Assange to face extradition

Well I a was a little surprised no-one else had posted this but anyway:

I sort of got a little tired of this bloke's attention seeking and histrionics concerning the publication of the Wikileaks archives in conjunction with some national dailies (including the Graun). However this extradition affair seems to me from what I've read a thinly disguised attempt to ship him off to the States. I seem to remember that a Swedish minister has as an adviser a certain Mr. Karl Rove - need I say any more?

Opinions?

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2011/nov/02/julian-assange-loses-appeal-extradition

Would not surprise me if he was a rapist.

Bollocks. Far easier to extradite to the US from Britain than it is from Sweden, thanks to our shitty no-proof-needed one-way extradition agreement with the Yanks.
Anyway, it's a good thing that the Assange circus is finally over. Ship him off and make him stand trial, like anyone else would have to.

A Swedish Minister don't just get to decide to bundle him off to the states though, they have a whole legal system over there. And one far less likely to agree to send him to the US.

His paid goons were refusing to let people into the public canteen at the courts this morning. This sort of thing is why he's rapidly running out of goodwill

Hmmm. Maybe he is guilty as charged, I am undecided on this - it's certainly possible I'll agree.

@ temper_tantrum He doesn't face any charges here for anything and the U.S. have, perhaps strangely considering our 'extradition agreement' not applied for extradition. They still, thankfully haven't gotten their hands on Gary McKinnon - someone I have a whole lot more sympathy for.

@ butchers He's really not doing himself any favours with that sort of stuff....

Nobody knows whether he's guilty or not, nobody will until he's been put on trial. I wouldn't want to predict the outcome.

Re: UK/US - well yes quite, he doesn't need to face charges here in order to be extradited to America, so your assertion that extraditing him to Sweden is a 'thinly-disguised attempt to ship him off to the States' is utter bollocks. If the Yanks wanted him, they could have filed an extradition request in the UK at any point. Sweden is far less likely to try and extradite him to the US, at the US's request. Just one of the reasons why I've never understood his strategy of fighting extradition (other than the possibility that it's attention-grabbing grandstanding, of course).

If he's innocent, he'll be found innocent and no doubt come out with a load of self-righteous shit about the waste of money spent getting an innocent person extradited and the lengthy courts process.

If he'd just gone to Sweden when asked to, to stand trial, if he was so confident in his innocence - then why the circus? The horrible shite.

Officially, he's only wanted for questioning by the Swedish at the moment IIRC. I don't know why the Swedish didn't just pick up the phone in the first place or arrange a videolink interview instead of going through this mad process which has taken nearly a year.

Probably because he dicked them around and they lost patience with him.

It's because the Swedish system isn't directly equivalent to the UK one. In Sweden being wanted for questioning happens at a stage in the process similar to being charged in the UK. In Sweden there's less tendency for the police to charge, bail then drop the charges. In Sweden being 'suspected' of a crime by police is almost the same as being charged in the UK. Partly related to there being no trial by jury over here. The police, prosecutor and judge have done a lot of deciding about whether someone's guilty or not before the trial officially starts, whereas in the UK it's supposed to be almost undecided until the jury return their verdict.

@ temper_tantrum Maybe it is 'utter bollox' lol but considering the trouble they're having getting hold of McKinnon it may be possible that they consider this an easier option. Who really knows?

here's an article from 2010 concerning Rove's links to the Swedish government:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/andrew-kreig/rove-suspected-in-swedish_b_798737.html

I think he might be genuinely scared; or was scared and is now too proud to back down. Hacker activist types tend to have a fairly overblown paranoid idea of how state repression works.

Given his unhinged approach to Private Eye, i'd say he's a drama queen.

Not been following it. What did he do?

Too tinfoil-hat for my liking. He's wanted over there, they therefore sought to extradite him, he should have just assisted with their inquiries and not dicked around so much.
I wonder how the women in this case are feeling? This whole hoo-hah probably hasn't exactly enhanced their experience.
No sympathy for him, I'm afraid.

Claimed that it was the 'jewish' journalists and the 'sort of jewish' editor Rusbridger at the guardian that were out to get him.

http://www.newstatesman.com/uk-politics/2011/03/assange-guardian-wikileaks

Jesus what a tool.

Not a great deal here either.

Oh dearie me. I've just read that New Statesman article.

Btw the Swedish government does have ties with the USA's right wing. Not just Karl Rove, the current foreign minister was one of teh few Euro members of the Committee to Liberate Iraq. There's a long history of structural cooperation between the Swedish and the US state, all through the cold war and since. But that is still dwarfed by the links between the UK and Sweden. Occam's razor suggests that what's different about Sweden is the strong presence of left-wing feminists, among anti-war actvists, in the police and also in the judiciary.

TBH, I couldn't find the Private Eye version in a few minutes of my short lunchbreak Ed - but the NS sums it up well.

You get found "not guilty", not "innocent" (you are legally innocent as a default position). Big difference that too many people don't seem to understand...

The European arrest warrant is fucking shit though.

The moment he took on Lord Gnome was the moment of his undoing. Farewell then, Julian Assaunge

Seconded.

Not sure why I missed that article first time around, it must have been linked to on here before, but kinnell!!

He's a complete idiot ...

You don't believe Hislop do you? I bloody don't.

He's achieved twenty times more than you or I ever will.

And possibly raped a few more too.

Of course, because that's how it always works isn't it?