/qresearch/ -  Q Research

>>21037715

Jerry Seinfeld opens up on time in Australia in exclusive 7NEWS interview amid heckler-plagued tour

In his most in-depth interview while touring Australia, the legendary comedian has paid a compliment to a 7NEWS journalist.

Jordan Bissell and Warren Barnsley - 20 June 2024

Jerry Seinfeld says Australia is “the best place to be a comedian”, while urging hecklers at his shows to “go where things are political” if they want to protest Israel’s actions in Gaza.

In his most in-depth on-camera interview while touring Australia, the legendary funnyman told 7NEWS of his “love” of the country despite his stand-up shows twice being interrupted by pro-Palestine hecklers.

“I love Australia, of course,” he told 7NEWS in Brisbane on Thursday, the morning after his only show in the Queensland capital.

“It’s just the best place to be a comedian. Australia’s comedy heaven.

“We’re having the time of our life. I’m having such a good time.”

Asked about his favourite thing about Australia, he responded, “the people”.

“The people love to laugh and they’re so nice. There’s just a warm feeling in every show, that I love,” he said.

After being heckled at both shows in Sydney, he said the “very polite” and “great” Brisbane crowd on Wednesday night did not follow suit.

Seinfeld, 70, flew to Adelaide on Thursday morning ahead of a show that night, before appearances in Melbourne across the weekend then travelling to New Zealand.

A supporter of Israel in its war on Hamas which has led to the deaths of tens of thousands of Palestinians, he encouraged his audiences to keep their political views to themselves.

“I don’t care what your politics are, but go where things are political,” he said.

“This is where we go to, kind of, forget about politics.

“We all want to forget about it for a couple of hours. That’s the whole idea of the show. Forget about everything for a couple of hours.”

Earlier this week, he mocked people at his Sydney shows who heckled him over his support for Israel, telling them, “We have a genius, ladies and gentlemen, he solved the Middle East.”

On Thursday, he couldn’t resist a comedic jibe at a 7NEWS camera operator after praising journalist Jordan Bissell for meeting him at Brisbane airport for the early morning interview.

“This is amazing that you got up, you got dressed, (turns to camera operator) … you want credit too? No, you don’t look as nice as her,” he said.

On another note, the New York native revealed a fondness for an Australian delicacy.

“Tim Tam, what’s that?” he said.

“Oh, the little chocolate candies — the chocolate?

“There was one of those in my (hotel) room and I ate the whole thing.”

https://7news.com.au/entertainment/celebrity/jerry-seinfeld-opens-up-on-time-in-australia-in-exclusive-7news-interview-amid-heckler-plagued-tour-c-15083556

>>21037715

‘Just gave money to a Jew’: Seinfeld faces more pro-Palestine hecklers in Melbourne

Cameron Woodhead - June 23, 2024

US comedian Jerry Seinfeld didn’t back down when hecklers interrupted his Melbourne show on Saturday night, sending the crowd at Rod Laver Arena into laughter.

Ten minutes before the evening show was due to finish, at least two protesters chanted “free Palestine”, prompting Seinfeld to draw on his trademark black comedy.

“You need to go back and tell whoever is running your organisation (that) ‘we just gave more money to a Jew’,” the 70-year-old US comedian told the protesters.

The response drew raucous laughter from the crowd as he continued with a two-minute spiel in response to the interruption.

“Listen, dude, listen, listen, let me explain something. You and I are in the same business,” he said.

He went on to tell the protesters that they were in the wrong place. “Our business is to get people to see things the way we see it,” he said.

Later, before taking questions from the audience, Seinfeld mused that the protesters might’ve taken so long to make their presence known because they were enjoying the show.

A handful of protesters had gathered at the entrances to Rod Laver Arena. At least 10 police officers were also on hand, but no trouble was reported. Event organisers had been expecting a crowd of up to 500 protesters.

It follows incidents at two of Seinfeld’s recent Sydney shows, where he was targeted by pro-Palestinian protesters during his performances.

In a statement issued to this masthead last week, activists associated with the protest actions in Sydney explained why they targeted Seinfeld.

They said they hoped to “raise awareness for both Seinfeld’s audience and the wider community of the current and ongoing illegal occupation and genocide perpetrated by Israel against the Palestinians” and to “generate conversation around the issue and encourage others to educate themselves and engage more deeply” with it.

Accepting that their protests might make patrons uncomfortable, the Sydney activists said “but such discomfort surely pales in comparison to our community’s collective trauma at the devastating loss of life in Gaza and the West Bank for the last eight months (and indeed since 1948)”.

The activists, who claim not to have bought tickets to Seinfeld’s shows but to have received them from people who had decided against attending after becoming aware of the comedian’s views, insist they are not antisemitic.

Seinfeld has become the target of protesters over what has been interpreted as his support for Israel’s military response to the October 7 terrorist attacks by Hamas, in which 1200 people were killed and another 250 taken hostage.

Since then, Israel’s campaign of retaliation has resulted in the deaths of an estimated 37,500 Palestinians, including a claimed 15,000 children. Israel’s military says more than 300 of its troops have died in the fighting.

Seinfeld and his wife, Jessica, visited Israel in December and toured sites of the Hamas attacks.

On her Instagram, Jessica posted on Christmas Eve that this was her fifth visit, “and I have never seen a more unified country. Among people of all walks of life, from wounded soldiers to families of peace activists whose mothers, fathers or siblings were murdered or are still held captive in Gaza, the horror of October 7th has erased divisions within Israel. Everyone has come together for a greater cause – to defeat Hamas, to build a better and safer Israel, and a better, safer world”.

On October 10, Seinfeld had himself posted an image of a young woman wrapped in an Israeli flag, with the legend “I stand with Israel”.

“We believe in justice, freedom and equality,” he wrote. “We survive and flourish no matter what. I will always stand with Israel and the Jewish people.”

In an interview with podcaster Bari Weiss last month, he described the visit to Israel as “the most powerful experience of my life”.

Though his statements on the conflict have rarely been overtly political (except insofar as he has taken to dismissing so-called “woke” culture), they have been deemed partisan enough for anti-war protesters in the United States to take issue.

Last month, some students at Duke University walked out on their own graduation ceremony as honorary guest Seinfeld began a commencement speech.

https://www.theage.com.au/national/victoria/just-gave-money-to-a-jew-seinfeld-shuts-down-pro-palestinian-hecklers-in-melbourne-20240622-p5jnx1.html?js-chunk-not-found-refresh=true

https://www.news.com.au/entertainment/tv/seinfelds-brutal-comeback-as-propalestine-hecklers-crash-another-show-on-aussie-tour-from-hell/news-story/17f5f1a059b4e4d5ac956a1aac5e8cbf

>>20932075

>>20969698

Anti-voice activists launch pre-election attack on the Greens

GEOFF CHAMBERS - JUNE 24, 2024

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The conservative activist group that torpedoed Anthony Albanese’s voice referendum will pump millions of dollars into a sole election campaign vehicle designed to drag down the Greens’ vote and expose the party’s radical policies.

The Australian can reveal that Advance, backed by 306,000 supporters and 32,000 donors, will spend $5m on phase one of a national election campaign titled “Greens Truth”, aiming to inflict “significant damage” to the left-wing party’s brand.

Armed with a post-voice war chest and new research showing voters remain disillusioned by the major political parties, Advance is launching its pre-election campaign to disrupt and halt the expanding electoral success of the Greens.

Amid rising speculation of an early election, and Peter Dutton’s Coalition making ground on the Albanese government, there is growing probability the Prime Minister could be forced into striking a deal with Adam Bandt to form minority government in a hung parliament.

With Greens preferences helping Mr Albanese claim victory after Labor secured a paltry 32.6 per cent primary vote at the 2022 election, Advance is warning voters of “catastrophic” outcomes for families if the left-wing party’s agenda is implemented.

The Greens, who have come under fire over accusations they are fanning anti-Semitism, push a range of extreme economic, defence, health, education and social policies that the major parties warn would wreck Australia’s economy and undermine national security.

Advance, initially established as a rival to left-wing activist group GetUp, has raised just over $900,000 from more than 5000 donations since soft-launching the Greens Truth campaign with supporters in May.

New donations data obtained by The Australian shows Advance continues to attract grassroots backing following its influential role in the Indigenous voice referendum campaign.

In the past 12 months, 18,492 out of 22,485 donations up to $499, were received, 3652 of $500-$4999, 329 of $5000-$24,999, 71 of $25,000-$99,999, and 31 of $100,000-$999,000.

A key driver of the anti-Greens campaign, which has been in the works since January, is the dramatic shift away from major parties and rise in protest voting.

Almost 32 per cent of Australians voted for a minor party or did not vote at the 2022 election, representing the biggest drift from the major parties in a century. Highlighting the protest vote trend, almost 258,000 people voted for the Greens in 2022 but preferenced the Liberal Party higher than Labor.

Research by Advance reveals 52 per cent of voters still believe the Greens look after the environment, water and wildlife, 26 per cent think they take action on climate, 20 per cent feel they stand for nothing, 8 per cent believe they look after the disadvantaged and 6 per cent categorise them as left-leaning, progressive and socialist.

Advance executive director Matthew Sheahan said the Greens Truth campaign would be an “all-out assault on the party that is a toxic and extreme influence on Australian politics”.

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>>21076973

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The campaign is targeted at erasing House of Representatives and Senate electoral gains made by the Greens over eight years and shining a light on extreme policies and culture, with Advance warning voters the party founded by Bob Brown is “not who they used to be”.

“Australian voters need to know that every election sees the Greens with more influence and closer to implementing their full agenda, which would be catastrophic for mums and dads, and their kids,” Mr Sheahan told The Australian.

