By Prof. Marcello Ferrada de Noli
[originally published in Newsmill, 3 April 2013]
The University of Adelaide’s Law School, Australia, has publicly announced
that Justice Stefan Lindskog “Chairman of the Supreme Court of Sweden,
Sweden's highest Court of Appeal will deliver a keynote public lecture
on the Assange affair, and freedom of speech, from the Swedish
perspective. As one of Sweden's most eminent jurists he is uniquely able
to provide an authoritative view of the Assange affair.“
It
is of course not completely known what will be the final content of his
address at Adelaide. But the fact that the event has been announced as
officially sponsored “in association with the Embassy of Sweden” clearly
indicates a new interference by the Swedish government in the juridical
case.
Stefan Lindskog has himself declared in Financial Review
that his public note will be dealing with such political issues (i.e.
human rights, freedom of expression) “from the Swedish perspective” and
specifically relating to the case Assange. Considering that this is a
case under investigation and by nominally lower ranks in the
Swedish legal system; and that they have manifested they are studying
the possibility of indictment (Assange HAS NOT been charged), the public
statements of a chairman of the Supreme Court prior to that formal
decision from the prosecutors is highly noteworthy.
It must be noted that Stefan Lindskog is himself of the opinion - as referred by Justice Marianne Lundius – that “the
role of (Supreme Court) judges, by a matter of principle, is not
compatible with the role of engaging themselves in criminal
investigations”. This was said in the context of declarations with regard to the investigation of Olof Palme assassination.
Since
the instigation of this case against Mr. Assange, Swedish media has
worked as an arm of the Swedish State and perpetrated a Trial by Media,
which has been widely marked by hearsay, misinformation, and attempted
character assassination of Mr. Assange (see my article in Newsmill,
English text, “(Swedish) Media reports on Assange are untruthful and identical”).
The fact that the chairman of the highest court in Sweden is being
sponsored by the Embassy of Sweden in Australia to opine publicly on a
case that may come before his court has been widely commented in social
media reaching millions of international viewers and participants, yet
neither the Swedish media nor the Swedish authorities have mentioned the
issue at all to the Swedish public. The silence is deafening.
I recently delivered an invited lecture on human rights
at The University of Örebro, about some similar topics that are to be
taken up by Stefan Lindskog in Adelaide. In the presentation I listed
facts that seriously contradict the message of the “Swedish law and
order” abiding principle that Justice Stefan Lindskog is generally
conveying in his column “Julian Assange: Swedish Justice”.
In
the first place, the Prime Minister of Sweden, followed by prominent
political leaders and journalists, has made declarations on behalf of
the accusers of Assange, directly intervening in the process, which, as
mentioned above, is still in the pre-investigation stage under one
prosecutor.
Secondly,
this prosecutor unilaterally decided to reopen the “case against
Assange” at the initiative of the law firm run by the Swedish
politicians Thomas Bodström (former Minister of Justice) and Claes
Borgström (former Ombudsman on gender issues). They, together with the
prosecutor of the case, Marianne
Ny, have been directly involved in government appointed committees
studying the enhancement of the sexual-offences legislation in Sweden.
However, when the prosecutor was reported for alleged irregularities in
the case Assange, this was rapidly dismissed on technical grounds by
the “Swedish legal system”.
Thirdly,
in Sweden, “according to the law”, it is forbidden for prosecutors to
reveal the identity or details in cases of sensitive accusations like
the one against Assange. Once more I remind that these are only
allegations under investigation, not charges, no trial. However, one
prosecutor revealed the name of Julian Assange and details of the
accusations directly to the tabloid Expressen, which ran a front page
smear article on the basis of uninvestigated allegations. The prosecutor
was reported by human right organizations, but the Swedish legal system
dismissed the case against the prosecutor on technicalities.
Then
we have the facts that are better known in the international community
about the interrogation-issue of Mr. Assange in London, a procedure that
has been flatly denied, without any juridical grounds, by the Swedish
prosecutors. Swedish prosecutors are fully able to go abroad to pursue
cases, including questioning. In fact, Swedish prosecutors and judges
travelled during 2012 all the way to Africa to put up a hearing in situ
(in Africa) regarding allegations against a person living in Sweden.
