The most shocking twist in the Assange case has just erupted and the total lack of mainstream media coverage is astounding…
The US’ case against Julian Assange must be dropped after a key witness confessed to lying, as the reputation of Western law and the future of journalism depend on it, UK journalist and friend to Assange Vaughan Smith has told RT.
The news that WikiLeaks volunteer turned FBI informant Sigurdur Ingi Thordarson fabricated some important parts of his accusations in the indictment against the site’s co-founder Assange “was not a surprise,” Smith pointed out. Those close to WikiLeaks have long known that the man “had behavioral issues,” he said.
Smith gave Assange refuge in 2010 – first at the Frontline Club in London and then at his country house in Norfolk – when the publisher was fleeing from sexual assault allegations, which he consistently denied, in Sweden. The investigation was later dropped by the prosecutors.
Icelandic citizen Thordarson was one of the people who was there with Assange and Smith, the journalist said, claiming that “he was known to have stolen some things when he stayed in my house all that time ago.”
In 2012, WikiLeaks filed criminal charges against the volunteer over embezzlement and financial fraud, and he ended up being sentenced for both of them in Iceland.
In an article published by Icelandic newspaper Stundin last week, Thordarson said that he had lied in his testimony, confessing, among other things, that Assange never directly ordered him to carry out any hacking.
These new statements by the US’ key witness are “devastating” and “completely undermine” America’s case against the WikiLeaks founder. “Basically, he’s explained how he lied to frame Julian to try to save his own skin,” Smith said.
…if a major witness recanted their testimony, shouldn’t that be a big deal for the Journalism trial of the century?
Thordarson became an FBI informant and lies he told them were essential to gaining the legal noose they are trying to use to extradite Assange with now.
That his testimony was false should be newsworthy, however Assange was cancelled for the rape allegations and as such is no longer the champion of exposing American war crimes and gets ignored as a story now.
That’s the power of cancel culture.
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https://www.commondreams.org/news/2021/07/03/assange-supporters-demand-release-amid-key-doj-witnesss-admission-testimony-was
The family of Julian Assange was joined by supporters on Saturday in Parliament Square, London, where they marked Assange’s 50th birthday—the third he’s spent in the city’s Belmarsh Prison as he awaits possible extradition to the U.S.—and to demand his release days after a key witness in the case against him admitted his testimony was false.
Assange’s partner, Stella Moris, was in attendance with the couple’s young children at the gathering, which took place two days after Assange’s father and brother wrapped up a tour of the U.S. aimed at building pressure on President Joe Biden to drop all charges against him under the Espionage Act.
“Democracies do not imprison journalists. Julian is a political prisoner,” Moris told the supporters in Parliament Square. “He’s a prisoner of conscience. He’s in prison because he acted according to his conscience, exposing the powerful and defending the weak and the powerless.”
The rally came a week after a key witness in the U.S. government’s case against Assange, Sigurdur Ingi Thordarson, “admitted that his entire testimony is false” in an article in the Icelandic news outlet Stundin.
“The article details how Thordarson, a convicted felon, pedophile, and diagnosed sociopath, used his position to steal money from Wikileaks, and received immunity from prosecution from the FBI in a quid pro quo,” FAIR reported, noting the new information received virtually no coverage from the corporate media.
Jennifer Robinson, a legal adviser to Assange, appeared on Democracy Now! earlier this week to discuss the development, calling Thordarson’s admission “just the latest revelation to demonstrate why the U.S. case should be dropped.”
Former Labour Party leader Jeremy Corbyn, Amnesty International, and press freedom organization PEN International were among those joining the calls for Assange’s freedom on social media on Saturday.
Veteran journalist John Pilger, who also attended the rally in Parliament Square, condemned the international press for its silence on the most recent development in the Assange case, which he said indicates that “the case against Assange has collapsed.”
“We celebrated Julian as a rare, true democrat,” Pilger said. “Don’t let America get its hands on him.”
(At the linked page above are further links through..)
The rape charges were dropped in 2017, due to lack of actual evidence and there being “no reason to continue”.
” The most shocking twist in the Assange case has just erupted and the total lack of mainstream media coverage is astounding…”
No its entirely predictable and if you only have mainstream corporate biased censored news to be informed then you are part of the suppression that is corporate neo liberal news.
Its a joke when we are focusing on ” free speech ” yet there is no debate about the censorship of the facts and the truth by corporate media and their enablers.
I really hope the just let Assange go. New chapter for the US to get back on the side of justice. So far Biden has been doing better than I expected – Biden dropping charges with a speech that US will strive towards tolerance and transparency would go a long way for their international reputation. (And show up some other regimes).
“We are being lied to. Constantly, and in more ways than we realize. By omission, by distortion, by half-truths and by outright deception.”
