– Part II of the Series "Undressing a Swedish juridical charade" –
By Prof. Marcello Ferrada de Noli
Image above: Edmond Dulac, "The Emperor's New Clothes" [1]
CONTENTS of Part II:
Introduction – 1. The Intercept exposures
and Swedish collaboration with the US – 2. The revealing silence on
The Intercept revelations from the part of the Swedish authorities and
media – 3. The extent of a geopolitical servitude.
Introduction
“A vain Emperor
who cares for nothing but his appearance hires two tailors who promise
him the finest suit of clothes from ‘a fabric invisible to anyone who is
unfit for his position’. The Emperor cannot see the cloth himself, but
pretends that he can for fear of appearing unfit for his position; his
ministers do the same. When the swindlers report that the suit is
finished, they mime dressing him and the Emperor then marches in
procession before his subjects, who play along with the pretense.
Suddenly, a child in the crowd, too young to understand the desirability
of keeping up the pretense, blurts out that the Emperor is wearing
nothing at all” [2]
After nearly four years of the message in Professors blogg
on the case Assange, my 250 analyses and articles, one book, and nearly
1,000 comments, I have to admit that the international debate on the
Swedish case against Assange is still futilely devoted to “the legal
aspects” of the case. The discussion has been made up from the beginning
around “technical” arguments, and where court verdicts or utterances of
legal folks have been paramount attraction. As an illustration, the
Swedish online forum Flashback, mainly dealing around such legal
aspects, has produced up to now nearly sixty thousand comments (N= 59
257) that have been viewed nearly six million times (N= 5 723 806). And
from the part of the Swedish press, the only opinion articles accepted
for publication on WikiLeaks or its founder Julian Assange are those
bound to contribute to the “legal discussion”, hence, towards the ever
blowing smoke-curtain encouraged to hide the real case.
Likewise, as soon the establishment’s
media monopoly prints a declaration – often repetitions – by lawyers
working for the perpetuation of the “Assange case”, the international
social media is inundated with exegetic comments trying in vain to
elucidate if any novelty might be at sight. Like when the people tried
to describe the Emperors clothes while he walked in front of them, as
blunt naked as his deceiving.
My position is instead: there is not such
a “legal case”; it has never been. Plainly: there is not legal ground
for a prosecution of Assange in Sweden on the base of the alleged
behaviours. Arguments from the part of the Swedish prosecutors in the
form of vague insinuations of “undisclosed” reasons for pursuing the
issue of an interrogation with Assange (at the same time that they
neglect carrying out such interrogation in London) emerges after four
years as a pure and simple bluff. And this bluff shall be certainly
“called” if an interrogation ever is to be performed. Ergo, the case is
postponed indefinitely.
Which in turn is the reason explaining
why the prosecutor has first neglected such interrogation while Assange
was still in Sweden, and the afterwards deferring of the interrogation
by the prosecutor while Assange has remained in London.
Which in turn explains the unreasonable
reiteration of the prosecutor’s bluff done recently by Claes Borgström,
on that the interrogation of Assange should take place in Sweden.[3]
For both the prosecutor and Borgström – and for that part the Swedish
legal establishment as a whole – are certain that, unless the Swedish
government would not issue guaranties about no-rendition of Assange to
the USA, Julian Assange will never risk travelling to Sweden.
After all, as already recorded in
History, the company Bodtsröm & Borgström, in the person of former
Justice minister Thomas Bodström, has allegedly its hands blooded with
the rendition to the CIA of prisoners kept in Swedish territory to be
transported for torture elsewhere. To the best of my knowledge, Claes
Bogström has never publicly taken stance against such deeds, or
commented his own main partner and political peer Thomas Bodström on
that issue.
So, in my opinion, what it is required
about this case’s stalemate is to shift from the time-consuming
developing on the legal technicalities that actually refer to a
non-existing “legal case”. What it is necessary is a creative
international criticism changing focus to the actual political plot and
the denouncing of its main actors. In other words, when nearly four
years has passed, may I ask to realize that the legal garments of
Emperor Sweden have never existed? For in the main, the Swedish
Versus Assange has been from the beginning a case aimed to disrupt the
publishing endeavour of the anti-secret organization WikiLeaks.