“The Greens are not who they used to be, and there is no greater threat to Australia’s freedom, security or prosperity. This election day no reasonable Australian mum or dad should be voting Green.”

The campaign will publicise darker sides of the party, including “the lie that the Greens are a party of transparency and integrity (and the) litany of cover-ups of toxic and sexist behaviour”.

Mr Sheahan said this includes “the cover-up of assaults, accusations of bullying, claims of rape, and even MPs resigning over sex scandals”.

“The Greens have a track record of being a disgraceful and dysfunctional party that has failed its female supporters, volunteers and candidates time after time,” he said.

Advance said the Greens, who have won major concessions from the Albanese government in return for their votes, have been left unchecked for more than 40 years.

With the Greens eyeing off government seats Macnamara and Richmond at the next election, after winning Griffith off Labor and Brisbane and Ryan from the Liberals in 2022, Mr Sheahan said the left-wing party’s free ride “ends today”.

A campaign priority is exposing the Greens’ “fraudulent brand positioning as a party that is only concerned with the environment”. Advance research shows when voters think of the Greens, “they think of who they used to be – an environmental movement who fought against the Franklin Dam in the 1980s, who stood in front of old-growth forests”.

“Forty years later, this is obviously untrue and, when tested, voters start looking for an exit.”

Mr Sheahan said Advance research shows “Australians are not across some of the Greens’ more extreme policies including defunding non-government schools, implementing an inheritance tax and decriminalising hard drugs including ice and heroin”.

“Australian families have every reason to fear this agenda and its impact on not only cost of living, but the future and safety of their children.”

He said another major line of attack focused on debunking the Greens’ “outsider reputation”.

“The Greens like to perpetuate the idea that they are a protest party with no influence. The reality is much different. The Greens are already deciding what legislation passes or at least having a major say in parliaments across the country.

“Their policies are already being implemented as they hold Labor governments to ransom with their preferences all over the electoral map.”

https://www.theaustralian.com.au/nation/politics/antivoice-activists-launch-preelection-attack-on-the-greens/news-story/3538b043c620aa608a22776a962ba476

>>21015578

>>21036156

Journos fall for spin as they tiptoe around China

CHRIS MITCHELL - JUNE 23, 2024

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If facts can no longer be accepted by the community, let alone by reporters, then journalism is being destroyed by opinion.

Social media certainly gives the ill-informed the ability to trumpet opinions more widely than in earlier eras, but much of the wider triumph of opinion is down to cheap clicks to online media businesses and shouty content in traditional media that consumers can agree with. Reporters have a duty to swim against this tide.

News coverage of last week’s visit by Chinese Premier Li Qiang is illustrative.

Had China’s diplomats not tried to shut out Sky News Australia reporter Cheng Lei from two Canberra events, our media would have let Prime Minister Anthony Albanese get away with a largely false narrative: he and Foreign Minister Penny Wong are repairing the China relationship broken by Albanese’s predecessor, Scott Morrison.

Patricia Karvelas said as much on Friday when she introduced Defence Minister Richard Marles on ABC Radio National.

Australia, Karvelas said, had made progress in re-setting its “once shattered” relationship with China.

Yet public outrage at China’s bullying of Cheng Lei, an Australian wrongly jailed for three years by Beijing, effectively undermined that Labor narrative. If ever Australians could see the ugly face of China’s bullying, watching Chinese officials inside Australia’s parliament trying to stop cameras filming an Australian journalist left no doubt China disrespects Australia.

Political journalists who have played along with the myth of the Coalition destroying Australia’s China relationship should hang their heads in shame.

The rift started during Malcolm Turnbull’s prime ministership when, in August 2018, Chinese telecommunications giant Huawei was banned from the 5G telecommunications rollout on security advice.

Other countries followed soon after, including the US, Japan, India, New Zealand, Singapore, Norway and Denmark. In April 2019, Labor ruled out reversing the Huawei ban if it was to win that year’s election.

The Huawei ban here came only months after Turnbull first flagged new foreign interference legislation in June 2018. Turnbull was right on both counts.

The Australia-China relationship really hit the rocks at the end of January 2020, when prime minister Morrison banned flights from China in the early stages of the spread of Covid-19, and then called for an international investigation into the emergence of the pandemic in the city of Wuhan. Morrison was right on both counts.

China responded with a series of bans and restrictions on Australian exports. Barley, wine, lobsters and beef from some abattoirs was banned. Some local restrictions were applied on shipments of Australian coal. This all came despite the China-Australia free trade agreement signed in 2015 by Tony Abbott’s Coalition government.

Last week on Sky News’ Sunday Agenda and on ABC’s 7.30 on Tuesday, Trade Minister Don Farrell was given soft treatment to claim the Labor government’s diplomatic efforts were succeeding in having those bans reversed.

The truth is that just as China’s bullying of Cheng Lei backfired, its strategy of using trade to punish Australia for speaking up on Covid was a spectacular own goal. Some of the world’s leading economics and foreign policy journals, including The Economist, The Atlantic and Foreign Policy, have not only called out the failure of China’s bullying but praised Australia for resisting pressure from the world’s number two economy.

In November 2021, Foreign Policy wrote: “But if Beijing hoped to punish Canberra for its defiance with economic pain – and send a warning to other countries not to oppose China – it has failed on both counts. The impacts on Australia have so far been surprisingly minimal. That fact will not be lost on other countries that have differences with China.”

Many Australian journalists during the China freeze seemed unaware of the reality of our economic position. Partly because of rising coal and iron ore prices – and partly because our most affected exporters found alternative markets – China’s bans were estimated by a Productivity Commission report to have cost us nine one-thousandths of a percentage point of GDP, or less than $225m.

As The Australian’s Tom Dusevic reported on July 24 last year, if anything, the bans “have been an inglorious own goal for our largest trading partner”.

(continued)

>>21077001

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While that sum would have been tough for some producers, many journalists reacted as if Australia was on its knees. And while it’s better in diplomacy to shout as little as possible and have disagreements behind closed doors, the evidence is China was determined to subjugate Australia, at least economically, and had been doing so for decades before the export bans.

A report by Peter Hartcher in The Sydney Morning Herald on November 7 last year argued “we received public notice of Beijing’s intentions to dominate Australia in a revelation in 2005”.

A Chinese diplomat working at the Sydney consulate defected. The diplomat, Chen Yonglin, said the Communist Party of China “had begun a structured effort to infiltrate Australia’’ because it saw us as a “weak link in the Western camp”. This was much more than just spying.

“The party ran an influence campaign, partly through its United Front organisations operating in Australia. Rich business people were dispatched to live in Australia to set up empires of influence. Their methods included political donations, sponsored trips to China, major investments and board appointments,” Hartcher wrote.

Between 2005 and the start of the pandemic, China’s share of our exports rose from 12 per cent to 38 per cent.

Even the US thought Australia could flip. Hartcher quotes White House Indo-Pacific co-ordinator Kurt Campbell confirming that Washington thought this possible.

But by early 2022, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken told the SMH: “I think China has lost more than Australia has in its efforts to squeeze Australia economically.”

This newspaper’s foreign editor, Greg Sheridan, last Tuesday nailed the real import of the Cheng Lei incident: it revealed Albanese’s weakness. The PM had already appeared weak when he seemed not to have raised with China’s President, Xi Jinping, at an APEC meeting in San Francisco last November the Chinese navy’s firing of sonar at Australian naval divers only days before.

While many journalists tiptoe around such issues, the public pounced last week. Why was an Australian journalist being bullied by Chinese officials inside Australia’s parliament?

Discussing our China trade relationship, reporters should have been led by the facts rather than by Labor’s spin. The Coalition did a lot wrong during the Abbott-Turnbull-Morrison years, but it mostly got China right and it certainly got the AUKUS submarine partnership with the US and UK right.

Journalists need to take care not to appear to be pushing the false narratives of their preferred side of politics.

ABC 7.30 host Sarah Ferguson on Wednesday interviewed Liberal energy spokesman Ted O’Brien about the Coalition’s new nuclear power policy. Why could Ferguson not concede O’Brien’s point about the many unknown costs in Labor’s renewables rollout across large tracts of the continent?

She sounded like an ALP staffer. Many countries rely on nuclear power but none rely exclusively on wind and solar. Countries relying on renewables largely tap hydro-electric power.

https://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/media/journos-fall-for-spin-as-they-tiptoe-around-china/news-story/e69d31c913b8befa059bd28df9dbcbc4

>>20808099 (pb)

Solomon Islands PM Jeremiah Manele seeks budget bailout

BEN PACKHAM - JUNE 24, 2024

Solomon Islands Prime Minister Jeremiah Manele will seek an ­urgent budget bailout for his country when he meets Anthony Albanese in Canberra on Wednesday amid improving relations between Canberra and Honiara.

Mr Manele is in Australia on his first international trip as the country’s leader, before heading on to Beijing and Tokyo.

The six-day trip comes amid ongoing Australian concerns over Solomon Islands’ security ties with China, which have been exacerbated in recent weeks by an alleged covert visit to Honiara by a delegation of Chinese police.

Sources in both countries said the Australia-Solomon Islands relationship had stabilised since Mr Manele replaced former prime minister Manasseh Sogavare on May 2.

Mr Manele flagged three weeks into his term that he would be seeking substantial budget support from Solomon Islands’ partners, noting such funding “will further cement our relations”.

After a meeting with Deputy Prime Minister Richard Marles, Mr Manele said he wanted to discuss “the possibility of much, much larger bilateral co-operation partnerships” to fast-track his country’s development.

Mr Manele is expected to make a similar pitch to China, but Beijing typically doesn’t provide cash, preferring loan-funded infrastructure projects.

The Solomons’ budget is in disarray, with Mr Sogavare – who is now Treasurer and Finance Minister – conceding days ago that the government would be forced to implement cost-cutting measures due to “(tax) exemptions, mismanagement and corruption”.

