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On April 11th, the anniversary of Julian’s arbitrary detention in UK prisons, Julian’s fiancee talks to the cameras

Editor’s Note: Was this forced by Judge Baraitser’s court disclosures or a voluntary decision for the family to step into the limelight?

• Stella Morris fell in love with Assange five years ago while visiting him
• She is South-African born lawyer and changed name from Sara Gonzalez Devant 
• The couple have been engaged since 2017 and relationship began in 2015
• She first visited him while working on legal bid to halt extraditions to the US [Editor’s Note: Sweden?]
• First child, Gabriel, was conceived in 2016 before the couple’s engagement
• Couple believe US intelligence agencies tried stealing son’s DNA from his nappy
• Miss Morris had second son, Max, in February 2019, with birth filmed on a GoPro
• Assange was visited in prison by both sons, when Max was three months old

Coverage in the
Daily Mail and fact checked in RT News
The Evening Standard
ABC News

A Google translation of a letter dated 11th April 2020

A year after Julian Assange’s imprisonment in the United Kingdom, the three unions of French journalists, members of the IFJ (SNJ, SNJ-CGT, CFDT Journalists), sent him a letter of solidarity.

Dear Julian,

In these times of pandemic where releases are massively granted to prisoners from several countries of the world, your release has been refused by the judge who intends to keep you behind bars in order to continue the hearings on your potential extradition to American soil . Hearings that are part of a flawed procedure, preventing an effective organization for your defense.

On behalf of the three unions of French journalists members of the IFJ (SNJ, SNJ-CGT, CFDT Journalists), we extend our deep support to you in the face of the avalanche of injustices that you have suffered for almost eight years. We can never forget the ordeal you are going through for having succeeded in making possible the most massive leaks of information of general interest in the 21st century. And we can never thank you enough for your titanic work which has enabled journalists from around the world to relay to the general public the files that you have helped to make accessible.

At the time of writing, it has been a year, to the day, since the British authorities took physical possession of your destiny by forcing you into the high security prison at Belmarsh, near London, where you are now being held in a purely arbitrary manner, on political criteria that your jailers, the British authorities, no longer even hide.

International solidarity is yours, but despite the multiple demonstrations outside the prison, information campaigns on social networks, petitions, open letters to institutions and other press releases, arbitrariness and unfairness overwhelm you. Ink has been spilled in many countries around the world to demand your release. But, and you yourself have helped to reveal it in the eyes of all, the methods of those who are striving for truth and transparency around the world are proving to be tenacious: the cogs put in place to make you pay for your courage doesn’t have not yet given in to initiatives in favor of your release.

Julian Assange, thank you for having given strength and inspiration to a number of citizens who are committed to making transparent the criminal designs and the operating modes of administrations which survive only by the opacity of their actions.

A considerable mind has kept you going until this day. May the moral support that we send you in this letter allow you to hold on, the time necessary to find a positive outcome to the sham of judgment organized by your jailers. The time needed to repair eight years of forced confinement, purely political.

Hold on, Julian, for yourself, your family and all those who count on you around the world, because you have become a symbol of the freedom to inform. We need you ! Know that our unions will never stop defending you and putting all means in its possession with the aim of finally freeing you. You can count on us !

Yours,

SNJ, SNJ-CGT, CFDT-Journalists

Paris, April 11, 2020.

Original Post in French on International Federation of Journalists Web Site

On the 27th March Emmy wrote

Editor’s Note: This article is included as Julian’s protagonists have seemingly unlimited resources to spread misinformation and undermine Julians character. We are many and setting the record straight and keeping the publishers honest is an integral part of the campaign

Correcting the record in the Julian Assange case is essential part of our solidarity work in support of the WikiLeaks founder and in these Corvid-19 days of social distancing hampering our street actions, provides an effective alternative of action with significant impact.

I wrote to The Evening Standard twice highlighting errors in their reporting and requesting they set the record straight. Both times their response has been good.

On March 18th this year I highlighted that their article with the title: “The Londoner: Father fears Assange will die in jail” incorrectly stated that: “Assange had been set to be extradited to Sweden over rape charges, but these were dropped last year as the complainant’s memory faded”.

