About torture, about pyschology, about the persecution of Julian Assange
John Pilger speaks out for Julian Assange
an example of the sensitive, clandestine, real-world CIA psychology deployed against ‘terrorists’ and enemies of the state, as Julian Assange and Wikileaks have been branded.
In this case, the adversary in the US crosshairs has been not only Julian Assange and Wikileaks, but the global populations that Wikileaks seeks to inform. It is our own vulnerabilities – the vulnerabilities in the information processing systems of all human beings – that have been leveraged and exploited in order to undermine and discredit Wikileaks.
The fundamental psychological task is to render truth suspicious and deceit reassuring, war criminals virtuous and their critics corrupt, pacifism threatening and violence comforting, abuse of power righteous and resistance reprobate, torture forgivable and whistleblowing a crime, censorship a bastion of democracy and free speech a menace to be overcome. Much as George Orwell foresaw.
In order to justify the psychological war on Wikileaks, US powerbrokers have branded Wikileaks and Assange “anti-American” “terrorists”, a “non-state hostile intelligence service” and “enemy combatants”. Bolstered by these factually indefensible slurs, Julian Assange now faces imminent extradition to the United States to face secret charges, most likely for 2010 scoops exposing US war crimes in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Peace is bad. War is good. Truth is dangerous. Censorship will set you free. These are the positions underpinning the war on Wikileaks.
The Psychology Of Getting Julian Assange, Part 1: What’s Torture Got To Do With It? https://newmatilda.com/2019/02/19/psychology-getting-julian-assange-part-1-whats-torture-got/ Dr Lissa Johnson on February 19, 2019
“…. Assange faces extradition to the United States and secret charges for his publishing activities should he step outside the Ecuadorian Embassy in London. This cross-border, extraterritorial persecution threatens not only Assange’s health, and possibly his life according to a recent UN statement, but poses grave legal risks both to journalism and dissent…..
The Australian rallies join a growing international chorus of organisations and individuals sounding increasingly urgent alarms over Julian Assange’s plight, and its implications for freedom of speech and democratic rights.
Late last year, as secret US charges against Julian Assange surfaced, and the threat of his imminent extradition to the US loomed, the United Nations Working Group on Arbitrary Detention (UNWGAD) issued a strongly worded statement to the UK Government, having previously ruled twice that Assange is being arbitrarily detained in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London.
In its statement, the UNWGAD demanded that the UK abide by its “binding” legal obligations and “immediately” secure freedom for Julian Assange. The UN reminded the UK Government that “human rights treaty law is binding law, it is not discretionary law. It is not some passing fancy”.
The same fears prompted 33 EU parliamentarians to write a similarly strongly worded letter to the British Prime Minister, the Ecuadorian President and the UN Secretary General on December 10th, condemning the “very serious and egregious violations of human rights in the heart of Europe.” They called for Assange’s “immediate release, together with his safe passage to a safe country.”
Two German MPs followed with a visit to the Ecuadorian Embassy on December 20th, at which they denounced the violation of Assange’s “fundamental rights” and expressed their “demand that this case has to be solved: that no publisher, no editor, no journalist is detained because of publishing the truth”.
The politicians’ and UN statements added to previous condemnations of Assange’s persecution from Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, the American Civil Liberties Union, the Committee to Protect Journalists, and a former senior lawyer for the UNHCR and UN Expert on the Promotion of International Order.
All of these leading legal and human rights authorities have been making essentially the same fundamental point: that Julian Assange is being persecuted for publishing truth in the public interest, placing public interest journalism itself at risk, along with freedom of speech and other democratic and human rights principles.
It is the same fundamental point made by several speakers at an earlier Australian rally to free Julian Assange, held in Sydney in June last year. John Pilger spoke at that rally also.
Pilger’s important 2018 speech, however, like the rally itself, was subject to a near total, if not total, mainstream media blackout. So if you missed it, that may be why. And if you haven’t followed the US war on Wikileaks from the outset, as I hadn’t when I attended last year’s rally, Pilger’s speech is a powerful way to bring yourself up to speed. Continue reading
Australian voters back Labor to deal with climate change
Ipsos poll: Voters back Labor to deal with climate change, The Age, Michael Koziol, 7 Apr 19 Only half the Coalition’s voters believe it is the best to handle climate change, as the Morrison government struggles to manage a damaging split over the Adani mine and shift the focus back to Labor’s energy policies…..
an Ipsos poll taken last week – after Labor released its climate policy on Monday – shows voters have firmed in their view that Labor is better than the Coalition on climate change, with 42 per cent saying the opposition had the superior policy of the two major parties.
Only 25 per cent felt the Coalition’s climate policy was preferable – a decrease of 12 percentage points from when the question was asked in 2012. …
Climate and the environment have returned to the fore as Prime Minister Scott Morrison prepares to call an election, with Labor wheeling out its energy policy and the government exposed to internal divisions over the final ministerial approvals for the Adani coal mine.
Queensland Liberal National MPs and candidates are agitating for Environment Minister Melissa Price to rubber stamp the process quickly while they work to defend vulnerable Coalition seats up north, but Liberals in capital cities are urging a delay to avoid the issue blowing up just as the campaign begins.
Cabinet sources indicated they did not want to “elevate” Adani in the national mindset, nor risk any decision being challenged in the courts because it had been rushed……..
The Ipsos phone poll of 1200 voters found Labor supporters were much more likely to back their party’s climate policy than Coalition supporters: 72 per cent of Labor voters said their party had the best policy, while 5 per cent backed the Coalition and 23 per cent didn’t know.
People who lived in capital cities, had a university degree or earned more than $100,000 a year were significantly more likely to say Labor had the better policy on climate change. https://www.theage.com.au/politics/federal/ipsos-poll-voters-back-labor-to-deal-with-climate-change-20190407-p51boe.html
1 This month
of the week – Disrupting War & Militarism in Oceania. Active solidarity. Radical practice.
Antinuclear 