Dodany: Feb 27, 2011   Od: ProtectSouthOssetia

Czas: 4:35

Kanal: Education

On June 28, 1971, Daniel Ellsberg was arrested for his role in stealing the Pentagon Papers, a collection of classified documents that revealed the U.S. government had been systematically lying to the American people about the Vietnam War. As for why The New York Times had a right to publish the Pentagon Papers, Justice Hugo Black composed one of the most famous paragraphs in Supreme Court case history: "Only a free and unrestrained press can effectively expose deception in government. And paramount among the responsibilities of a free press is the duty to prevent any part of the government from deceiving the people and sending them off to distant lands to die of foreign fevers and foreign shot and shell." /// The WikiLeaks founder says the charges are baseless and if extradited, he believes he will not face a fair trial. Assange posed some interesting questions: "Why is it that I am subject, a non-profit free-speech activist, to a US$360,000 bail? Why is it that I am kept under electronic house arrest when I have not even been charged in any country?" And he is not the only one asking those questions, particularly as the British government has a history of granting asylum to some fairly controversial characters, including Russian business tycoon Boris Berezovsky who has blood of many on his hands. Berezovsky later said he had been trying to overthrow the Russian government, using the UK as his base. "It shows here the hypocrisy of the British court. Berezovsky has quite clearly been involved in the mafia over the years. All sorts of very serious offences, which you may actually, quite literally, equate with terrorism, and yet he is not being extradited," says investigative journalist Tony Gosling. "And yet we see here, what appears to be anyway, a trumped-up charge of rape, which hasn't actually even come to charges in Sweden. Assange appears anyway being taken over to Sweden and there's going to be an appeal, so we will see, but there certainly does appear to show blatant political interference into the court system here in Britain and total hypocrisy from the British justice system." Around 40 people wanted by Russian law enforcement agencies are resident in the UK and the list of the rich and powerful wanted by Interpol is even longer. The UK is even harboring suspected terrorists. In 2003, alleged Chechen terrorist Ahmed Zakayev was granted political asylum. The same year, asylum was granted to Russian tycoon Boris Berezovsky, a case that took two years and severely damaged Russia's relationship with the UK "A basic tradition relating to asylum is that anybody can come here, provided they are allowed, provided they have got lots of money -- we will let them in, because we want them in with their money," CANA-UK Director William J. Spring stated plainly. "And therefore it is not particularly that Russian magnates and oligarchs are welcome here. Arab sheikhs who may have a dubious criminal record, as it were, of torture -- yet they are allowed to swirl around London and no problem whatsoever." Recently, the immigration minister admitted 139 suspected war criminals have been given the right to settle in Britain permanently. They are thought to include former henchmen of Saddam Hussein, an Afghan official who tortured prisoners, and Rwandan genocide perpetrators. Since the Second World War, the UK has seen only two successful convictions for war crimes. While Julian Assange looks set to be cast from the safe harbor of the UK into choppier waters, it is unlikely he will sink from view just yet. ASSANGE MAY NOT HAVE BILLIONS IN THE BANK TO BUY HIMSELF OUT OF TROUBLE, LIKE MANY REAL CRIMINALS DO IT IN UK, SO HE WILL JUST HAVE TO HOPE HIS FRIENDS IN HIGH PLACES HAVE INFLUENCE. Assange's defense team has vowed to now take his case to the highest courts in the land, in the hope of preventing his extradition. Meanwhile, convicted criminals like Boris Berezovksy and those with outstanding international arrest warrants, like Akhmed Zakayev, remain at large in the UK, under the protection of the state. Assange's defense team has vowed now to take his case to the highest courts in the land, in the hope of preventing his extradition. Meanwhile, some of the world's nastiest people -- suspected torturers, terrorists and war criminals -- enjoying their fancy life in the UK.

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