James Cogan

A critical moment is approaching in the protracted vendetta by the US government and its allies against the WikiLeaks organisation and its editor Julian Assange.

The legal avenues to prevent Assange’s extradition from Britain to Sweden to face allegations of sexual assault are rapidly being exhausted. On May 30, the majority of a seven-judge bench of the British Supreme Court rejected his appeal against rulings that a Swedish-lodged European Arrest Warrant should be enforced.

Assange’s lawyers are expected to seek a re-opening of the appeal before a deadline on June 13. The British judges, however, are unlikely to accept the defence argument that their ruling was based on legal points not raised during the hearing. His lawyers could further attempt to appeal to the European Court of Human Rights, but that also is given little prospect of success.

Assange’s extradition to Sweden will almost certainly result in criminal charges and his detention. It would also establish the conditions for US authorities to unveil a secret grand jury indictment on charges of espionage and to file a warrant for his extradition from Sweden.

The existence of the secret indictment in Virginia in 2010 was confirmed in leaked emails by Fred Burton, a vice-president of the private intelligence company Stratfor. Burton wrote in February 2011: “Not for Pub—We have a sealed indictment on Assange. Pls protect… Assange is going to make a nice bride in prison. Screw the terrorist. He’ll be eating cat food forever.”

This intense hatred of Assange in US ruling circles is the product of WikiLeaks’ public exposure of the sinister machinations and crimes of the US government and governments around the world. The website published information that revealed US atrocities in Iraq and Afghanistan as well as hundreds of thousands of American diplomatic cables documenting anti-democratic intrigues that go on every day in the corridors of power internationally.

The response of the US political establishment has been vicious and relentless. Assange has faced public death threats. Vice President Joseph Biden accused him of being a “high-tech terrorist.” WikiLeaks has had its Internet domains shut down and its financial operations blocked. Its employees and supporters have been subjected to state harassment and surveillance.

Alleged whistle-blower Bradley Manning has been detained without charge for more than two years and is to be dragged before a military court martial in November. Manning faces life imprisonment for espionage and “aiding the enemy”, as would Assange if he were prosecuted on the same charges.

More »

Ellen Brown

Modern version of Niobe and her sorrows:
Niobe and her European lovers this time...

The problem is all inside your head she said to me
The answer is easy if you take it logically
I’d like to help you in your struggle to be free
There must be fifty ways to leave your lover.
~ Lyrics by Paul Simon

The Euro appears to be a marriage of incompatible partners. A June 1st article in the UK Telegraph titled “Why Europe’s Love Affair with the European Project Is Ending” reported that two-thirds of 9,000 respondents thought that having the euro as their single currency was a mistake.

For Greece, it was a tragic mismatch from the beginning; and like many a breakup, it is really about money. Greece is a vivacious young woman chained to a tyrannical old man. She yearns to be free to dance on her own; but breaking up is hard to do. Defaulting on her debts will force her out of the Eurozone and back to issuing drachmas, and she could get brutally beaten by speculators on foreign exchange markets for her insolence.

Fortunately, there are alternatives to an ugly divorce. The treaties binding the 17 member nations are just a set of rules, entered into by mutual agreement; and rules can be bent or broken, especially in crises. The ECB (European Central Bank) broke a litany of rules to save the banks, and so did the Federal Reserve to save Wall Street in 2008. Rules that can be bent for banks can be bent for people and nations—not just Greece, but all the other Eurozone countries threatening to file for divorce.

Paul Simon says there are 50 ways, but here are five creative alternatives.

More »

Alex Lantier

The US policy of assassination is inherently indiscriminate and criminal in character.

Speaking in Kabul yesterday, US Defense Secretary Leon Panetta threatened Pakistan with a ground intervention if it did not crush forces in Pakistan fighting US occupation troops in Afghanistan.

Panetta singled out the so-called Haqqani network, a militia in Pakistan’s North Waziristan region that mounts raids on US forces across the Afghan-Pakistani border. He said, “Haqqani safe havens still exist on the other side of the border. Pakistan has to take action [to stop] allowing terrorists in their country to attack our forces on the other side of the border. We are reaching the limits of our patience here.”

He continued, “It is difficult to achieve a secure Afghanistan as long as there is a safe haven for terrorists in Pakistan from which they can conduct attacks on our forces. … The United States will do whatever we have to do to protect our forces.”

Asked if the US might send ground troops from Afghanistan to attack targets in Pakistan, Panetta refused to rule it out. “I’m not going to go into particulars,” he said. “It’s about protecting our forces and trying to urge the Pakistanis to take the steps they have to take to control the situation.”

Panetta spoke alongside Afghan Defense Minister Abdul Rahim Wardak, who called for joint action by the US-backed Afghan puppet regime and the Pakistani government in Islamabad. “I do hope,” he said, “that gradually they will come to the conclusion to cooperate with us. If that cooperation starts, we will be able to disrupt their command and control, disrupt their training, disrupt their weapon recruitment and also will be able to eliminate or capture their leadership. Without doing that, I think our endeavor to achieve victory will become much more difficult.”

More »