Solomon Islands’ MP Peter Kenilorea, who leads a bloc of nine independents in the country’s parliament, said Mr Manele’s trip was “all about finances”.

“The coffers here are really dry in terms of government revenue collection. And there’s big promises that they need to deliver on. There’s money they need to get for the so-called CDF – the Constituency Development Fund.”

The fund needs to deliver about $860,000 for each of the country’s 50 electorates, requiring the government to come up with about $43m.

Mr Kenilorea urged the Albanese government to “keep those purse strings tight”. “Why would Australian taxpayers bail us out when we don’t have our house in order?” he asked.

Rather than giving cash, he said Australia should fund specific programs such as the purchase of much-needed medicines.

Mr Kenilorea said the Prime Minister’s trip came amid divisions in the country’s police force, with two factions now in dispute over an allegedly unauthorised visit to the country by four Chinese police officers.

The Australian has seen copies of the passport details of the four alleged officers, but the force’s commissioner has denied they ever entered the country.

Former Australian high commissioner to Solomon Islands James Batley said Solomon Islands security ties with China – cemented in a bilateral agreement signed by Mr Sogavare – remained the biggest thorn in the bilateral relationship.

He said Australia’s willingness to help the country climb out of its budget black hole would likely depend on whether Mr Manele was prepared to heed Australia’s concerns on China.

“If he can provide sufficient assurances, his case will be listened to more seriously,” Mr Batley said.

The May budget revealed Australian taxpayers gave a $600m budget support loan to Papua New Guinea in 2023-24.

It’s understood Solomon Islands is seeking direct funding from Australia’s aid program.

https://www.theaustralian.com.au/nation/politics/solomon-islands-pm-jeremiah-manele-seeks-budget-bailout/news-story/6d4ccec3a94c19709b785f2aed92925c

Judge lashes Xavier College’s ‘troubling’ conduct in school abuse claim

David Estcourt - June 24, 2024

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The religious order that runs Catholic boys’ school Xavier College is facing a multimillion-dollar lawsuit after a Supreme Court judge overturned a settlement struck to compensate the victim of a “serial recidivist paedophile” who abused a student at the elite school.

The victim, a 69-year-old who cannot be named for legal reasons, successfully appealed the agreement struck in August 2011 between him and the Society of Jesus in Australia, which included a term that Xavier College in Kew cover tuition for his two sons and pay him $150,000.

In a decision released last week, the victim claims priest Noel Bradford abused him in 1968 and 1970 while he was a boarder. The former student is now claiming loss of past earnings and superannuation of between $1,248,791.62 and $4,952,307.62 in damages.

The Society of Jesus in Australia, more commonly known as the Jesuits, runs Xavier College and would be financially liable for any settlement. The college declined to comment.

The Jesuits have accepted the 1968 abuse allegation but have not admitted the alleged instance of abuse in 1970.

Supreme Court associate justice Mary-Jane Ierodiaconou overturned and criticised the settlement deed because the victim did not have a lawyer when it was struck, and no Jesuit or school staff told him to report the matter to police.

“The defendant did not ensure that the plaintiff was adequately supported or informed in his negotiations, which led to the settlement deed. He was not legally represented,” Ierodiaconou found.

“Information about other abuse complaints against Bradford was not disclosed. Medical information enabling a proper assessment was not sought … He was not encouraged to make a complaint to the police.

“If the plaintiff is successful in this proceeding, there is a strong prospect that will result in a significant award of damages that will substantially exceed the settlement sum.”

Bradford was appointed to Xavier College by the Jesuits and worked and lived at the college for 15 years. He held numerous positions including second division prefect, teacher, master, cricket coach and football coach.

The court heard he was known as “Brick” and had a “large presence” at the school.

Ierodiaconou also sharply criticised the conduct of Jesuit priest Father Michael Head who worked at Xavier, provided pastoral care to the victim and counselled him about his abuse.

But, Ierodiaconou found, it was “troubling” that while Head acted as a confidant for the victim, he was also acting as an agent of the school when the deed was struck in the 2011 settlement.

“Based on Fr Head’s file notes, this afforded the plaintiff a space to openly vent his feelings and emotions. There appears to be an element of pastoral care,” Ierodiaconou said.

“The plaintiff did not have the benefit of ongoing independent legal advice at this time. The capacity in which Fr Head held his informal meetings with the plaintiff is troubling. He provided pastoral care to the plaintiff whilst serving the defendant’s interests in negotiating the settlement deed.”

Court documents say there is no evidence that the defendant undertook any investigations into Bradford’s conduct regarding the victim, with Head writing in July 2008 that the victim “knows of several other boys who (claim) they were molested by [Bradford] over some years”.

“He did not give names and I did not ask for them,” the file note written by Head says.

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Bradford’s abuse had devastating consequences for his life, the victim said in an affidavit filed with the court, causing him to suffer profound depression and struggle with alcohol and drug addiction.

“I have struggled with depression and suicidal thoughts for decades. I turned to drugs and alcohol to help me hide my emotional suffering from others,” the judgment quotes him as saying.

“The abuse had a huge impact on my education and what I’ve been able to achieve since leaving school. Before I was abused, I was a very good student. After Bradford abused me the first time, I ran away from school three times that year.”

He said he struggled in higher education but failed most of the coursework, failing to hold jobs for a long period of time and often relying on his family for support.

“I’ve moved around a lot as an adult. I’ve had dozens of short-term jobs, and long periods of unemployment. There have been a number of occasions when my family have helped me get work. Without their help, I would have been unemployed,” he said in the document.

The victim argued in court that Bradford was “a serial recidivist paedophile who repeatedly sexually assaulted young boys” but this information had not been provided to him during negotiation of his settlement.

Right Side Legal partner Michael Magazanik told The Age that the victim was in poor health and the Supreme Court had ordered his claim be fast-tracked as a result.

“Yet, the Jesuits still thought it appropriate to try and get his claim thrown out on the basis of a paltry payment made years ago when my client was effectively legally powerless and unrepresented,” he said.

“The Jesuits have fought so hard to deny my client his day in court that it makes you wonder how many other legally worthless deeds they are sitting on. How many other victims of abuse at Xavier have been paid off with small sums of money?

“This decision sends a message to those students: you have legal rights, you’re entitled to proper compensation. My client is grateful and pleased with the decision and is looking forward to his day in court.”

In 2022, an alleged victim of historical sexual abuse by different Xavier College staff members, Eldon Hogan and Father Patrick Stephenson, filed suit against the school, also seeking millions of dollars in compensation.

If you or anyone you know needs support, you can contact the National Sexual Assault, Domestic and Family Violence Counselling Service at 1800RESPECT (1800 737 732), Lifeline (13 11 14), the Suicide Call Back Service (1300 659 467), Beyond Blue (1300 22 4636) and Kids Helpline (1800 55 1800).

https://www.1800respect.org.au/

https://www.lifeline.org.au/

https://www.suicidecallbackservice.org.au/

https://www.beyondblue.org.au/

https://www.kidshelpline.com.au/

https://www.theage.com.au/national/victoria/judge-lashes-troubling-conduct-by-xavier-as-school-faces-abuse-claim-20240624-p5jo4x.html

>>21077046

Victorian Supreme Court judge: ‘reasonable’ to set aside alleged sex abuse settlement deed for former Xavier College student

TRICIA RIVERA - JUNE 23, 2024

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A former Xavier College student could seek almost $5m in dam­ages after a judge ruled it was just and reasonable to set aside a settlement deed over historic sex abuse claims against a priest alleged to be a “well known toucher of boys” at the Melbourne elite private school.

The plaintiff, a 69-year-old who will be referred to as “P”, alleges he was abused twice by priest Noel Bradford in 1968 and 1970 while he was a student and is now seeking to claim between $1,248,791.62 and $4,952,307.62 in damages for past pecuniary loss and loss of future earning ­capacity.

A settlement deed inked in Aug­ust 2011 between P and The Society of Jesus in Australia stated that the victim would receive a $150,000 payout and free tuition for his two sons to attend Xavier College, in exchange for the defendant to be released from any future lawsuits.

Victorian Supreme Court judge Mary-Jane Ierodiaconou last week ruled it was just and reasonable to set aside the settlement deed reached in 2011, and a variation deed in 2016, which changed to cover P’s sons’ attendance at St Joseph’s College instead of Xavier College.

Justice Ierodiaconou found that legal barriers, namely the plaintiff’s claim was subject to a statute of limitations and legal identity barriers, materially impacted his decision to enter into a settlement deed.

P’s evidence stated that the only way he knew to get compensation at the time was to ask for it, and that he engaged in “glorified begging”.

The court was told P knew he was “out of time” as the alleged abuse occurred decades ago, and he had received legal advice advising him it was impossible to sue the defendant because of their organisational structure.

In his deposition, P said: “I had no idea what my claim was really worth. In the end, the Jesuits offered me $150,000 and I took it.

“It seemed like a modest sum, given what I had been through, but I was very aware that this was my only avenue for getting some compensation from them.”

He also submitted that children at Xavier College were abused by staff and priests before his alleged abuse, and that the school ought to have known this.

Bradford, who was also known as “Brick”, worked and lived at the school from 1964 to 1979 and held roles including second division prefect, master and sports coach.

“Bradford had a large presence at the school and according to a website titled xavier-college-kew-abuse.com … regarding Xavier College abuse he was ‘a well known toucher of boys’,” P submitted in his court documents.

In evidence, P said the alleged abuse had “devastating consequences” on his life and he had struggled with depression and suicidal thoughts for decades, and in the past turned to alcohol and drugs. “Before I was abused, I was a very good student,” he said. “I did not go on to university, even though I wanted to.