It emerges now clearer that the “Assange
prosecution-case” was a request from the US government. And most
interesting, the dialectics of this deception is double fold. On the one
hand explains the diathesis of the case, its origins and bogus
character; on the other hand it explains the impossible situation of the
Swedish prosecution authority. They cannot afford to finish the
interrogation, now under the world scrutiny, because the bluff would be
called of when the public will realize that there has never been a legal
base for initiating such prosecution – after that it was dismissed by
Chief-Prosecutor Eva Finné in 2010.
This being the genuine reason for the
excuse-finding series produced for the protracting of the case; such as
the last publication in SvD by politician Borgström, mentioned above.
The same regarding the bogus European Arresting Warrant issued nominally
by Chief Prosecutor Marianne Ny and publicly defended by
Prosecutor-General Anders Perklev; as I explained in a recent analysis,[4] such EAW had as real target
not the detention of Assange, but the creation of an extradition
process leading to the subsequent stalemate of the case and the
immobilization of the WikiLeaks founder. It is highly the time we denounce this
in the first place and mobilise in accordance politically. For the
deadlock of a political case can only be broken down by political means.
In these days, new revelations published
by The Intercept (18 February 2014) on US efforts to get Assange
prosecuted by allies elsewhere, confirm to a great extent main theses
that I have put forward on the Assange case 2010 and onwards.
Although the Greenwald & Gallagher
revelations in those regards are not new (for the same information has
been released on at lest two occasions in 2010, see below), this new
actualization has deserved widespread attention. Partly, for the
information it was ascribed to Edward Snowden documents, and partly
because it comes almost simultaneously with the publication by Alexa
O’Brien (17 February 2014) of a thorough and inedited documentation she
obtained, pointing to the US preparations for indicting Assange and
WikiLeaks.[5] In agreement with the author, I newly republished Alexa O’Brien’s documented analysis in Professors blogg.
in In this article I discuss the above-mentioned findings and
actualizations against the backdrop of the Swedish political-prosecution
itinerary.
Finally in this Introduction, I wish to
state that my contention on a paramount political diathesis of the case
is not a “working hypothesis”, or much less a “conspiracy theory” – as
Expressen’s Editor-in-Chief Tomas Matson referred to my standpoints in a
debate with him at Swedish Radio One.[6] I am a Swedish/US educated scientist, not a Swedish journalist; [7]
and I am professor of empirically based medical sciences, not else.
Meaning: my analyses on the Swedish case against Assange are not other
than the review of facts as they have truly happened in the societies
involved. And, beyond opinions, I have never met a rebuttal on the facts I have put forward.
1. The Intercept exposures and the Swedish collaboration with the US Department of Justice
On the 18 of February, based on Edward Snowden documents, Glenn Greenwald and Ryan Gallagher revealed in The Intercept [8]
important evidence, in my opinion direct relevant to the Swedish case
against Julian Assange. Summarizing the news with Kevin Gosztolas
headline in The Dissident; [9]
“Manhunting Timeline’ Further Suggests US Pressured Countriesto Prosecute WikiLeaks Editor-in-Chief”.
Accurately, the Snowden document referred
by Kevin Gosztolas stated the following (the full document has not been
available, to the best of my knowledge; the excerpt is contained in the
above referred article by Greenwald & Gallagher):
“The United States on 10 August urged
other nations with forces in Afghanistan, including Australia, United
Kingdom and Germany, to consider filing criminal charges against Julian
Assange, founder of the rogue WikiLeaks Internet website and responsible
for the unauthorized publication of over 70,000 classified documents
covering the war in Afghanistan. The documents may have been provided to
WikiLeaks by Army Private First Class Bradley Manning. The appeal
exemplifies the start of an international effort to focus the legal
element of national power upon non-state actor Assange and the human
network that supports WikiLeaks.”
It should be clarified, as also is stated
in The Intercept article, that findings refers to an early publication,
or “scoop”, done by Philip Shenon, former NYT investigative reporter.
He published his report on US urging allies hounding Julian Assange and
WikiLeaks already on the 10 of June 2010, in the Dailybeast.[10]
a)
The first thing striking me was that the communication in which the US
government urged certain countries to initiate a prosecuting against
Assange was directed to “other nations (than the US) with forces in
Afghanistan”. Ergo, this includes Sweden, unmistakably.
