Assange’s liberation is only the first step – Part 2

Julian Assange sacrificed 14 years of persecution to defend freedom. His opponents, however, were not external autocracies, but influential circles within the Western military and intelligence services. It is an alarming contradiction that Assange exposed the violation of democratic principles by the security forces, while their job was to defend those same principles.

The contradiction is easily resolved if one has fully internalized the Jefferson quote in Part 1 of this article, “I hope our wisdom will grow with our power and teach us that the less we use our power, the greater our it will be.”

During its formative decades, the United States was the historically predestined leading nation within a circle of friendly other nations that share with it the ideals of free democracy. This circle expanded first in Europe, where the American population mainly comes from. In general, the spread of free democracy occurred without violence, simply by following the successful example of the United States, which became the leading country in the world through its effective free market economy and the smooth integration of immigrants.

This peaceful spread of free democracy could have transformed the earth into the harmonious community of free nations that the UN are falsely believed to be. Instead, undemocratic and anti-liberal circles with British roots have managed to enter the USA and to transform the republic and its fair market economy into an empire of big money, governed by oligopolies and the rule of the stronger.1)

Even worse, the peaceful expansion based on idealism was substituted by a primitive militarism, first practiced full-scale during the presidency of William McKinley (1897-1901). This militarist was also the first candidate who became president through a generously funded, professionally managed election campaign. This way it became clear whose interests were actually served by American politics thenceforth.

Julian Assange became a freedom hero by successfully exposing counterproductive actions by the US security apparatus during military operations. A look behind the curtain of (unconstitutional) secrecy shows that the WikiLeaks founder was not simply fighting for the truth, but actually for freedom of the press and against the rule of violence.

But Assange underestimated the extent of the threat his work posed to these undemocratic circles – and their willingness to use illegal tricks to get him out of the way.

But thanks to the idealistic work of Nils Melzer, till 2022 UN Special Rapporteur on Torture, these manipulations came to light. Meanwhile, the free press closed its eyes to reality and avoided critical questioning of the unconstitutional actions.

Melzer did the crucial groundwork to dissuade the militarists from further persecution of Assange and to release him after 1901 days of detention in return for an admission of guilt. The idealist accepted the end of his UN career as the price he had to pay for his courageous defense of Assange and constitutional principles. Since July 2022, he works as a Red Cross Director of International Law, Policy & Humanitarian Diplomacy.

Among other things, Melzer revealed that

– the two rape allegations against Julian Assange were false, as in both cases there had been consensual sex without violence.

– in one of the two police reports, the transcript was rewritten with fabricated accusations – while in reality the woman only wanted to force him to take an AIDS test after the meeting.

– in the second police report, the accusation consisted of the claim that the accused did not use a condom without the woman’s consent.2)

The media not only spread the false accusations, but also served up a second untrue narrative, namely that Assange had evaded cooperation with the Swedish justice system – while he repeatedly, but in vain, asked for the opportunity to defend himself against the false accusations.

The same truth-distorting reporting concerned Assange’s decision to leave Sweden for the UK. In fact, this was not done at all to evade Swedish justice, but to avoid extradition to the US at all costs. There he faced a closed trial under the unconstitutional Espionage Act of 1917 for having viewed and published secret documents (mainly about war crimes committed by the American security forces and their allies). This trial before a special court could have resulted in the death penalty or, as was later commented, up to 175 years in prison.

As Nils Melzer gained more insight into the case, he became a whistleblower himself and was exposed to bullying and resistance on various levels. Behind all these events, Melzer recognized a deep-seated problem in the Western system, the Assange case playing a key role in solving it.

“I am an activist, but not for Assange, but for the rule of law. … Here I have the chance to achieve something that goes beyond the case… The protection of press freedom and the rule of law.”3)

Melzer played a crucial role in saving Julian Assange’s life, but his main task has not yet been fulfilled. It is about the long overdue containment of an unconstitutional influence – the influence of the Anglo-American MIC militarists, including the security agencies. The outcome is still open; after around five years of intensive warnings by the idealistic former UN Special Rapporteur on Torture about the threat to the West from its own security apparatus, foreign policy is still and even more strongly dominated by militarists. The course is leading the liberal civilization into wars with Russia and China and endangering the existence of Israel, risking civil war in the USA and promising manifold chaos in Europe.

To peacefully free our civilization from the undemocratic and highly dangerous dominance of backward militarists, the same civil courage is now required that Nils Melzer and other freedom activists already showed to free Julian Assange.

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References

1) https://www.frieden-freiheit-fairness.com/en/blog/empire-big-money

2) https://www.pressenza.com/2020/03/how-swedish-authorities-invented-the-rape-charge-against-julian-assange/

3) https://www.blick.ch/schweiz/sonderberichterstatter-nils-melzer-51-der-fall-assange-hat-meine-uno-karriere-beendet-id16682596.html