“My marks and my mental health weren’t good enough to allow me to study at university after school.”

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A psychiatrist who undertook an independent psychiatric assessment of P in October 2023 said the alleged abuse and their long-term impacts contributed to about 75 per cent of the plaintiff’s ongoing emotional vulnerability and distress.

“It is clear that the trajectory altering effects of the abuse period caused the disruption in the crucial periods of education which caused his academic achievement to be scuttled,” the psychiatrist said.

“His working career has been hampered by persistent alcohol and drug abuse, poor self-worth and low confidence, difficulties interacting with male figures and poor stress tolerance.“

The judge noted that P’s brother, who also attended Xavier College, is a senior barrister and it is “plausible” P would have had a successful career.

“The defendant may not have been aware of Bradford being an abuser at the time of the alleged abuse in this proceeding, however … the defendant knew or ought to have known about the existence of other pedophiles at Xavier College at the time,” Justice Ierodiaconou’s judgment stated.

“The total compensation paid by the defendant in 2011, being $150,000, is a modest sum compared to what he would have received in 2011 had the matter proceeded to trial. Per the variation deed, the total compensation was ultimately … around $261,000. The same analysis applies. It is a modest sum.

“The compensation paid to the plaintiff is heavily discounted in comparison to the damages that he might be awarded now.”

https://www.theaustralian.com.au/nation/victorian-supreme-court-judge-reasonable-to-set-aside-alleged-sex-abuse-settlement-deed-for-former-xavier-college-student/news-story/4ea8693cdf8c52b1c96ef2e7a31b8d63

http://xavier-college-kew-abuse.com/

https://web.archive.org/web/20230602060718/http://xavier-college-kew-abuse.com/

https://web.archive.org/web/20230307091950/http://xavier-college-kew-abuse.com//offenders.php?oname=Noel_Bradford

>>21080059

Julian Assange released from jail, after accepting US plea deal

BEN PACKHAM - 25 June 2024

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Wikileaks founder Julian Assange has been freed from a British prison and will return to Australia within days after agreeing to a US plea deal over his role in the publication of troves of classified military and diplomatic documents.

Assange, who has spent more than a decade trying to avoid extradition to the US, boarded a flight from London on Tuesday AEST en route to the US territory of Saipan, where the plea deal is expected to be finalised.

The dramatic turn of events follows high-level lobbying by Australia of US and British officials, including by Anthony Albanese who publicly called for his release.

The Prime Minister’s office was cautious at the news of Assange’s release, saying his legal proceedings were yet to be finalised.

“Given those proceedings are ongoing, it is not appropriate to provide further comment,” Mr Albanese’s spokesman said.

“Prime Minister Albanese has been clear – Mr Assange’s case has dragged on for too long and there is nothing to be gained by his continued incarceration.”

Assange is expected to plead guilty to a felony charge of conspiring to obtain and distribute classified information, according to court papers and people familiar with the matter.

The charge relates to Wikileaks’ publication of thousands of confidential US military records and diplomatic cables about America’s actions in Iraq and Afghanistan in the 2000s.

Assange is expected to be sentenced to the 62 months he has already spent in a London prison, and be allowed to return to Australia.

The deal, which must be approved by a judge, will end his long-running legal drama that spanned three continents.

Assange’s legal team – which was adamant he would not travel to the US – reportedly reached a deal with the US Justice Department that would allow him to plead guilty to a felony charge without having to appear in suburban Virginia, where the original case was filed.

The deal was applauded across the Australian political spectrum.

Opposition foreign affairs spokesman Simon Birmingham said: “We have consistently said that the US and UK justice systems should be respected. We welcome the fact that Mr Assange’s decision to plead guilty will bring this long running saga to an end.”

Labor MP Julian Hill said: “Whatever you think of Assange he is an Australian and enough is enough. The prime minister deserves enormous personal credit for his Judgement and determination, never giving up in pursuing resolution of this case.”

Nationals MP Keith Pitt said Assange offered his congratulations, declaring “I hope this works out”.

He said all those involved in advocating for the Wikileaks founder deserved credit.

“(The Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade) are always the quiet achievers. They get around, they do some very, very difficult things at a consular level, all over the world,” he said.

“I’m sure Penny Wong has also been involved, as were previous foreign affairs ministers and prime ministers.”

Greens’ leader Adam Bandt hailed the outcome but lamented his lost decade fighting extradition to the US.

“Julian Assange will finally be free,” he wrote on X. “While great news, this has been over a decade of his life wasted by US overreach. Journalism is not a crime.”

(continued)

>>21083236

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Assange had spent almost 2000 days in the UK’s Belmarsh Prison fighting extradition to the US, after years holed up in Ecuador’s London Embassy.

Footage posted by Wikileaks showed him completing paperwork and walking up the stairs to board his flight from London. He appeared healthy, despite concerns his fight for release had left him mentally and physically damaged.

Stella Assange asked supporters to help her husband’s “new chapter” in life in a video on YouTube that was recorded on June 19.

“I’m visiting Julian in a high security prison. But this, this period of our lives, I’m confident now has come to an end,” Ms Assange said.

“And I think that by this time next week. Julian will be free. Things are moving very quickly, and it’s very difficult for us to plan or even play out the next few hours and days,” she said.

“But, if everything goes well, Julian will be on a plane on the way to freedom.”

She said an “incredible” movement had formed around the WikiLeaks founder, but “we still need your help”.

“What starts now, with Julian’s freedom, is a new chapter,” she said. “In the coming hours, we intend to start an emergency fund for Julian’s health and recovery.”

Assange had revelled in his role as a champion of “radical government transparency”. But Wikileaks’ disclosures undermined American diplomacy and – the US argued – threatened the lives of US military personnel and intelligence sources.

Public perceptions of him soured after the 2016 election, when WikiLeaks published tens of thousands of documents the US says were stolen from Democrats by Russian government hackers.

Former President Donald Trump’s first CIA director, Mike Pompeo, called the website a “nonstate hostile intelligence service”.

US prosecutors charged Assange in 2019 in connection with the Iraq and Afghanistan leaks, accusing him of conspiring to help former US Army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning break into a Defense Department computer system by trying to help her crack a password.

They added further charges under US espionage laws, leaving him to face 18 counts of conspiring to disclose classified information and hack a military computer.

Assange’s legal team had argued the Wikileaks founder was a journalist and his publication of leaked information should be protected by America’s First Amendment.

https://www.theaustralian.com.au/world/julian-assange-released-from-jail-leaves-uk-for-saipan/news-story/45a0a0ce52cf3df000dd614a4ef51108

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/68881226/united-states-v-assange/

https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.nmid.6474/gov.uscourts.nmid.6474.1.0.pdf

>>21083246

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HISTORIC CHARGES

WikiLeaks in 2010 released hundreds of thousands of classified U.S. military documents on Washington's wars in Afghanistan and Iraq - the largest security breaches of their kind in U.S. military history - along with swaths of diplomatic cables.

Assange was indicted during former President Donald Trump's administration over WikiLeaks' mass release of secret U.S. documents, which were leaked by Chelsea Manning, a former U.S. military intelligence analyst who was also prosecuted under the Espionage Act.

The trove of more than 700,000 documents included diplomatic cables and battlefield accounts such as a 2007 video of a U.S. Apache helicopter firing at suspected insurgents in Iraq, killing a dozen people including two Reuters news staff. That video was released in 2010.

The charges against Assange sparked outrage among his many global supporters who have long argued that Assange as the publisher of Wikileaks should not face charges typically used against federal government employees who steal or leak information.

Many press freedom advocates have argued that criminally charging Assange represents a threat to free speech.

"A plea deal would avert the worst-case scenario for press freedom, but this deal contemplates that Assange will have served five years in prison for activities that journalists engage in every day," said Jameel Jaffer, executive director of free speech organization Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University.

"It will cast a long shadow over the most important kinds of journalism, not just in this country but around the world."

LONG ODYSSEY

Assange was first arrested in Britain in 2010 on a European arrest warrant after Swedish authorities said they wanted to question him over sex-crime allegations that were later dropped. He fled to Ecuador's embassy, where he remained for seven years, to avoid extradition to Sweden.

He was dragged out of the embassy in 2019 and jailed for skipping bail. He has been in London's Belmarsh top security jail ever since, from where he has for almost five years been fighting extradition to the United States.

Those five years of confinement are similar to the sentence imposed on Reality Winner, an Air Force veteran and former intelligence contractor, who was sentenced to 63 months after she removed classified materials and mailed them to a news outlet.

While in Belmarsh Assange married his partner Stella with whom he had two children while he was holed up in the Ecuadorean embassy.

https://www.reuters.com/world/us/wikileaks-assange-expected-plead-guilty-us-espionage-charge-document-says-2024-06-24/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2zcajHDjqlM

>>21083236

WikiLeaks Tweet

JULIAN ASSANGE IS FREE

Julian Assange is free. He left Belmarsh maximum security prison on the morning of 24 June, after having spent 1901 days there. He was granted bail by the High Court in London and was released at Stansted airport during the afternoon, where he boarded a plane and departed the UK.

This is the result of a global campaign that spanned grass-roots organisers, press freedom campaigners, legislators and leaders from across the political spectrum, all the way to the United Nations. This created the space for a long period of negotiations with the US Department of Justice, leading to a deal that has not yet been formally finalised. We will provide more information as soon as possible.

After more than five years in a 2x3 metre cell, isolated 23 hours a day, he will soon reunite with his wife Stella Assange, and their children, who have only known their father from behind bars.

WikiLeaks published groundbreaking stories of government corruption and human rights abuses, holding the powerful accountable for their actions. As editor-in-chief, Julian paid severely for these principles, and for the people's right to know.

