"Truth is NOT a Crime"
“The truth will set you free, but first it will piss you off.” ― Joe Klaas, Twelve Steps to Happiness
This quote from Joe Klass is the core conflict with the prosecution of Julian Assange. In the United States of American we pride ourselves on Free Speech but do we really have Free Speech?
In the case of Julian Assange, he did not.
Assange is known for being the creator and founder of Wikileaks in 2006. This site is known for leaking news and classsified information to the public. In 2010, Wikileaks was the site that was responsible for leaking emails sent from the then Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton.
But this leak was not what got Assange in the spotlight.
In 2010 Wikileaks released the "Collateral Murder" video, which was unedited military footage from 2007 showing US Military killing inocent civillians.
Supposdly, we are told that they men "saw" what appread to be a gun but I believe they just said that to try and validate thier actions.
This video shows the men murdering and then even laughing at the wounded on the ground. But not only were there civillians, there were also U.S. reporters trying to do thier jobs among the attacked.
When this video was released of course it was wide spread news. New stations from all over picked up on this story and further published it.
But the main question was where did Wikileaks get this information?
According to Assange, it was an anoynomous source and he was not going to release thier name.
As a result, the U.S. Government was furious. At the same time Assange was also being investigated for alleged sexual assault. He claimed that the sex was consentual and did appeal his case but was denied. Inevitably the charges were dropped because of the statute of limitations violations by the Swedish police.
In the meantime he seeked asylum in the Ecuadorian embassy in London to avoid extraction. But after seven years, he was no longer able to stay and the UK authorities came and detained him.
The US filed 17 charges against Assange for violating the Espionage Act- which is technically only applicable for government employees.
But can the United States detain Assange from the UK?
I personally feel that this is a violation of our rights as American Citizens. Being a journalism major, it is extremely frustrating and discouraging that someone who is speaking the truth about what our government is doing is now getting prosecuted.
Comentarios