I pointed out their error correcting the record that Julian Assange was never charged in Sweden and that the case remained in preliminary stage investigating allegations only.

I provided them with several resources backing up my complaint like links to the UK’s Supreme Court clarifying note, and more recently, statements by Swedish Prosecutor Eva-Marie Persson to the press:

“I would like to make the following very clear: my decision to re-open the preliminary investigation is not equivalent on whether or not to file an indictment with the courts. This is the matter we’ll have to revisit,”

as reported by CNN

“Deputy Chief Prosecutor Eva-Marie Persson reopened the remaining case after Assange left the embassy, but she said on Tuesday the passage of time meant there was not enough evidence to indict Assange.

“After conducting a comprehensive assessment of what has emerged during the course of the preliminary investigation I then make the assessment that the evidence is not strong enough to form the basis for filing an indictment,” she told a news conference. ”

as reported by Reuters.

Concluding I asked them in the name of accuracy and truthful reporting, to replace the word “charges” with the word “allegations”.

Two days letter The Evening Standard’s Assistant Managing Editor Jeannette Arnold
Assistant Managing Editor wrote back thanking me for my letter. She corrected the error replacing the sentence with a more accurate description: “Assange had been set to be extradited to Sweden over a rape allegation, but the investigation was dropped last year as prosecutors said witnesses’ memories had faded.”

But went further to delete the word “Hiding” (in the embassy) by saying:

“we don’t consider this to be inaccurate. It’s a colloquial shorthand way of explaining that Mr Assange had entered the embassy in breach of his bail conditions and was avoiding arrest by the UK police. Nonetheless, we have deleted this word from the online article as a gesture of goodwill.”

Furthermore she continued:

“The article made no comment about the lawfulness or otherwise of Mr Assange’s eviction from the embassy. We are under no obligation to include every detail of the case.”

Since I did not highlight these additional points in my complaint, it is reasonable to assume that other people did place complaints and the editor created a single response collating the corrections that she then sent to all people who had complained.

Back in September last year I had made a similar complaint about exactly the same issue.

Their article of 27/09/2019 “Julian Assange: Private security firm ‘spied on WikiLeaks founder in Ecuadorian embassy for CIA’ ” stated that:

“He took refuge there in 2012 while on bail and facing extradition to Sweden on sex charges, saying he feared extradition to the US if he left over the activities of WikiLeaks.”

The same lady advised me on the same day that the article had been updated.

In conclusion:

The Evening Standard has a well staffed, fast response team for dealing with inaccuracies in their articles. Their reporting on the Julian Assange case is frequent as are the errors. It is worth reviewing its reporting to document historic errors. For someone with time in their hands, Evening Standard articles to March 2020 mentioning assange sweden charges and file complaints for all of them. It would be interesting to see if Editors would correct all of the errors going back to 2010.

Read original article plus more in WiseUp

On the 8th April, Craig Murray Blogs about the hearing that day

Yesterday Mark Sommers QC, the extremely erudite and bookish second counsel for Julian Assange in his extradition hearing, trembled with anger in court. Magistrate Vanessa Baraitser had just made a ruling that the names of Julian Assange’s partner and young children could be published, which she stated was in the interests of “open justice”. His partner had submitted a letter in support of his Covid 19 related bail application (which Baraitser had summarily dismissed) to state he had a family to live with in London. Baraitser said that it was therefore in the interests of open justice that the family’s names be made public, and said that the defence had not convincingly shown this would cause any threat to their security or well-being. It was at this point Sommers barely kept control. He leapt to his feet and gave notice of an appeal to the High Court, asking for a 14 day stay. Baraitser granted four days, until 4pm on Friday.

I am in lockdown in Edinburgh, but received three separate eye witness reports. They are unanimous that yet again Baraitser entered the court carrying pre-written judgements before hearing oral argument; pre-written judgements she gave no appearance of amending.