As he returns to Australia, we thank all who stood by us, fought for us, and remained utterly committed in the fight for his freedom.

Julian's freedom is our freedom.

[More details to follow]

https://x.com/wikileaks/status/1805390138945528183

>>21083236

Stella Assange Tweet

Julian is free!!!!

Words cannot express our immense gratitude to YOU- yes YOU, who have all mobilised for years and years to make this come true. THANK YOU. tHANK YOU. THANK YOU.

Follow @WikiLeaks for more info soon…

https://x.com/Stella_Assange/status/1805393089819033890

>>21083236

Mike Pence Tweet

Julian Assange endangered the lives of our troops in a time of war and should have been prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. The Biden administration’s plea deal with Assange is a miscarriage of justice and dishonors the service and sacrifice of the men and women of our Armed Forces and their families. There should be no plea deals to avoid prison for anyone that endangers the security of our military or the national security of the United States. Ever.

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/amp/rcna158695

https://x.com/Mike_Pence/status/1805426412670570928

>>21083236

Stella Assange Tweet

Julian calling into Sydney from Stansted airport last night (his day time).

#AssangeJet #AssangeFree

https://x.com/Stella_Assange/status/1805489643246567873

—

WikiLeaks Tweet

Approaching Bangkok airport for layover.

Moving closer to freedom.

#AssangeJet

https://x.com/wikileaks/status/1805523516130722200

>>21083236

Pit stop for a guilty plea and Julian Assange is homeward bound

BEN PACKHAM - 26 June 2024

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Julian Assange has landed on the US territory of Saipan Island and is on his way to court, where he will plead guilty to a single felony charge of conspiring to obtain and distribute classified information, before heading home to Australia.

The WikiLeaks founder flew in to the remote Northern Marianas Islands on a private jet from Bangkok, an almost six-hour journey, and will face court at 9am (AEST).

The flight tracker website Flightradar24 said Assange’s jet was the most tracked flight on Wednesday.

Assange’s wife says she is “elated” at her husband’s release from prison and the family’s top priority is to help him regain his health following a plea deal with US authorities to end his long-running legal saga.

Assange landed in Bangkok on Tuesday afternoon, AEST, accompanied by Australia’s high commissioner to the UK, Stephen Smith, after a dramatic breakthrough that saw him released from a British prison after nearly 2000 days on remand fighting ­extradition to the US.

Under the deal, the US Justice Department will end its pursuit of Assange over his release of hundreds of thousands of classified documents, allowing him to return home to Australia.

The deal follows lobbying by Anthony Albanese of Joe Biden and successive British leaders, and a relentless campaign by ­Assange’s family and global network of supporters. Stella Assange told the BBC from Australia she had experienced “a whirlwind of emotions” in recent days as the plea deal moved closer to being finalised.

She said the family had not yet had a chance to discuss their plans for the future, but the priority was “for Julian to get healthy again”.

Ms Assange said her husband had “been in a terrible state for five years” and they wanted “time and privacy” to start a new chapter of their lives with their children.

“It’s always been quite extraordinary,” she said. “But I’m just so emotional now. You know, this is finally over.”

The Prime Minister was cautious on Tuesday as news of ­Assange’s release broke, fearing any misplaced comments could jeopardise the carefully negotiated agreement allowing his release. “While this is a welcome development, we recognise that these proceedings are crucial and they are delicate,” Mr Albanese said. “As these proceedings are ongoing, it isn’t appropriate to provide further details.”

He said he had been clear in ­opposition and government that “regardless of the views that people have about Julian Assange and his activities, the case has dragged on for too long”. “There is nothing to be gained by his continued ­incarceration and we want him home to Australia,” he told parliament. “We have engaged and advocated Australia’s interests using all appropriate channels to support a positive outcome.”

According to the New York Post, Assange is believed to have shelled out $US500,000 ($752,000) for a private jet to fly to the remote island of Saipan in the US territory of Marianas Islands, in the northwest Pacific, to avoid returning to the American mainland.

Assange, 52, is scheduled to ­appear at 9am AEST on Wednesday in the US District Court in Saipan. He is expected to be sentenced to 62 months ­already served in a London prison, and be allowed to return to Australia.

His guilty plea, which must be approved by a judge, follows years of legal efforts by the “radical transparency” advocate to avoid charges in the US over WikiLeaks’ document dumps that embarrassed America and its allies.

According to a court document, Assange will plead guilty to one count of conspiring to obtain and distribute classified information.

(continued)

>>21089005

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The charge relates to WikiLeaks’ publication of troves of confidential US military records and diplomatic cables about America’s actions in Iraq and Afghanistan in the 2000s. He had previously faced 18 charges under US espionage laws.

His legal team had been adamant he would not travel to the US to face court in suburban Virginia, where the original case was filed.

The plea deal followed signs of a looming resolution to the case, including a comment by Mr Biden in April when he was asked by the press about Australia’s request for Assange to be freed. “We’re considering it,” Mr Biden said.

Assange’s release was applauded across the political spectrum. Opposition foreign affairs spokesman Simon Birmingham said: “We have consistently said that the US and UK justice systems should be respected. We welcome the fact that Mr Assange’s decision to plead guilty will bring this long-running saga to an end.”

Labor backbencher Josh Wilson said it was an “enormously heartening development”.

Nationals MP Keith Pitt said all those involved in advocating for the WikiLeaks founder deserved credit. “(The Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade) are always the quiet achievers. They do some very, very difficult things at a consular level, all over the world,” he said. “I’m sure Penny Wong has also been involved, as were previous foreign affairs ministers and prime ministers.”

Greens leader Adam Bandt welcomed the outcome but ­lamented Assange’s lost decade fighting extradition to the US.

“Julian Assange will finally be free,” he said. “While great news, this has been over a decade of his life wasted by US overreach. Journalism is not a crime.”

Assange’s fight for freedom has been at times surreal. He was pursued by Sweden in 2010 on rape charges that were later dropped, and sought asylum in Ecuador’s Embassy in London two years later. He remained there for five years, receiving Ecuadorean citizenship and fathering two children.

Assange has sought sanctuary in the Ecuadorean embassy in London, but outstayed his welcome by failing to clean up after his cat, skateboarding in the hallway and allegedly leaking personal information about Ecuador’s president to a rival.

He was stripped of Ecuadorean citizenship in 2019, kicked out of the embassy, and ­immediately ­arrested by British police.

Assange revelled in his role as a champion of free speech, arguing he was a journalist and his publication of leaked information should be protected by the US first amendment. But WikiLeaks’ disclosures undermined American diplomacy and, the US argued, threatened the lives of military and intelligence personnel. Former president Donald Trump’s first CIA director, Mike Pompeo, said the website was a “non-state hostile intelligence service”.

US prosecutors charged ­Assange in 2019, accusing him of conspiring to help former US intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning break into a Defence Department computer system.

https://www.theaustralian.com.au/world/julian-assange-released-from-jail-leaves-uk-for-saipan/news-story/45a0a0ce52cf3df000dd614a4ef51108

>>21089028

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Inside the courtroom

Assange's case started at 9am when he entered the court room wearing a black suit.

Sat behind him were Mr Rudd, Mr Smith, and human rights lawyer Jennifer Robinson.

All stood up as Judge Manglona entered the court room.

The judge then told the court the charge was "conspiracy to obtain and disclose national defense information," which carries a maximum penalty of up to 10-years in prison.

Assange was then asked to enter his plea to the specific charge, to which he said "guilty".

However, in a last act of defiance against the US legal system, he said there were caveats to his guilt.

The judge then said she accepted the plea.

In an interview with the BBC on Tuesday, Assange's wife Stella said there was an agreement "in principle" with the US Department of Justice but the judge must have signed off on it before it became official.

"Once the judge signs off on it, then it is formally real," she said.

Judge Manglona has been serving as the court's chief judge since her nomination in 2011 by then US president Barack Obama after eight years as an associate judge.

The Saipan native was a trailblazer in the US federal legal system where among other achievements she was the first Indigenous woman to pass the local bar exam and the first and only woman to serve on this court.

Ms Assange said all the details of deal they made with the US would be "made public, and I think it's a very interesting deal".

"The important thing here is that the deal involved time served — that if he signed it, he would be able to walk free," she told the BBC.

Under the deal he will be sentenced to 62 months of time that he has already served.

Assange left the island after the hearing and made his way back to Australia.

A surprise stop at island court

Until yesterday, the next date on the calendar for Assange's legal matters was in early July when a UK court was due to hear his appeal against his extradition to the US.

The Australian government has long been pushing the US to resolve the case and recently US President Joe Biden said "we're considering it" when asked if he had a response to Canberra's request that he end Assange's prosecution.

So there was some pressure and indication a deal might be possible, but little clue it would involve a trip to the Northern Mariana Islands.

As news of the plea deal broke, pre-prepared videos from Ms Assange and WikiLeaks editor Kristinn Hrafnsson were released.

In one, Mr Hrafnsson said: "If you're seeing this, that means he's out."

Meanwhile, the High Court in London on Tuesday sealed an order that revealed a "plea agreement" was signed between Assange and the US government on June 19.

While Assange has left the United Kingdom, he was due in court next month for an appeal hearing, and the proceedings still need to be formally terminated.

The order said conditional bail was approved to allow Assange to travel to Saipan to attend Wednesday's court hearing.

Assange was charged with 18 criminal offences in the US, including obtaining, receiving and disclosing classified information.

American officials declined to publicly discuss the plea deal before the hearing.

"While the matter is pending, it's important for me not to comment on it at all," US State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said. "Maybe tomorrow, we'll have more to say."

But the order released by the High Court in London says the agreement is for Assange to plead guilty to one of the 18 charges, with a "proposed sentence of time served".