The
Swedish Ministry of Foreign Affairs, in an initiative revealed after
the visit of Foreign Minister Carl Bildt to Australia, is behind the
unethical, opportunistic sponsoring of Justice Stefan Lindskog, of the
Supreme Court, traveling all the way to Australia in a bid to counter
the international embarrassment Sweden has suffered through its own
actions in the case Assange. They have chosen this route instead of ending
the embarrassment by ethically (and totally according to the Swedish
law praxis) conducting the interrogation of Assange in London, which is
just a couple hours’ flight from Stockholm. It is left to see whether
Associate Professor Stefan Lindskog will have an independent stance in
spite of the official embassy sponsoring, and whether such stance would
or not represent prospective rulings of the Supreme Court.
Let
us make clear that Mr. Assange, through his legal representatives, has
stated that it is his wish to clear the Sweden case and that he would
come to Sweden if they guarantee no onward extradition to the United
States. Indeed, Ecuador’s decision for granting Mr. Assange asylum is
based in part on Sweden’s refusal to grant such assurances. In the case
that Mr. Assange would face extradition from Sweden, it is the Supreme
Court, chaired by Justice Stefan Lindskog, who would decide the legality
of any extradition. If extradition is ruled legal, then it would be up
to the government to decide whether to allow extradition. Nevertheless,
there are cases in which the Swedish government has facilitated
extrajudicial extraditions at the behest of the United States. These are
the cases of “extraordinary renditions” authorized by the Justice
Ministry and of the Foreign Office of Sweden. One of these cases was
exposed and occasioned the sanctions from the part of the UN against
Sweden, for serious violations against the Absolute Ban on Torture,
which Sweden had signed.
Justice
Lindskog has announced he will be arguing around the extradition-issue
of Assange to the US. For that, he has prepared a long list of
law-paragraphs that he presented in Financial Review. Let me just remind
that in contrast with the legal wording of documents signed by
Sweden on matters of extradition, we have the praxis of the Swedish
government. These facts cannot possibly be washed away with a fancy
lecture or a pseudo panel of arranged questions and deceptive responses.
Sweden
is not a neutral country. Rather, it is now fully committed to
Intelligence and military operations led by the US armed forces
Sweden
participated actively with logistical and engineering aid in the US
bombardment of Iraq. Sweden participated in the military surveillance of
the bombardments of Libya, an initiative from the government, which
received the support of all the Swedish established political
parties, from the conservatives (Moderater) to the Left Party (Vänster).
Sweden is actively participating, under the command of US, in the
military occupation of Afghanistan.
In connection to the above, WikiLeaks has exposed that the Swedish surveillance-legislation (FRA-lagen) which, in spite of great controversy, the government put forward in 2008, was a “made-to-order-job” directly requested by the US government.
Most recently, a legislation initiative was put forth by the Swedish
government aiming to protect the interests of the countries with which
Sweden has on-going collaboration. The proposed legislation is also
known as the anti-WikiLeaks legislation.
Whatever
the concrete formulation of an indictment of Assange in the US, it will
be inevitably related to allegations of whistleblowing military
secrets, etc. Sweden, as a close military partner with the US, has
largely complied with and even collaborated on matters of renditions of
individuals regarded as enemies of the US. Swedish reporters have
revealed very recently, with sources independent of WikiLeaks, that
Minister Carl Bildt has been an informant of the US government for
decades. These episodes have irritated his old political partners of
previous government coalitions, who claim they did not know, and that
they do not approve of Bildt’s position as it has been revealed.
However, it is none other than Carl Bildt who is deciding extradition
and rendition matters in Sweden. Let’s recall that the recent rendition
to the US of Swedes in Ethiopia, was done with the knowledge of the
Swedish Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and in spite that Swedish
prosecutors have cleared these individuals from suspicions of being
terrorists.
The words printed
in the Swedish law books tell that agreements with foreign powers
compromising sovereignty-issues should be known and approved by the
Swedish Parliament. The current praxis has been, however, that
military intelligence endeavours such as gathering of information about
Swedish nationals is nowadays controlled by agreements of officials of
the Justice Ministry and of the Foreign Office of Sweden with US
government Intelligence organizations. This, totally unknown by the
Swedish Parliament, is one of the items exposed by WikiLeaks. A
prominent journalist from Expressen wrote about these Intelligence tasks led by the US that the “Swedish government officials got the impression that they were working under direct orders of the CIA”.
Sweden’s real praxis on political extraditions is not concerned with judges or legislation
If
we now examine the praxis of Sweden in the issues of political
extraditions that Professor Stefan Lindskog will be referring in his
address:
To
start with, referring to the US requests on extraditions: Regardless of
what is written in the multiple extradition agreements mentioned by
Stefan Lindskog, the reality in Sweden regarding extradition is that,
since over a decade, ALL THE CASES requested by the US of individuals in
Swedish territory to be extradited to the US were approved by Sweden.