IDP ,,, International Dirty Politics ,,, Nobody Cancels Better
“You want to talk about a threat to the press? Forget jailing journalists and whistleblowers, how about all news outlets of any real influence unifying to simply deny coverage to any major information which comes to light? This is a threat to the thing the press fundamentally is. More than a threat. It’s the end….. ”
“The journalist who worked on the Stundin report says he spent months working on this story, and he would surely have expected his revelations to get some coverage in the rest of the western press. The OPCW whistleblowers would surely have expected their revelations to get enough attention to make a difference, otherwise they wouldn’t have leaked those documents at great risk to themselves. What’s being communicated to whistleblowers and journalists in these blackouts is, don’t bother. It won’t make any difference, because no one will ever see what you reveal.”
https://caitlinjohnstone.com/2021/07/03/the-horrifying-rise-of-total-mass-media-blackouts-on-inconvenient-news-stories/
anti-woke Canceling?? ,,
https://youtu.be/LO820q9z54c?t=5514
Pretend woke Cancelling? ,,, Happy CENSORSHIP of July 4th! https://youtu.be/f7f_90eTlLo
‘The Standard’ blog ran a series of slanderous anti-Assange posts where anyone questioning the orchestrated prosecution of Assange and the motives of those behind it was labelled a rape apologist and worse.,,
The ‘Killing’ of Assanges reputation in a campaign by our mass media,,,, helped TS authors paint Assange as a horrible person who no decent person would support.
Only for it to turn out that those ‘bringing Assange to Justice ,,,,, ended up using a serial child rapist ,,,, who in exchange for his perjury against Assange ,,, had his sex Crimes against child victims PARDONED.
Some Authors posts and coverage at TS were disgraceful against Assange ,,,, accompanied by John Key Like ‘loony left ‘insults directed at Nicky Hager , John Pilger etc,,, from Authors.
Their present state of quiet ,,,, could be interpreted as rape apology / minimisation ,,,, on behalf of the dishonest child sexual predator.
Those who play dirty politics always end up with shit on their hands ,,,,
The present Assange suppression is an attempt to limit the amount of self inflected killing of their own reputations ,,,
I’ll finish by noting that if anything could stir the apathy of the Aussie citizenry to finally supporting Assange ,,,,,, A liar child molester fitting up one of their own could do it.
They hate ‘rock-spiders’ more than refugees or Muslims.
https://caitlinjohnstone.com/2021/06/27/assange-prosecution-relied-on-false-testimony-from-a-diagnosed-sociopath-and-convicted-pedophile/
‘The Standard’. That site is a woke joke and too bad if that rhymes. Some of the nastiest freaks who purport to be ‘ Left’ opine on that site. A few are reasonable but are drowned out by the haters.
One only has to look at the lack of coverage and comment in regards the latest Roy Morgan poll in the MSM to realise that media is muffled (or muzzled?) by the state apparatus.
The “free” press is anything but these days.
And expecting it to be otherwise is naive. $100M buys a lot of compliant press here in New Zealand. Just imagine what the state can buy in places like Europe and the USA.
https://youtu.be/L_mAT8rOgxA?list=TLPQMDYwNzIwMjFYnm5vHHxGdA&t=2568
The Wizard (For Julian) https://youtu.be/SHJqn1CPA3E
With allies like this:
‘Afghan anger over US’s sudden, silent Bagram departure
Military officials say troops turned off power and slipped away without notifying new commander
US forces plunged their main operating base in Afghanistan into darkness and abandoned it to looters when they slipped away in the middle of the night after two decades at the site without notifying their Afghan allies.
The furtive departure from Bagram airbase, which is vital to the security of Kabul and holds about 5,000 mostly Taliban prisoners, infuriated the Afghans. Many saw it as emblematic of a withdrawal they say is being carried out entirely to fit an American political schedule, with no heed for the collapsing security situation on the ground.
“People are saying: ‘The Americans didn’t ask Afghans about coming here, and they didn’t consult Afghans about leaving’,” said one senior official.’
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/jul/06/afghan-anger-over-uss-sudden-silent-bagram-departure
who needs enemies?
But just to rub salt into the wound, we have traitors (and environmental vandals) who constantly lie to the masses running NZ, and driving it even further into financial, social and environmental ruin.
Almost like being in prison, his life has been ruined by dirty politics in collusion with the MSM. This is what all the right wing nut jobs think Jacinda is going to do to kiwi bigots. This shows you don’t need to fear updated hate speech laws because the powers that be will do what they fucking like anyway. Poor bugger.
Yanis Varoufakis: “Biden, Johnson, Merkel: you are intentionallly killing Julian Assange’s body.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8v4sm2Kfqs8
A breakthrough:
https://rsf.org/en/news/uk-high-court-grants-limited-permission-us-appeal-assange-extradition-ruling
As the UK High Court grants limited permission for the US government to pursue its appeal against the decision opposing the extradition of Wikileaks publisher Julian Assange, Reporters Without Borders (RSF) reiterates the call for Assange’s immediate release and for the case against him to be dropped.
On 7 July, the UK High Court gave notice to the parties involved that the US government’s appeal against the extradition decision will be listed for a hearing. No date has yet been given. …More at link
This world always hates on those who tell the truth, Jesus, Mandela, Assange, and Martin Luther King jr…
https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/b/assange-psychological-jail-free-demands
A group of doctors representing over 250 medical professionals from 35 countries wrote to US President Joe Biden today, urging him to drop charges against Mr Assange under the Espionage Act.
They said: “Mr Assange continues to suffer serious, life-threatening effects of the psychological torture he has been subjected to for more than a decade.”
The US is appealing against an English court decision in January not to extradite him, but no date has been set for the hearing, so Mr Assange remains in Belmarsh prison. His legal team said today that permission to appeal has been granted on a limited basis, allowing only “narrow, technical grounds.” …More at link
NOT a breakthrough!
I read that headline the wrong way round…
Rather than appealing extradition, the appeal will be against opposition to the extradition.
Very disappointing.
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