It says it is "anticipated that a plea will be entered on Wednesday" and that after it is, "the United States have undertaken to withdraw the extradition request".

Following the conclusion of the court proceedings the DOJ released a lengthy statement revealing under the plea agreement Assange was prohibited from returning to the US without permission.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-06-26/julian-assange-hearing-pacific-island-mariana-islands/104020120

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n2-jScoqJ5M

https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/wikileaks-founder-pleads-guilty-and-sentenced-conspiring-obtain-and-disclose-classified

>>21083236

‘He did the right thing’: Assange’s father ready for reunion

David Crowe - June 26, 2024

No matter what a United States court says about Julian Assange, one man wants all Australians to know the Wikileaks founder should be declared not guilty when he returns home.

Assange’s father, John Shipton, arrived in Canberra on Tuesday night in the hope he could embrace his son on Australian soil for the first time in 15 years.

“He stood his ground, he did the right thing,” Shipton says of the controversial work by WikiLeaks to reveal alleged war crimes, diplomatic cables and other secrets others wanted to hide.

“He stood in the icy, cold wind of truth and remained upright – he remained upright for 15 years. You’ve got to give a lot of credit to that man.

“And the smears, the lies, the calumnies, the double-dealing and the effort by certain members of the legacy press to climb up on his corpse, or at least attempt to, that was off-putting. But I don’t care. The fight was to bring him home to Australia.

“I believed in my heart that Australians would respond to the call for righting an injustice and seeing a sense of justice being done. And I was not wrong in that.”

Shipton last saw his son in Australia about 15 years ago, before Swedish authorities issued an arrest warrant over sexual assault allegations, the first legal step in what became a long effort by US authorities to extradite him to an American court to face espionage charges.

“Julian has been fitted up,” he says. Shipton never believed the claims against his son and praises legal experts who, he says, picked apart the sexual assault accusations. (One of them, Nils Melzer, was the United Nations Special Rapporteur on Torture for six years.)

Shipton believes Assange was and is a journalist who revealed news others wanted to keep secret, and says he is just as deeply Australian as other expatriate journalists such as John Pilger or Phillip Knightley.

While he did not get involved in the formal negotiations over a plea deal, Shipton spent years campaigning for Assange on seven trips around Australia. He recalls the welcomes he received in places like Castlemaine in Victoria and Wagga Wagga in NSW.

He praises Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and others, including Foreign Minister Penny Wong and the two key diplomats involved, Kevin Rudd in the US and Stephen Smith in the UK. But he emphasises the cross-party support in federal parliament from Labor, the Liberals, the Nationals, the Greens and independents.

He names members of parliament ranging from Tasmanian independent Andrew Wilkie to Greens senator Peter Whish-Wilson, former Nationals resources minister Matt Canavan and former Nationals leader Barnaby Joyce.

“If you want to do something, here’s the lesson: make it cross-party,” he says.

“That’s the lesson, because they’re all Australians, these people, and they want to advance Australia. So make umbrella ideas the public can support and both sides of parliament can weld themselves around.”

Shipton is seen by some as an apologist for Russia because they claim he has spoken at a pro-Russian rally after the invasion of Ukraine, but he denies this and says he was speaking about his son. “I was ambushed by Cossack people who surrounded me with Russian flags and took photographs,” he says. Of the invasion, he says he is against all war.

The claim against him is another reflection of the concern that Assange used information from Russian hackers to release emails that undermined Democrat candidate Hillary Clinton in the 2016 presidential campaign. While Shipton was photographed in Canberra on Wednesday morning wearing a Russian hat, with an Assange badge on the front, he says he was given this during a New York winter.

Shipton saw Assange in Belmarsh Prison in the UK when he could, most recently last month, but still sounds stunned that he can see his son in Australia once more.

“I think it’s staggering. Can believe that the entirety of the institutions of the United States – the Pentagon, the CIA, the FBI, the Department of Justice, the Department of State – all lined up against Julian Assange,” he says.

“And the Australian government managed to unpick that Gordian knot and allow him to return. It’s just astonishing.”

There are challenges ahead for Assange. His wife, Stella, says the family is broke and will have to start a fundraising campaign to find about $750,000 to cover their costs, including the charter flight to bring him home.

Shipton says his son will at least be able to hear the call of a magpie in the morning and see and smell the Australian bush.

“He’s got here just in time to see the wattle bloom,” he says.

https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/he-did-the-right-thing-assange-s-father-ready-for-reunion-20240626-p5josa.html

https://x.com/mopeng/status/1805747571002064907

>>21083236

Julian Assange freed after pleading guilty to one espionage charge at a hearing in Saipan

James Oaten - 26 June 2024

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Julian Assange is a free man after pleading guilty to one charge of espionage in a federal United States court as part of a plea deal with prosecutors.

But inside the room, he had one last act of defiance.

The tension was palpable as the chief judge entered the US federal court of the remote Northern Mariana Islands, deep in the Pacific Ocean.

After more than a decade of highly publicised legal battles and fierce debate over the publication of highly sensitive material, one of the biggest court cases of the year was to be resolved on a little-known US territory.

So little-known, the US federal judge felt compelled to address the matter in court.

"Not many people recognise we are part of the United States, but that is true," Chief Judge Ramona V Manglona said.

Assange was facing one charge of conspiracy to obtain and disclose national defence information, which carries a maximum 10-year jail penalty.

Julian Assange spoke directly and calmly when it was discussed if he was willing to enter a plea.

"Guilty," he said.

Eventually, the decision everyone expected was handed down.

Chief Judge Manglona said had Assange faced court in 2012, she would not be inclined to accept the deal.

But with the passage of time, she accepted there had been no physical injury as a result of his actions, and he had already served five years in one of the UK's harshest prisons.

She sentenced Assange to time already served in prison, meaning he is now a free man.

"I hope you start your new life in a positive manner," Chief Judge Manglona said.

After years of communicating through lawyers and advocates, there was a moment in the hearing when Assange spoke about his case in his own words.

He spoke calmly and confidently before the court, stating there were caveats to his guilt, and spoke of the US Constitution's First Amendment, which upholds free speech and freedom of the press.

It was another act of defiance against the US legal system that has pursued him for more than a decade.

"Working as a journalist, I encouraged my source to provide information that was said to be classified in order to publish that information," Assange told the court when asked to explain his understanding of the charge.

"I believed the First Amendment protected that activity.

"I believe the First Amendment and the Espionage Act are in contradiction."

Outside court, Australian human rights lawyer and Assange's longest-service counsel, Jennifer Robinson, said today was "a historic day".

"Julian Assange can go home a free man," she said.

"This also brings to an end a case which has been recognised as the greatest threat to the First Amendment in the 21st century.

"There has been a global movement behind Julian to protect free speech and it is because of the global movement of support that today's outcome is possible."

Ms Robinson said: "This prosecution sets a dangerous precedent that should be of concern to journalists everywhere."

"The US is seeking to exercise extraterritorial jurisdiction over all of you without giving you constitutional free speech protections.

"Anyone who cares about free speech and democratic accountability should stand against it."

The US Department of Justice released a statement as proceedings concluded.

"Unlike news organisations that published redacted versions of some of the classified documents that Assange obtained from [Chelsea] Manning and then shared with those organisations, Assange and WikiLeaks disclosed many of the raw classified documents without removing any personally identifying information," the statement read.

"Specifically, in many instances, the classified documents [were released] … in a raw or unredacted form that placed individuals who had assisted the US government at great personal risk."

The department also confirmed it was part of the plea agreement that Assange would not be allowed to enter the United States without permission.

(continued)

>>21089086

2/2

Assange was initially facing multiple charges of disclosing and publishing highly sensitive material, which could have seen the 52-year-old sentenced to up to 175 years in prison.

Under the terms of the plea deal, by admitting guilt to one charge, Assange is now a free man and can go home — a relief for him, his family, and his supporters.

And now a bilateral headache for the US and Australia is over.

Assange and WikiLeaks have long argued the disclosure of the highly sensitive material was public interest journalism, which is protected under the US Constitution.

His detractors argued that he recklessly dumped unfiltered material online, which put the lives of US personnel in jeopardy.

Even with his final act of defiance, Assange is now a convicted felon and has publicly admitted his work — at least part of it — overstepped the mark.

How this impacts journalism going forward is one of the many unknowns of this deal.

High commissioner, former PM by his side

Assange arrived at the courthouse in a white SUV wearing a black suit and a smile as he walked past security.

He entered the federal US court, a place he has made every attempt to avoid for 14 years, flanked by former Australian prime minister Kevin Rudd.

His expression was one of anticipation — positive and very much ready for the legal formalities to get underway.

He was supported by Australian High Commissioner to the UK Stephen Smith, who accompanied him on the journey out of Britain.

Ms Robinson was also by his side. After years of representing Assange, both legally and as an advocate to politicians and the public, she too walked into court with an obvious look of cautious optimism and a hint of relief that a mammoth job was about to conclude.

Inside the courtroom, Assange stood as the chief judge entered and then the start of the end to his epic legal battle began.

While the hearing was underway, WikiLeaks announced Assange's flight out of the US territory would depart shortly after the court appearance ended and have him in Canberra by the end of the day.

The time on the ground in the Northern Mariana Islands was really just a detour on his way home, albeit the stop that would ultimately set him free.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-06-26/julian-assange-freed-as-court-hearing-concludes-in-saipan/104022842

>>21083236

>>21089086

WikiLeaks Tweet

Just a moment -

https://x.com/wikileaks/status/1805825779130831061

—

Stella Assange Tweet

Julian walks out of Saipan federal court a free man. I can’t stop crying.

