr. Assange’s role in publishing information about the U.S. State Department, Guantanamo Bay, and wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Much of this information was published by mainstream newspapers, such as the “New York Times” and “Washington Post”, who often worked with Mr. Assange and WikiLeaks directly in doing so. Based on the legal logic of this indictment, any of those newspapers could be prosecuted for engaging in these reporting activities. In fact, because what Mr. Assange is accused of doing is legally indistinguishable from what papers like the “New York Times” do, the Obama administration rightfully declined to bring these charges. The Trump Administration, which brought these charges against Assange, was notably less concerned with press freedom.
The prosecution of Mr. Assange marks the first time in U.S. history that a publisher of truthful information has been indicted under the Espionage Act. The prosecution of Mr. Assange, if successful, not only sets a legal precedent whereby journalists or publishers can be prosecuted, but a political one as well. In the future the “New York Times” or “Washington Post” could be prosecuted when they publish important stories based on classified information. Or, just as dangerous for democracy, they may refrain from publishing such stories for fear of prosecution.
Mr. Assange has been detained on remand in London for more than three years, as he awaits the outcome of extradition proceedings against him. In 2021, a U.K. District Judge ruled against extraditing Mr. Assange to the United States on the grounds that doing so would put him at undue risk of suicide.
The U.K.’s High Court overturned that decision after accepting U.S. assurances regarding the prospective treatment Mr. Assange would receive in prison.
Neither ruling adequately addresses the threat the charges against Mr. Assange pose to press freedom.
The U.S. Department of Justice can halt these harmful proceedings at any moment by simply dropping the charges against Mr. Assange.
We appreciate your attention to this urgent issue. Every day that the prosecution of Julian Assange continues is another day that our own government needlessly undermines our own moral authority abroad and rolls back the freedom of the press under the First Amendment at home.
We urge you to immediately drop these Trump-era charges against Mr. Assange and halt this dangerous prosecution.
Sincerely, Members of Congress
Rashida Tlaib, D-Mich.
Jamaal Bowman, D-New York
Ilhan Omar, D-Minn.
Cori Bush, D-Mo. (incomplete)
Source of the letter: https://theintercept.com/2023/03/30/julian-assange-congress-rashida-tlaib/
Source of the introduction: https://www.infosperber.ch/freiheit-recht/menschenrechte/fuer-die-pressefreiheit-die-anklage-gegen-assange-fallenlassen, 16. April 2023 (Translation of the introduction: “Swiss Standpoint”)
1 https://theintercept.com/2023/03/30/julian-assange-congress-rashida-tlaib/