The USA have already requested his extradition in the UK - to say that "Sweden only sought rape charges because then the USA can extradite him from Sweden" is clearly bogus.
If he actually confronted these charges in Sweden, and found guilty, he may actually be out of prison by now.
And at the centre of all of this, that everyone seems to have forgotten, are these two women that have accused him of rape. It seems really inhumane and unjust to simply shrug these accusations off as political, and not that they might be telling the truth, and he's a criminal in Swedish law
As far as I know, and at least Assange has claimed this publicly in a video at least once, these two women themselves did not make rape charges against Assange.
The case was picked up by some prosecutor who initiated the charges.
They have also, wisely avoiding much of the media, enlisted a lawyer to speak on their behalf on the matter, and it was the lawyers filing that led to the investigation being reopened again.
For a pretty complete chronology, see this page on the Swedish prosecution authority: https://www.aklagare.se/en/news-and-press/media/the-assange-...
"We are going to do everything we possibly can to get the swedish police investigation re-opened so that Assange can be extradited to Sweden and prosecuted for rape. No rape victim should have to wait 9 years to see justice be served." https://twitter.com/ElisabethMFritz/status/11162929511251804...
In many jurisdictions prosecutors don't need the permission, nor cooperation, of the victims to bring a case to court. This is especially important in crimes of sexual violence because the fear of retribution causes many victims not to report; and because some victims will be being coercively controlled by their partners.
In less serious cases the victim's wishes are taken into account. However, the prosecutor is the one who charges the accused, and consent or cooperation from the victim isn't needed. It is hard to convict in cases where an uncooperative victim is the only witness, but it happens in domestic abuse cases all the time.
It is not clearly bogus. It was a concern. The concern might be wrong, as they often are. That doesn't make it somehow not legitimate.
He would be sent to USA to respond of his alleged crimes in front of a public court of justice.
Haha, no. He'd be sent to a secret FISA Star Chamber. There's no way he'd be tried in public.
And if the Swedish authorities wanted Assange to answer for alleged crimes in Sweden, all they had to do was publicly declare that they wouldn't extradite Assange to the US. That was the sole requirement he had made of the Swedish authorities in exchange for his willingness to return to Sweden. The fact that the Swedish authorities refused even that is deeply suspicious.
The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court and the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court of Review only are empowered to handle foreign intelligence surveillance warrant process.
Criminal charges are handled in US District Courts, and are Constitutionally guaranteed to be public.
If you think that the US DOJ hasn't spent a million man-hours to find some way to keep everything as secret as possible, you haven't been paying attention to their actions thus far. They will find some way to kangaroo-court him out of the public eye. They do it with foreign nationals all the time.
I'm pretty sure that they have neither spent that many man-hours nor would get much value from spending anywhere close to that, because the parameters of “as secret as possible” are, while always subject to further litigation around the borders, not so mysterious or difficult to assess that it would take that much work to get a solid idea both where the boundaries were and what the relative risks of various ways of probing the areas where there is remaining uncertainty.
> They will find some way to kangaroo-court him out of the public eye. They do it with foreign nationals all the time.
Not with foreign nationals subjected to formal criminal extradition they don't. Foreign, allegedly unawful, combatants detained by the US military or transferred to their custody by America’s cobelligerents in the context of military conflict, all completely outside of the civilian criminal justice system, sure; foreign parties where the government covertly intervenes with overseas regimes to detain them without involving the US criminal justice system to, that too. But none of those are applicable here.
It's not a trade, he allegedly raped a girl, that's his problem.
If I was Assange I would want my name clear on rape allegations, I wuoldn't run away from it.
https://www.svt.se/nyheter/inrikes/aklagaren-vill-hava-haktn...
Prosecutor works independently. Sweden has civil law system based on classical Roman law and German model. There is no plea bargaining, everyone who is prosecuted must stand trial.
The investigation was just suspended because Assange could not be questioned. They bring him for questioning to get interview. After that, the prosecutor may choose not to press charges.
The case seems very weak, so the prosecutor may drop the case.
He tried to claim that this wasn't rape in both Sweden and England (the dual criminality element which is required for extradition) and that was rejected by the court.
The first prosecutor decided to shelve the case. One of the victim's lawyers asked for this decision to be reviewed. A more senior prosecutor resumed the case.
My memory of accusations are they they sure meet my personal definition of rape. We may only disagree on the terminology; I trust we don't disagree that what is alleged should be a crime.
Source, please.
[1] https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/germany/10...
They paid, in money, but they paid.
Hell, they even filmed an entire season of Homeland in Berlin soon after...
Or how about the Evo Morales grounding incident? [0]
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evo_Morales_grounding_incident
Evo Morales incident is a complete different story.
Snowden was (is?) an american citizen, Assange is not.
Anyway, it is laughable to tjhink that European countries are in the pocket of USA, they are allied, alliance means be on the same side, sometimes even when it is wrong.
It doesn't mean that everything they order, other countries will do.
It's laughable to think that.
Alas, from the moment he entered the embassy, he has been a dead agent. What is of most import, is how this will affect the whistleblowers.
(Whistleblowers, we know you're out there. Got more fake news?)