#AssangeFree #AssangeJet

https://x.com/Stella_Assange/status/1805799041558888555

>>21089129

2/2

Assange flew into Saipan, in the Northern Mariana Islands, on Wednesday morning as part of a plea deal that saw him sentenced to time served in exchange for a guilty plea to the espionage charge, which carried a maximum penalty of up to 10 years in prison.

Chief Judge Ramona Manglona, an Obama appointee, approved the plea deal though she said if Assange had faced court in 2012 she would have been less inclined to accept it, as it was only the passage of time that showed no one had been physically harmed due to the leak.

She sentenced Assange to time served, given the five years he had spent in the UK's Belmarsh Prison while he fought extradition to the United States.

The plea deal resolves a 14-year battle over Assange's future, however, it has sparked renewed concerns about the case's potential chilling effect on press freedom, with free speech advocates highlighting the need for Assange's style of activist journalism to keep governments honest.

The resolution to Assange's case also follows years of diplomacy from the Australian government, with the case becoming a thorny issue in the US-Australia relationship.

Speaking after the court accepted the plea deal, Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said the resolution was "a welcome development" but it should be recognised that the US court proceedings were "sensitive and should be respected".

"This isn't something that has happened in the last 24 hours," Mr Albanese said.

"This is something that has been considered, patient, worked through in a calibrated way, which is how Australia conducts ourselves internationally."

He added that Assange had been provided with consular assistance throughout the plea deal process, including the presence of its ambassador to the United States, Kevin Rudd, and ambassador to the United Kingdom, Stephen Smith, at the hearing.

Assange spent five years in the UK's Belmarsh Prison fighting moves to extradite him to the United States in relation to the WikiLeaks publications.

He had previously spent seven years in the Ecuadorian embassy in London fighting moves to extradite him to Sweden on a charge of rape, saying he was concerned he would be extradited to the United States if he went to Sweden in person to fight the charge.

The UK government maintained a 24-hour guard outside the embassy for the majority of his stay there, preventing his escape to Ecuador, where he had been granted asylum.

The charge in question was eventually dropped in 2019, with prosecutors citing insufficient evidence to proceed.

Assange is due to arrive in Australia on a flight to Canberra later on Wednesday.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-06-26/julian-assange-wikileaks-guilty-conspiracy-mariana-islands/104022410

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tw6OWYGHWyA

https://x.com/wikileaks/status/1805743347165761842

https://www.flightaware.com/live/flight/VJT199

>>21083236

>>21083277

>>21089086

Julian Assange: Fittingly pathetic end to tawdry tale of a traitor

MICHAEL WARE and JUSTINE A. ROSENTHAL - 26 June 2024

Finally, at long last, Julian Assange has confessed to being a traitor.

For who else disseminates our military or diplomatic secrets in a time of excruciating and bloodcurdling wars he never had to fight, bleed for, or watch his friends die in, and does so with unabashed “look at me” abandon?

Materials he disseminated without a conscious thought for the safety of the people or methods named in the documents he paraded, without a thought to anyone’s actual lives. Documents that, in the hands of a journalist, would have been equally revealed but with ethical and moral guardianship.

In the end, perhaps fittingly, the self-aggrandising saga of Assange has ended ignominiously on an island, in a far-off tiny commonwealth of the US in the Pacific Ocean, where he is due to plead guilty to a single US felony count of illegally obtaining and disclosing national security material.

It may be a Pyrrhic victory, but it’s a victory nonetheless. Not only for our national security services, but for journalists as well.

For in the courtroom of public opinion and in the halls of justice, Tuesday was a condemnation not only of treason but a validation of high journalism. Julian Assange will no longer play the poster child of national security secret dumping masquerading as heroic selflessness in the name of freedom of the press.

As we have said before in the pages of this publication, there is a worthy, storied place for whistleblowers with the courage to stand up against those who wish to conceal secrets that should be made public – the ugly truths that must be told.

But at some feverish and ludicrous point, Assange went from theatre, to farce, to tragedy. Until, finally, his story became about a sad little man with seemingly agonising personal issues who thought he was somehow more divine than the world of realpolitik he egotistically bumbled into.

A relentless but vital world in which he was proverbially run over by a tank.

It’s an evisceration that should, finally, give all true journalists some relief and breath.

For Assange sought to defraud the public, and his acolytes, into thinking he represented our journalistic profession. A profession some of us have lived or died for. Assange doesn’t have a clue where free speech begins nor ends. He doesn’t know when not to cry “fire” in a crowded theatre. He’s merely a digital garbage bin behind the great halls of true reporting. Indeed, he even derided on Twitter to never wanting to identify as a journalist. Undermining, one supposes, not only his legal defence but his own manufactured sense of identity and purpose.

Feted by those in foolish fugue and confused, who, now, will be saddled with him upon his release?

It would seem it will not be the Ecuadorians, not the Brits, nor the Americans who must now live with the soiled imprint and presence of Julian Assange. But us. Australia. For he is, after all, one of our “own”?

Should that be so, then let us be grateful because, if there is justice in this world, at least the Assange anguish could be over. For there is no winning, or winners, in his tale.

Thus, it is time to at last bury his lede. Headlines are his heroin. Maybe Australia will let him rest. Forget him, even? For to keep enabling this kind of headline-seeking addict is to promote precisely the wrong type of freedom of the press and services of truth to power to which we all aspire. And which truly serves our democracy.

For Assange is now yesterday’s news. Lest he cannot help himself. And betrays us again. But in any event, he should not be abetted. It’s beyond time we deprive Assange the attention he craves like the oxygen we breathe. There remain, and will continue to emerge, true whistleblowers to laud. It’s in them our energies and devotion must lie. Not in vacuous hacking vessels who crossed lines too numerous to count.

Yet Assange may yet still serve a noble purpose – as a cautionary tale. He may illuminate genuine whistleblowers, such as US Lieutenant Colonel Alexander Vindman who, at career-ending cost, called out what he saw as Russian interference in Ukraine and US elections.

It’s time to bury Assange’s headline. For, after all, haven’t we all now served our time? Assange has served his, which we’ve read about endlessly. Let us hope he does not trouble us once more, and that we, all, do not have to serve our time again because of him.

Under law. Without question.

Michael Ware is a former CNN war correspondent. Justine A. Rosenthal is a former executive editor of Newsweek Magazine. Both are award-winning documentarians.

https://www.theaustralian.com.au/nation/politics/julian-assange-fittingly-pathetic-end-to-tawdry-tale-of-a-traitor/news-story/693af67b7573213a104d5768b5334fa5

>>21083236

>>21089086

U.S. Embassy Australia Tweet

STATEMENT BY U.S. AMBASSADOR TO AUSTRALIA CAROLINE KENNEDY

“The return of Julian Assange to Australia brings this longstanding and difficult case to a close. The United States is grateful to the Government of Australia for their commitment and assistance throughout this process.”

https://x.com/USEmbAustralia/status/1805810310277906746

>>21083236

>>21089086

Julian Assange reunites with family after he arrives in Canberra

Jake Evans - 26 June 2024

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has landed in Australia, ending the former fugitive's decade-long diplomatic saga.

Assange's plane touched down just after 7:30pm in Canberra as his family, supporters and media watched on.

Crowds erupted in cheers as Assange waved at supporters and hugged his wife on the tarmac.

As he stepped off the plane, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, speaking from parliament, welcomed his return.

"Earlier tonight I was pleased to speak to Mr Assange to welcome him home and had the opportunity to ask him about his health and have my first discussion with him," he said.

"His safe return to Australia as we know means so much to his family."

Assange's family and media then raced to East Hotel in Kingston, where his wife Stella Assange and legal team addressed media and celebrated his return.

Ms Assange thanked the government and opposition, public servants and the Australian people for their tireless advocacy.

"It took all of them, it took millions of people, it took people working behind the scenes, people protesting on the streets for day, and weeks, and months and years," Ms Assange said.

"And we achieved it."

Assange's lawyer, Jen Robinson, said he spoke with the prime minister on the phone as soon as he landed, and expressed his thanks for his return.

"[Assange] told the prime minister he had saved his life, and I don't think that's an exaggeration," Ms Robinson said.

"That Julian came home today is the product of 14 long years of legal battles, political advocacy and ongoing campaigning — not just by us, but by so many people in this community.

But his legal team repeated their frustrations that Assange had to plead guilty in order to be freed, and said that amounted to the criminalisation of journalism.

Ms Assange added that Julian wished to pass on his thanks, but he needed time to recuperate.

"You have to understand what he's been through," she said.

"Julian should never have spent a single day in prison, but today we celebrate because Julian is free."

Earlier on Wednesday, Assange pleaded guilty to one charge of conspiracy with a sentence of "time already served", in a deal that concluded the United States' pursuit of him for more than a decade.

The US had sought Assange's extradition from the United Kingdom since 2012 over the publication of classified US military intelligence through WikiLeaks.

Julian Assange touches down in Australia

Mr Albanese said regardless of what people think of Assange, it was clear his case had dragged on for too long.

He said in his phone call with Assange expressed "praise" for the Australian government's efforts in returning him home, saying it took patient diplomacy.

Outside the East Hotel in Kingston, the mood was jubilant as a crowd of Assange's supporters gathered to welcome his return.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-06-26/julian-assange-touches-down-in-australia/104025444

>>21094264

Assange’s defiant gesture on return as wife asks for time to recover

Matthew Knott, David Crowe and Paul Sakkal - June 26, 2024

1/2

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has returned to Australia with a clenched-fist gesture in emotional scenes in Canberra on Wednesday night, as Prime Minister Anthony Albanese vowed to always stand up for citizens in trouble overseas.

Assange made a symbolic show of victory, his arm outstretched and his fist clenched, after stepping onto Australian soil for the first time in 14 years, as he hugged his wife, Stella Assange, and his father, John Shipton, on the tarmac.

