- Re: Julian Assange's father interviewed on UK TV (video) Archived Message
Posted by George Brennan
on April 25, 2019, 1:34 pm, in reply to "Julian Assange's father interviewed on UK TV (video)"
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Did Assange pere say ”torture without touch”? Memorable expression. One of the sofa potatoes misled by suggesting that a Tory Home secretary might have to face some responsibility Labour Blunkett’s servile 2003 extradition treaty limited Home Office power to block extradtion to the question of cruel and degrading punishmen. Gary McKinnon not only confessed to but boasted of hacking, so his illegality was not in doubt, and in 2010 New Labour minister Jaqui Smith could treat his bail application with appalling callousness. But by 2012 there was universal public sympathy for a person now medically diagnosed as mentally ill, for whom any spell in any gaol must be a cruel and unusual punishment. This forced to Theresa May in to ignore her officials and defy the US. Rather than have to do the right thing ever again she waived all Home Office rights to block extradition to the USA. She passed the buck to the courts. Assange does not admit to hacking, and the fact that her torturers have not yet broken Chelsea Manning shows they still have not proven their case. But it is not clear to me whether or how far the servile 2003 Treaty does require the US to prove its case. Any information? British public opinion certainly, and UK Supreme judges probably, will not count five years in a US jail as cruel and degrading punishment. That Assange, once deported, will probably disappear for ever into the US Gulag will not be deemed a concern of the courts. gb gb |