There have been two Covid-19 deaths in Belmarsh prison so far. For obvious reasons the disease is ripping through the jail like wildfire. The Department of Justice is admitting to one death, and refuses to give statistics for the number of cases. As even very sick prisoners are not being tested, the figures would arguably not mean much anyway. As the court heard at the bail application, over 150 Belmarsh prison staff are off work self-isolating and the prison is scarcely functioning. It is the most complete definition of lockdown.

The Prison Governors’ Association submitted to the House of Commons Justice Committee (which yesterday morning considered prisoner releases in closed session) that 15,000 non-violent prisoners need to be released to give the jails any chance of managing COVID-19. The Department of Justice has suggested releasing 4,000 of whom just 2,000 have been identified. As of a couple of days ago, only about 100 had actually been released.

The prisons are now practising “cohorting” across the estate, although decisions currently lie with individual governors. Prisoners who have a cough – any cough – are being put together in segregated blocks. The consequences of this are of course potentially unthinkable. Julian has a cough and chronic lung condition for which he has been treated for years – a fact which is not in dispute.

Yesterday Baraitser again followed her usual path of refusing every single defence motion, following pre-written rulings (whether written or merely copied out by herself I know not), even when the prosecution did not object. You will recall that at the first week of extradition hearing proper, she insisted that Julian be kept in a glass cage, although counsel for the US government made no objection to his sitting in the body of the court, and she refused to intervene to stop his strip searching, handcuffing and the removal of his court papers, even though the US government joined the defence in querying her claim she had no power to do this (for which she was later roundly rebuked by the International Bar Association). 

Yesterday the US government did not object to a defence motion to postpone the resumption of the extradition hearing. The defence put forward four grounds:

1) Julian is currently too ill to prepare his defence
2) Due to Covid-19 lockdown, access to his lawyers is virtually impossible
3) Vital defence witnesses, including from abroad, would not be able to be present to testify
4) Treatment for Julian’s mental health conditions had been stopped due to the Covid-19 situation.

Baraitser airily dismissed all these grounds – despite James Lewis QC saying the prosecution was neutral on the postponement – and insisted that the May 18 date remains. She stated that he could be brought to the cells in Westminster Magistrates Court for consultations with his lawyers. (Firstly, in practice that is not the case, and secondly these holding cells have a constant thoughput of prisoners which is very obviously undesirable with Covid19). 

It is worth noting that the prosecution stated that the US government’s own psychiatrist, appointed to do an assessment of Julian, had been unable to access him in Belmarsh due to Covid 19 restrictions.

This is getting beyond me as it is getting beyond Mark Sommers and the defence team. Even before Covid 19 became such a threat, I stated that I had been forced to the conclusion the British Government is seeking Assange’s death in jail. The evidence for that is now overwhelming.

Here are three measures of hypocrisy. 

Firstly, the UK insists on keeping this political prisoner – accused of nothing but publishing – in a Covid 19 infested maximum security jail while the much-derided Iranian government lets Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe out and hopefully will release her altogether.
Which is the inhumane regime?

Secondly, “open justice” allegedly justifies the release of the identities of Julian’s partner and kids, while the state enforces the secrecy of Alex Salmond’s busted accusers, even though the court heard evidence that they specifically colluded to destroy him using, as a deliberate tool, the anonymity afforded to people making sexual accusations.

Thirdly, nobody cultivates her own anonymity more than Vanessa Baraitser who has her existence carefully removed from the internet almost entirely. Yet she seeks to destroy the peace and young lives of Julian’s family.

Keep fighting for Julian’s life and for freedom.

Refer Craig Murray’s Blog

Posted on wiseUp on 22 March 2020

Investigative journalist and author Iain Overton worked with WikiLeaks Julian Assange in the publication of the Iraq War Logs while he was working for The Bureau of Investigative Journalism. Here, speaking to the podcast Anonymous Bites Back, he raises a strong voice in defence of the WikiLeaks publisher almost 10 years after their initial collaboration.

Read article with full transcript at WiseUp

Threat raised 7th January 2020; Response delivered 20th March 2020 on the CoE Platform to promote the protection of journalism and the safety of journalists

Review Incident Logs for complete picture

Editors Note: The response seems to over look the disproportionate sentencing issues and arbitrary nature of detention. It might also be possible the prosecution has already argued the safeguards of the Extradition Act 2003 as outlined below do not apply.