This is an item not been highlighted by
the above-cited articles of Greenwald & Gallagher, or Gosztolas, or
by the article reproducing the interviews of Michael Ratner, President
Emeritus of the Centre for Constitutional Rights on the recent exposures
based on the Edward Snowden documents.[11]
In fact, the press secretary of the
Swedish Foreign Office, Anders Jörle, was asked by that time (8
September 2010) whether they have been contacted by the US on the stance
Sweden should be held about WikiLeaks. Most interesting I that the
answer provided by the Foreign Office representative did NOT deny a
contact from the US government’s on any such request to Sweden. He only
said that no contact has been carried out on the issue between USA and
officials the Swedish Foreign ministry “through the official channels”.
The said interview was conducted by Expressen’s journalist Oscar Joulander and published on September 8th, 2010. I quote from the Expressen’s report:
“They have not been in contact with us
through the official channels in Stockholm or at the embassy in
Washington”, says the Foreign Office spokesman Anders Jörle”. [12]
But this is exactly what WikiLeaks
denounced in the Diplomatic Cables on Sweden: that the contacts on
matters of Intelligence operations between the US Government and the
officials at both the Swedish ministries of Justice and of Foreign
Affairs were conducted “in secret”, and even hidden from the Parliament.
In the context, we shall consider that
Sweden represent for the US government the staunchest ally in Europe
(together with he UK) in that kind of operations. Regarding which
countries are “closest allies” in Intelligence operations is not any
longer a guessing. They were exposed initially as the “Five eyes”
countries. However, some moths ago it emerged that Sweden has been in
fact the secretly closest collaborationist European country of the Bush
and Obama government. Sweden has during last times repeatedly been
referred in the international media as to “the Sixth Eye” of the SIGINT
alliance under US command.[13]
b)
The second aspect being that this request to these countries (including
Sweden) was put forward on the 10 of August 2010. It would be enough for
the reader to check the document “Affidavit of Julian Paul Assange” to
realize the timing of the request from the US to Sweden and the timeline
of its implementation.
It is well known that on the 20 of August, only ten days after the above-referred date, [14]
Expressen published the “scoop” that Assange has been “arrested for
rape”. Expressen interviewed Maria Häljebo Kjellstrand, the Swedish
prosecutor that had issued the arresting order, and quotes:
“It is rape, confirms Maria Häljebo Kjellstrand” [15]
But what is less known, in fact, to the
best of my knowledge never been mentioned before in the debate, is what
journalist Emanuel Karlsten “anticipated” in his article in the same
issue of Expressen on that 20 of August:
“Internet is boiling with rumours that
the US government is exercising pressure on its allies to arrest
Assange. Departing from that, and from this notification (the Swedish
prosecutor arrest order) I assume that it will be extensively conspired
about that CIA finally has managed to infiltrate even the Swedish
authorities.”
Well, who was really conspiring on the 10 of August 2010?
c) The third relevant aspect being that charges were asked to be filed against “the founder of WikiLeaks Julian Assange”.
That was the case all along, that the
Swedish prosecution (the “accusations”) was initiated under request
because Assange was the founder of WikiLeaks, and for the “damage”
WikiLeaks had infringed to NATO interest and in particular in exposing
the secret agreements between the US government and “neutral” Sweden. In
fact, these were the first words I published on the case Assange back
in in 2010: [16]
“As the detention of Julian Assange is
now implemented on behalf of Sweden, it would be necessary to clarify
some issues for non-Swedish speaking audiences. Possible equivocal terms
based on direct translations of Swedish dispatches may refer not only
to the Swedish case against Assange, but also on the responsibility of
Swedish authorities in the production of the aggravating secret
agreements with American Intelligence services and that were exposed in
the diplomatic documents leaked by Assange’s organization.”
The media strategists of the requested
operation skilfully mastered the item. They managed to revert its
presentation by appealing to a false notion of “all equal under the
law”. Meaning, “just because he is a celebrity he will not be excused”.
Another trick engulfed by the Swedish public, which did not realize
that it was exactly the opposite. It was because Assange is the
WikiLeaks forerunner and indicated as main responsible of the exposures.
Further, no one has cared to
statistically examining the prevalence of such “legal measures” from the
part of the Swedish authorities among a cohort of average Swedes
accused of similar behaviours, cases with about the same degree of
“evidence” or personal-affective motivation behind, as it is purported
being the case “of the two women” accusations against Assange.