Additionally, there are further treaties ruling extraditions issues
between US and Sweden, and which would enable Sweden to deliver Julian
Assange to the US, such as in the case he would be requested as a
witness in the trial against Bradley Manning.
Does
the government of Sweden really need any written law or agreement to
comply with political requests of extraditions from the US, particularly
in the frame of “terrorist” accusations – such as Assange has been
named in the US, for instance Vice President Biden had likened Julian Assange to a “high-tech terrorist”; and his Republican counterpart Sarah Palin, former US Vice Presidential Candidate declared, “Julian Assange should be targeted like the Taliban”.
Sweden’s
unsavoury behaviour regarding political extraditions can be traced
through the historical record. Over half of the 4 000 Russians refugees
that Sweden secretly extradited at the request of Stalin were soldiers
in the Red Army who fled to Sweden after being confined in German camps,
for which they were refugees in Sweden (see “Interpellation 2001/02:12” of the Swedish Parliament; the corresponding link Interpellation 2001/02:12 Riksdagen has now been removed). Also in the post war year Sweden extradited ca. 150 Baltic soldiers to the Soviet Union,
and they clearly were political refugees in Sweden. These extraditions
proceeded despite there being “no legal ground for the extradition
according to the Hague Conventions”, which Sweden had also signed.
Episode after episode (see my article “In the history of Swedish extradition of political prisoners to foreign powers“) indicate that what Sweden signs about
extraditions, what is “written in the law” and the jurists repeat, are
in drastic contradiction with the praxis executed by Sweden in their
secret agreements with foreign powers.
During
the last years Sweden has been taken countless times upon the European
Court for the extradition/deportation of political refugees that have
face such ominous fate at arrival in their original countries, after
being airborne there with the escort of Swedish police. In many cases
the deported have encountered immediately arresting upon arrival. I know
about also because I have professionally participated in the past with
documentation on diagnostic assessments on behalf of those refugees,
whose cases have eventually been taken to such European tribunals.
Politically appointed judges
Further,
in Sweden, the majority of judges in the lower courts (of the kind that
would eventually try the Assange case if it goes to court) are appointed by the established political parties.
It must be understood here that those established parties – according
to the Swedish praxis of political consensus on issues of foreign policy
- are backing the government on geopolitical issues according to the
Bildt doctrine, and it is alleged that the organization WikiLeaks and
his founder Julian Assange are compromising the national interests of
Sweden. In these lines, the Swedish military establishment spreads (i.e.
the statements of Mike Winnerstig, at the time Deputy Director of
Research, Swedish Defence Research Agency – institution under the
Swedish Ministry of Defence) in the state owned television the false
notion that WikiLeaks and Assange are “blackmailing Sweden”,
and also suggesting that WikiLeaks would be favouring Russian interests
while focusing in the exposure of NATO. The state-owned Swedish
National Television (SvT), in its turn, has equated Julian Assange
“Sweden’s No. One Enemy”. The Trial by Media against Assange has been
compact. So far no judge, no prosecutor, no legal authority whatsoever
has protested about these events, and we therefor wondered: What
guarantees of a fair trial could Assange expect in Sweden?
Now Judge Lindskog have declared abroad, although - to the best of my knowledge - not in Sweden:
"At
the end of the day, many years from now, I think Assange will not, even
in Sweden, be associated with his efforts to escape the laws of Sweden.
He will be thought of as the person who made public some pieces of
classified information to the benefit of mankind. Crimes against
humanity such as the [WikiLeaks images of Iraqi civilians being killed
in a] helicopter shooting need to be made known. The good made by
leakage of such information cannot be underestimated. It should never be
a crime to make crimes of state known."
This
may be a promising development. We will listen with much care and
interest to Justice Stefan Lindskog’s keynote public lecture on the
Assange affair. And we really hope that, in honouring the Swedish
perspective, he will be addressing also the issues mentioned here. The
mismanagement of the Assange case has been devastating to Sweden’s
international reputation and to the credibility of its legal system. A
positive outcome of Justice Lindskog’s public presentation would be to
tell the international community the complete truth about this case.
Justice Lindskog may have an outstanding opportunity to demonstrate that
at least Swedish professors, such as him, have independent academic
voices and are not, as otherwise customarily read in Swedish media,
instruments and actors of an uncritical consensus, which definitely do
not help this noble Nation.
Acknowledgments
I thank @treisiroon for valuable comments
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