UK Response

UK State reply to alert “Continued Detention of WikiLeaks Founder and Publisher Julian Assange”
Received by e-mail on 20 March 2020

Mr Julian Assange is accused of unlawfully obtaining and disclosing classified documents related to the national defence of the US, and of computer misuse. The US extradition request for Mr. Assange is governed by Part 2 of the Extradition Act 2003. The Act provides a person whose extradition is sought by another jurisdiction with full and effective safeguards. For example, the court must consider human rights issues, including whether the person will receive a fair trial.

The next stage in the US extradition proceedings is a Magistrates’ Court hearing at which Mr. Assange may challenge his extradition on the grounds of the statutory bars in the Extradition Act, such as human rights. The hearing began on 24 February 2020 for one week and will continue on 18 May for three weeks.

Statement of Threat

Julian Assange, founder and publisher of WikiLeaks, is currently detained in Belmarsh high-security prison, United Kingdom, pending extradition to the United States of America. On 11 April 2019, after the Government of Ecuador had decided to stop granting him asylum in its London embassy, Assange was arrested by the British police, and found guilty that day of breaching the UK Bail Act. On 1 May 2019, he was sentenced to 50 weeks in prison in the United Kingdom, and the Government of the United States unsealed an indictment against him for alleged computer intrusion, based on a series of leaks provided by US Army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning. The charges were extended on 23 May 2019 to violating the US Espionage Act of 1917. 

Several lawyers, politicians, journalists and academics consider Assange’s arrest in the United Kingdom and prosecution in the United States for publishing leaked documents of public interest an attack on press freedom and international law. After examining Assange in prison on 9 May 2019, UN special rapporteur on Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment Nils Melzer concluded: “In addition to physical ailments, Mr Assange showed all symptoms typical for prolonged exposure to psychological torture, including extreme stress, chronic anxiety and intense psychological trauma.” In a letter sent on 29 October 2019 to the UK Government, Melzer wrote: “I found that the UK had contributed decisively to producing the observed medical symptoms, most notably through its participation, over the course of almost a decade, in Mr. Assange’s arbitrary confinement, his judicial persecution, as well as his sustained and unrestrained public mobbing, intimidation and defamation. (…) British officials have contributed to Mr. Assange’s psychological torture or ill-treatment, whether through perpetration, or through attempt, complicity or other forms of participation. (…) Recurring and serious violations of Mr. Assange’s due process rights by UK authorities have rendered both his criminal conviction and sentencing for bail violation and the US extradition proceedings inherently arbitrary. (…) The detention regime currently imposed on Mr. Assange appears to be unnecessary, disproportionate, and discriminatory and to perpetuate his exposure to psychological torture or other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.”

WikiLeaks makes new content available free to broadcasters and websites

Ten year anniversary of the “Collateral Murder” release

This Sunday, April 5th, marks the ten year anniversary of WikiLeaks publication of Collateral Murder, the video taken from the cockpit of two US Apache helicopters of the shooting dead of 2 Reuters journalists and 11 civilians on the streets of Baghdad. The release had a global political impact.

This package has been produced to mark the ten year anniversary and contains new interviews those who were involved.

This material is free for broadcasters, media organisations, and campaign websites to use.

The Collateral Murder publication by WikiLeaks included the US military Rules of Engagement, for which the US now seeks Julian Assange’s imprisonment. He faces 175 years in prison if extradited to the United States.