But it is also an item I have been
insisting in clarifying all along. That we should not let pass
uncontested that the case against Assange is presented at the media
divorcing “the person Assange” from the fact he is the founder and
forerunner figure of WikiLeaks. This is a mistake also contained in
several interventions from the part of WikiLeaks supporters, who
unfortunately did not realise it was part of the smear-accusation
strategy. That has been the strategy assayed by Swedish journalists and
in general among the Anglo-Saxon media, separate “Assange” from
“Wikileaks”, a mantra still going strong in the social media
particularly Twitter.
All this, but principally the
above-mentioned revelations done by Alexa O’Brien, would bring support
to the hypothesis defended in these columns (the “stalling hypothesis”)
about the protracting of the case from the part of Sweden in order to
allow the completion of the indictment in preparation in the US against
Julian Assange and WikiLeaks. In other words, the findings by O’Brien
also indicate the real nature of the Swedish case VS. Assange, as she
clearly demonstrates that US investigation of WikiLeaks is now entering its 5th year.
Why selecting Sweden for the Assange op?
One answer could be found in the content
of the first reports from Fox TV, the Daily Telegraph, etc., back in
2010-2011. Those reports nearly highlighted that Sweden is “neutral”,
and expressly anticipate the argument around these terms, “it is
unconceivable that a neutral country like Sweden, and which remained
neutral during the Second World War, would be doing this on orders of
another country.” In other terms, the image Sweden as a neutral country
would show the “objectivity” of the accusations and the subsequent
State-sponsored arresting warrants and extradition requests. But the
image of a “neutral Sweden” was deceitful, as demonstrated by the facts
exposed in the 2011 article “Sweden, NATO and Assange”,[17] answering to Clarie Harvey’s piece in Daily Telegraph. [18]
2. The revealing silence on The Intercept revelations from the part of the Swedish authorities and media.
After five days of the Intercept scoop,
particularly when the item concerning WikiLeaks and Assange has been
referred in principal international media outlets, not a single word has
been uttered by the Swedish press or broadcasting services, public or
private. This, considering that according to Google, the item referred
by the scoop of Greenwald & Gallagher to Assange and Wikileaks in
conjunction to “prosecution”, has been referred 402 000 times on the Web
so far in these five days.[19]
The scandalous touch is given by SvD. The
paper is running today (23 of February) an extensive article in the
Culture section precisely on the theme of Edward Snowden’s exposures and
in the main context of The Guardian journalist Luke Harding’s book ”The
Snowden files”. The title is even headed “A matchless reportage on
Snowden and the scoop of all times”. [20]
The article even reports expressly the launching of The Intercept,
“completely aimed at exposures based on the Snowden documents”. But
WikiLeaks is only mentioned in the article as an organization once
despised by Snowden; and Greenwald is only portrayed as a bitter
journalist “irritated that Harding has stolen his scoop”. And
about the WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange as a target for international
prosecution as described in that launching of The Intercept? Not a
word.
It is not believable that the Swedish
media would not consider relevant to Sweden, if not highly relevant, the
revelations done by Glenn Greenwald and Ryan Gallagher in The
Intercept. I will first explain this relevancy for the Swedish scenario.
Then I will enumerate some central myths cultivated by the Swedish
authorities, the Swedish legal system and their servant media about
Assange and the “legal case”. For in these behaviors is to found the
real reasons why the media is absolutely mute about the last Snowden
revelations. For it exposes the bluff.
3. The extent of a geopolitical servitude
At the very same time the right-wing
conservative SvD published politician Claes Bogström’s new utterances in
support of a prosecutor authority, this time on the Assange case,
Sweden’s Riksdagen (the Congress) was holding its yearly
debate-session on “Swedish” foreign policy. Main actors in this
nationwide-broadcasted parody were Carl Bildt, US government informer
and foreign minister of Sweden, and Urban Ahlin, a right-wing
spokesperson in foreign affairs of the main “opposition” party, the
social democrats, party comrade of Bogström & Bodström and also a
conspicuously visitor of the US Embassy in Stockholm. [21]
To give an idea of the extent of Sweden’s
geopolitical servitude, it will be enough to mention that even the
staunchest pro-US newspaper in the Swedish MSM, right-wing conservative
SvD, run on the 19 of February 2014 an article with the headline:
“USA dominates parliament’s distorted worldview”.[22]
The article, published the day after of
the afore -mentioned debate, ensued with statistics showing the thematic
distribution of partisan interventions on foreign policy done in the
Parliament during the last decade. But it was not clear difference among
the Swedish parties. This is the country were even the former feminist
Communist Party, which changed the name to “Vänster” (means
“Left”), voted for Carl Bildt’s proposition of sending jetfighters to
Lybia, and most recently, announced its support for the Swedish
participation with troops in the military occupation of Mali.
