speedking

Come on, we're British. Surely we're not going to revoke the sanctity of a foreign embassy just so that a man accused of a sex offence abroad can be arrested and extradited!

IMO a heavy handed approach, and likely to lead to all sorts of problems for British embassies abroad in the future.

Opinions anyone?

Tidgy

Equador aren't following the rules of why an embassy is the countries ground, so why should we follow the rules about it?

tony de wonderful

It's total theatre. Equadors play the humanitarian being all 'concenrned' that he might be extradited to the US whilst hardly being a beacon of human rights in themselves. Assange acts like he's Mr freedom whist sucking up to Russia today etc.

Dedrater

It is stalemate, the embassy is in violation of the 1961 Vienna convention, the same convention preventing the UK police from entering the embassy.

It is the USA who is piling on the pressure here for there own interests and Australia should be ashamed of itself for not defending one of it's citizens

brendy76

iTrader: (6)

On a similar note, http://www.channel4.com/news/uk-man-...e-arms-charges
I know this guys son and its laughable that the US can just wade in and demand a man to be given to them.

Tidgy

his claimed reason for not going to face charges in sweeden is because he fears extradition to the US where he would face the death penalty, which goes against the european laws of human rights, which state a person cannot be deported to a country where they face capitl punichment other than there own.

so in other word, if he went to sweeden he couldn't be sent to US and im sure sweeden would publicly and legaly say that anyway.

He's just trying to avoide charges, simple as. There are rumors floating around about his dealings with equador and possible donations to political parties that are in power, make of that what you will cos there not confirmed.

Dedrater

He can still be extradited and spend the rest of his life in a supermax prison, people are there, for what America think, are lesser crimes.

Tidgy

yep, as above he's just using excuses to avoide goign on trial.

speedking

What have the Ecuadorians done?

Even if Assange is in hiding (which I don't doubt) is it worth unilaterally removing Embassy status just to reach one man who has not been found guilty?

Tidgy

Im not a law maker so i may be off target, but my understanding is that the agreement states that the embassy is soverine (sp) ground to allow the staf to carry out there diplomatic mission without interfirance from local authorities.

Further more for a person to be given or be held under asylum, that person must at risk of torture, death or persecution in the country seeking there deportation.

so for point 1, he has nothing to do with Equadors diplomatic mission.
point 2, if deported to sweeden he doesn't face torture or death and will be tried in a cout of law therefore not liable to persecution aka if hes proven inocent at the trial he will be free to go.

So equador has no legal basis to allow him asylum so is sheltering him. I also have doubts that he would face anything other than prison at worst even if he did end up in America, that again you could argue he has case to answer in a fair court of law in America.

dpb

Well he's got it

Tidgy

yeah, he's stuck in the embassy for life though lol

dpb

He deserves it

bigsinky

ironic that that to arrest a man accused of rape, the police are prepared to use a forced entry.

C/O Frankie Boyle via Twitter

bigsinky

flashmob outside the embassy with guy fawkes masks on. embassy staff all come out wearing the same. sneak him on a boat until they get into international waters then transfer him to a slow boat to Ecuador.

again i cant take credit for the idea

GlesgaKiss

Apparently the sexual assault charges are because he told women who had consensual sex with him that he was wearing a condom when he wasn't.

F*ck, is that bad?!

Anyway, do their eyes not work?

bigsinky

with some of the manky owl fannies you've been in I would say not so much "bad" as essential.

GlesgaKiss

Hey, 40 is not old. They say it's the new 30. And that's only 5 years older than me.

Suresh

Assange is a anarchist c@nt. He published his leaks in the Grauniad of course - where sudpected/accused sex offenders are heroes it seems.

He is a traitor to the west and has put countless lives in danger and so if the US wants to extradite and gitmo him then that's fine for me.

f1_fan

iTrader: (9)

Assange has just pointed out to the world a few home truths about the good old US of A. Truths that were more or less out there, but not very well publicised.

The sex offence charges are likely to be utter bollocks just trumped up to get him to a country that will hand him over the US without a single question. The UK is obviously having pressure applied by the US now hence why they are prepared to break international law to see him sent to Sweden.

Hope he gets to Ecuador and tells the US and UK to **** off!

Boro

iTrader: (1)

I can't decide whether he's a whistle blower or a traitor. Would make a great film though!

tony de wonderful

That's pure speculation F1.

f1_fan

iTrader: (9)

As was Suresh's post, point made

Luan Pra bang

What isn't ?
By any stretch the rape charges against him look dubious , go read any account of how it happened and it is clear the case would never had proceeded in any civilised nation except for Americas desire to make an example of him. Revealing Americas dirty little secrets and showing the world that the government there is no more moral than a third world dictator has pissed people off greatly and as such he will be punished. The Yanks feel they can extradite people who have committed no crime on American soil and as usual genuine justice, sovereignty and morals have nothing to do with it. They have become a ridiculous overpowering force in the world and Stalin would have been proud of what they have achieved in terms of enforcing their will upon the world at large,

markjmd

iTrader: (11)

They would do in any country that doesn't have some pretty weird ideas about what can actually constitute an offence of rape, yes, but unfortunately for Assange he chose to dip his dagger in a country that has exactly such ideas. Sweden's one of only 2 or 3 countries in the whole of Europe where the purchaser in a prostitution transaction is criminally liable, and where for example you're liable to be charged with 'minor rape' if you decide to give a woman a little poke in her sleep, even if you'd been boffing her brains out for hours earlier with her full consent before she nodded off.

The law on sexual offences there has been pushed to the extremes by a bunch of lefty uber-feminists over the past few decades, and so far as Assange is concerned he's just had the bad luck to end up on the receiving end of their lunacy.

Read more here:
http://justice4assange.com/Sexual-Offences.html

GlesgaKiss

I just read through that link. Got progressively more annoyed as the artictle went on! The most laughable bit for me was the idea that there should be an 'expression of consent'. What a truly frightening system to live under.

'Yes, I will have sex with you' - every time a man and his wife/girlfriend have sex? Either verbal or WRITTEN? What's the point in that? It's not as if it's a binding contract of consent, since consent can be withdrawn at any moment. So not just unfair but completely pointless. And then, of course, bearing in mind that consent can be withdrawn at any moment, should the woman constanly remind the man of her consent? After all, he can't possibly know for sure without something verbal or written.

'I still agree to this, by the way, so keep going'.

dpb

Ha, brings back memories of a Steve wright in the afternoon sketch 20 years back, some french women

An0n0m0us

The moon is in some strange alignment with the sun or something today as I actually agree with you

This stinks of a US stitch up job to get to him. What other way is there to destroy a bloke's reputation other than to accuse him of sex offences?

He exposed the USA for some of the lesser popular things it does and they have gone hell for leather out to get him at any cost.

I hope he makes it to Ecuador just so the US doesn't get it's way.

An0n0m0us

And this lot are more of a danger to society than the World's terrorist organisations put together. Extremism taken to a new level

tony de wonderful

I think it would be better to have the charges judged in a court of law rather than in the court of internet opinion where it is quite probable that all the fact are not available.

The allegations may be false, but it's sweden not somalia, it's a european democracy with a legal system no worse than any.

There is no evidence that the US are trying to 'stitch him up', they haven't even said they intend to extradite him.

Contrary to the narcissism of Assange and his supporters he probably isn't so important that the US will get involved in vase conspiracies to silence him. He is just a keyboard conspiracy theorist who published mostly mundane stolen information, then somehow was canonised as almost Jesus himself by a gushing lefty press.