The new Collateral Murder – Ten Years On Video Package can be found here: https://www.dropbox.com/s/8s319c28alpgi0u/Cut%2015.mp4?dl=0

For more information:

Stay Informed – Don’t Extradite Assange: https://dontextraditeassange.com/#initiatives

Background: Julian Assange extradition and imprisonment – current status

Council of Europe: Platform to Promote the Protection of Journalism and Safety of Journalists – Alert 1/2020 – Continued Detention of WikiLeaks Founder and Publisher Julian Assange (Level 1) EFJ/IFJ, AEJ, Index on Censorship

https://www.coe.int/en/web/media-freedom/detail-alert?p_p_id=sojdashboard_WAR_coesojportlet&p_p_lifecycle=0&p_p_col_id=column-4&p_p_col_pos=2&p_p_col_count=3&_sojdashboard_WAR_coesojportlet_alertId=57066904

Commissioner for Human Rights Dunja Mijatovic (Council of Europe)

Julian Assange should not be extradited due to potential impact on press freedom and concerns about ill-treatment

https://www.coe.int/en/web/commissioner/-/julian-assange-should-not-be-extradited-due-to-potential-impact-on-press-freedom-and-concerns-about-ill-treatment

Reporters Without Borders (RSF)

UK: Legal arguments during the first week of Julian Assange’s extradition hearing highlight lack of US evidence

https://rsf.org/en/news/uk-legal-arguments-during-First-week-Julian-Assanges-extradition-hearing-highlight-lack-us-evidence

International Bar Association – Human Rights Institute

IBAHRI condemns UK treatment of Julian Assange in US extradition trial

https://www.ibanet.org/Article/NewDetail.aspx?ArticleUid=c05c57ee-1fee-47dc-99f9-26824208a750

OSCE Media Freedom Representative calls on UK authorities not to extradite WikiLeaks editor Julian Assange to the US

https://www.osce.org/representative-on-freedom-of-media/446923

Amnesty International

USA must drop charges against Julian Assange

https://www.amnesty.org/en/get-involved/take-action/julian-assange-usa-justice/

UK: Assange bail application highlights COVID-19 risk to many vulnerable detainees and prisoners

https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2020/03/uk-assange-bail-application-highlights-covid19-risk-to-many-vulnerable-detainees-and-prisoners/

The Lancet: Letter from 117 doctors – End torture and medical neglect of Julian Assange

https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(20)30383-4/fulltext

The Council of Bar and Law Societies of Europe (CCBE)

Letter regarding the interception of communications between Julian Assange and his lawyers

Letter from The Council of Bar and Law Societies of Europe (CCBE) to UK authorities about the interception of communications between Julian Assange and his lawyers @wikileaks @DefendAssange @AssangeLegal pic.twitter.com/hljFK7gW8J

— Aitor Martínez (@AitorxMartinez) February 27, 2020

New York Times

Editorial Board: Julian Assange’s Indictment Aims at the Heart of the First Amendment

For more information contact Joseph Farrell  +44 7919 891992

Or email: media@dontextraditeassange.com

Some things Judges should have considered in Assange case
see the Equal Treatment Bench Book (whole book pdf)
(extracts in attached screenshots as follows)

On 28th February, RSF reported

Editor’ Note: This observation may be applied to the Bail application of the 25th March when the prosecution claimed Julian Assange was not a Covid-19 risk or Judge Baraitser acknowledged Julian was not the only vulnerable detainee in Belmarsh.

During the first week of Wikileaks founder Julian Assange’s US extradition hearing in London, Reporters Without Borders (RSF) was concerned by the clear lack of evidence from the US for its charges against Assange. RSF also remains concerned about Assange’s wellbeing and inability to participate properly in his hearing, following reports of mistreatment at Belmarsh prison and the judge’s rejection of his application to sit with his lawyers in the courtroom. The hearing will resume from 18 May, when three weeks of evidence will be heard.

RSF conducted an unprecedented international trial-monitoring mission to the UK for Julian Assange’s US extradition hearing from 24-27 February, as the prosecution and defence presented their legal arguments at Woolwich Crown Court in London. RSF Secretary-General Christophe Deloire and RSF Germany Director Christian Mihr joined RSF UK Bureau Director Rebecca Vincent for the hearing, and Vincent was able to systematically monitor each sitting over the four days. RSF staff from London, Paris, and Berlin also staged an action outside the adjacent Belmarsh Prison – where Assange is being held – on 23 February, and joined protests outside the court on 24 February.

Read Full article in Reporters Without Boarder’s Web Site