One important aspect in this
“deformity” consisting in, according to Anna Jardfelt (CEO of the
Swedish Foreign Policy Institute), that Sweden is taking part militarily, with troops, in regions of the world that are not in the political priorities of Sweden.[23]
This military participation of Sweden is said to be implemented in the
frame of EU-cooperation. But the truth is that these operations
basically correspond to NATO design and operative command.
No doubt Sweden has revealed itself been
the closest collaborationist European country of the Bush and Obama
government, and nowadays has repeatedly been referred in the
international media as to “the Sixth Eye” of the SIGINT alliance under
US command.
I found strange that this association
with Sweden, as a country receiving the request from the US government
to pursue a prosecution against Assange, has not been found (it has not
been mentioned or developed) amidst the different interviews or articles
dealing with the report by Greenwald and Gallagher in The Intercept.
References & Notes
[1] Wdmond Dulac (1882 - 1953)
[11] ”Documents Reveal NSA and GCHQ Efforts to Destroy Assange and Track Wikileaks Supporters”
Interview transcript by Anton Woronczuk. Truthout, 21 Feb 2011. Michael
Ratner (President Emeritus of the Center for Constitutional Rights
(CCR) in New York and Chair of the European Center for Constitutional
and Human Rights in Berlin) says: “And what the substance of it is is it
says that we have to make an effort to get Julian Assange prosecuted
everywhere in the world. And at that point they pointed to four, maybe
five countries–the United Kingdom, Germany, Australia, the U.S.,
Iceland. Those are the countries that are going to go after him in. And,
obviously, there are other countries added as they go along.”
“På det svenska Utrikesdepartementet förnekar man att man kontaktats av USA.
– De har inte varit i kontakt med oss den
officiella vägen. Varken i Stockholm eller på ambassaden i Washington,
säger UD:s presschef Anders Jörle.”
“Sweden has sometimes been called the
‘Sixth Eye’ – referring to the English-speaking Five Eyes SIGINT
alliance – suggesting a close working relationship between Sweden’s FRA
and the NSA and GCHQ. New documents suggest that it has access to the
XKeyscore tool, and has helped in the Quantum hacking program.”
[14] “…internet kokar av rykten om att USA utövar påtryckningar mot sina allierade för att gripa Assange. Jag utgår från att det i och med anmälan kommer att konspireras flitigt om att CIA till sist lyckats infiltrera även svenska myndigheter. In:
[16] Glenn Greenwald & Ryan Gallagher. Op. Cit.
[18] In an article on the case Assange in The Daily Telegraph,
Clarie Harvey referred to Sweden in these terms,: a “proudly
independent nation that remained neutral even during World War II”.
[21]
The “shadow foreign-affairs minister” Urban Ahlin has also been
disclosed in the Wikileaks diplomatic cables. Swedish paper Expressen
published at that occasion the article “Wiklieaks discloses: Ahlin wanted to sell the (Afghanistan) war to the Swedish people in this way“.
Namely, Urban Ahlin had asked at a meeting in the US Embassy in
Stockholm, that US should send to Sweden a local politician from
Afghanistan in order to tell the Swedes “affective-impacting” stories.
This would further increase the support from the Swedish people towards
the military occupation, reasoned Ahlin. Urban Ahlin has of course tried
to deny
that such conversations had occurred and dismissed it as “Wikileaks’
lies”. Nothing happens afterwards; he was not further questioned by any
Swedish journalist and he is still Sweden’s “shadow foreign-affairs
minister”.
[22] USA dominerar skev världsbild i riksdagen, SvD, 19 Feb 2014.
[23] Id. Excerpt: “Det finns också en
säkerhetspolitisk dimension av den skeva fokuseringen, påpekar Anna
Jardfelt, Utrikespolitiska institutets direktör.– Flera av de
konfliktländer där Sverige deltagit med trupper inom ramen för
EU-samarbetet är inte så politiskt prioriterade, enligt undersökningen. I
och med EU-medlemskapet borde det bli ännu viktigare för Sverige att
diskutera situationen i fler länder än bara de som vi traditionellt
fokuserat på. För i och med EU-medlemskapet blir Sverige än mer direkt
engagerat särskilt i Mellanöstern och Afrika, säger Anna Jardfelt.”