A crowd gathered in Canberra to greet the controversial figure, hailed a hero by some and traitor by others, when he landed in Australia after a plea deal in a remote Pacific island courthouse to end years of legal pursuit by United States authorities.

Assange told Albanese “you saved my life” in a phone conversation as soon as the charter flight landed, with the prime minister saying the WikiLeaks founder described the arrival as a “surreal and happy moment” after years in prison.

Stella Assange made an emotional plea for her husband to be given privacy while he reunited with their children, while she also signalled a campaign to secure a presidential pardon for Assange in the years ahead.

“Julian wanted me to sincerely thank everyone,” she told a packed press conference in Canberra, as supporters jostled to see the Assange family and his lawyers, Jennifer Robinson and Barry Pollack, and others clamoured to enter the room.

“But you have to understand what he’s been through. He needs time. He needs to recuperate. And this is a process. I ask you - please - to give us space, to give us privacy. To find our place. To let our family be a family before he can speak again at a time of his choosing.”

She argued for a pardon for her husband not only for his sake but because, she said, the US prosecution against him set a disturbing precedent and put all journalists at risk.

Robinson, the key lawyer who has acted for Assange in London for many years, also described the prosecution under the US Espionage Act as a grave threat to free speech.

In a key statement to critics of Assange who claim his revelations put lives at risk, Robinson cited the court decision on Wednesday as proof this was not so, given the judge said nobody had been harmed as a result of his activities.

Assange arrived in Australia after appearing in a courtroom in the Northern Mariana Islands, a United States commonwealth in the Pacific, earlier in the day, where he pleaded guilty to a single charge of conspiring to unlawfully obtain and disseminate classified national defence information.

His arrival in Australia for the first time in 14 years brought a dramatic end to a legal saga that tested the boundaries of press freedom and required skilful lobbying by the Albanese government and Assange supporters to secure his release.

Albanese said at a press conference at 8pm, just as Assange disembarked from a chartered flight, that the release of Assange had taken years of diplomatic effort and showed the government was “not in a contest of machismo” because it worked quietly behind the scenes rather than talking in public about its negotiations with the US.

“I believe in standing up for Australian citizens,” he said of his talks with US President Joe Biden and the broader effort to settle the case.

(continued)

2/2

Albanese acknowledged the strong opinions about Assange and did not take sides on the dispute about whether he was a journalist and had been unfairly pursued.

While the prime minister welcomed Assange home, there are no plans for a public show of support in a joint press conference or other event together in coming days.

Opposition Leader Peter Dutton remained silent in question time on Wednesday when Albanese spoke about Assange, while other Coalition frontbenchers have criticised the WikiLeaks founder this week and said his work had undermined the US and its allies.

Stella Assange told the BBC that her husband “will have to pay the Australian government $US520,000 ($777,000) back for the chartered flights” that brought him from London to Canberra via Bangkok and Saipan.

She said Assange’s supporters had already raised more than half the sum required through a crowdfunding appeal.

The US Justice Department on Wednesday defended its six-year-long pursuit of Assange, accusing him of behaving differently to traditional journalists and putting individuals who helped the US government “at great personal risk” by not redacting their names.

Assange will be banned from returning to the US without permission as a result of the conviction, the Justice Department said.

At his Mariana Islands plea, Judge Ramona Manglona said it was important to recognise that Assange had been jailed for 62 months in a London prison, roughly equivalent to the time US Army whistleblower Chelsea Manning served for disclosing classified information about the Iraq and Afghanistan wars to WikiLeaks.

“I hope there will be some peace restored,” she said, wishing Assange a “happy birthday” as his 53rd birthday falls next week.

Assange was originally charged with 18 felony counts, carrying a maximum prison sentence of 175 years.

The Justice Department said that, unlike traditional news organisations, “Assange and WikiLeaks disclosed many of the raw classified documents without removing any personally identifying information”.

“Assange’s decision to reveal the names of human sources illegally shared with him by Manning created a grave and imminent risk to human life,” the department said.

https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/assange-celebrates-australian-return-with-clenched-fist-salute-family-embrace-20240626-p5joya.html

https://x.com/Stella_Assange/status/1805912602482291195

>>21094264

Anthony Albanese first on the phone as convicted felon Julian Assange tastes freedom at last

BEN PACKHAM, RHIANNON DOWN and TRICIA RIVERA - June 26, 2024

1/2

Australia’s highest profile fugitive Julian Assange has returned home a convicted felon, reuniting with his wife and father after five years in prison and more than a decade on the run from US authorities over his publication of troves of top secret documents.

He disembarked from a charter flight from Saipan in the western Pacific at about 7.55pm on Wednesday, raising a fist as he walked across the tarmac at Canberra’s RAAF Fairbairn terminal.

He embraced wife Stella ­Assange on the tarmac, lifting her off the ground before hugging his father John Shipton amid cheers from supporters.

Moments after his arrival, ­Anthony Albanese declared: “We have got this done.” The Prime Minister revealed he was the first person Assange spoke to after he touched down. According to one of the WikiLeaks founder’s lawyers, Assange told Mr Albanese he had “saved his life”.

Mr Albanese claimed credit for Assange’s release, saying his government was focused on “making a difference”.

“This is what standing up for Australians around the world looks like,” he said. “It means getting the job done; getting results and getting outcomes; having the determination to stay the course.”

But the Prime Minister ­declined in an evening press conference to say whether he believed Assange was a journalist – as the WikiLeaks founder claims – who was wrongfully pursued by the US over his disclosure of hundreds of thousands of classified documents. “There will continue to be different views about Julian ­Assange and his activity,” Mr ­Albanese said. “My role as Prime Minister has been to firmly say that whatever the views that people have, there was no purpose to be served by this ongoing incarceration.”

Ms Assange said after her husband’s arrival that freedom of speech was “in a very dangerous place”, and there needed to be a conscious pushback against ­efforts to stifle reporting.

“Julian needs time to recover, to get used to freedoms,” she said, saying she wanted her husband to “have that space to rediscover freedom slowly”.

Assange’s return to Australia followed his guilty plea in the US District Court in Saipan to a single count of conspiring to obtain and distribute classified information under the US Espionage Act. But he stood defiantly by his claim to have acted as a journalist in dumping the files on the internet.

“Working as a journalist, I ­encouraged my source to provide material that was said to be classified,” the 52-year-old told the court. “I believe the first amendment and the Espionage Act are in contradiction with each other, but I accept that it would be difficult to win such a case given all these circumstances.“

(continued)

>>21094308

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Assange’s lawyer, Barry Pollack, said the conviction was a “chilling” precedent, arguing the US Espionage Act should never have been used to pursue a ­publisher or journalist such as ­Assange. “Mr Assange revealed truthful, newsworthy information, including revealing that the United States had committed war crimes,” he said. “He has suffered tremendously in his fight for free speech, for freedom of the press, and to ensure that the American public and the world community gets truthful and important newsworthy information.”

But the US Justice Department said Assange’s guilty plea was an admission of a conspiracy with former US soldier Chelsea Manning – who served seven years in jail – to release top-secret information without caring about the harm it would cause. “After obtaining classified ­national ­defence information from Manning, and aware of the harm that dissemination of such national defence information would cause, Assange disclosed this information on ­WikiLeaks,” it said.

Under the terms of his plea deal, Assange is barred from travelling to the US. He was also required to “take all action within his control” to return or destroy any unpublished classified documents in his possession, or held by ­WikiLeaks.

Ms Assange, who said her husband would seek a pardon, launched a funding drive to raise about $778,000 to cover the cost of the chartered jet that brought her husband home, already reaching $629,518 late on Wednesday.

District Court judge Ramona Manglona said the 62 months ­Assange had already served in a British prison “was fair and reasonable and proportionate to Manning’s actual prison time”.

Assange was accompanied in court, and on the flight to Australia, by Australia’s ambassador to the US, Kevin Rudd, and high commissioner to the UK, Stephen Smith. Mr Albanese paid tribute to the efforts of both men in lobbying for Assange’s freedom. US ambassador to Australia Caroline Kennedy thanked ­Australia for its co-operation, saying Assange’s return “brings this longstanding and difficult case to a close”.

Independent MP Andrew Wilkie said Mr Assange’s release was “thrilling news”, but his conviction set an “alarming” precedent.

“It’s the sort of thing we’d ­expect in an authoritarian or totalitarian country, it is not what we would expect from the US or a similar country like Australia,” he said. “Julian Assange is a Walkley award-winning Australian journalist who did his job.”

Opposition home affairs spokesman James Paterson said Mr Assange was “no hero”, and had drawn out the resolution of his own case by “evading lawful extradition requests”. “It is a credit to the US that they are showing such leniency towards someone ­accused of such a serious crime,” Senator Paterson said.

Former Home Affairs Department secretary Mike Pezzullo said it would be “deeply troubling” if Assange was given “celebrity status”, arguing it would be inappropriate for senior government figures to personally welcome him home. “He shouldn’t be treated as a hero, but he is an Australian citizen who was deserving of consulate support,” he told Sky News.

Foreign Minister Penny Wong said Assange’s freedom was the result of “careful, patient and determined efforts”, comparing his release with the government’s success in securing the freedom of Cheng Lei from a Chinese prison, and Sean Turnell from detention in Myanmar. “The approach we have taken is to pursue outcomes. We haven’t taken the approach of seeking headlines,” she said.

A group of more than a dozen MPs who supported Assange gathered in Parliament House on Wednesday. Among them were Mr Wilkie, Labor MPs including long-term supporter Josh Wilson, Liberal MP Bridget Archer, Nationals senator Matt Canavan, and Greens senators Peter Whish-Wilson and David Shoebridge.

https://www.theaustralian.com.au/nation/politics/anthony-albanese-first-on-the-phone-as-convicted-felon-julian-assange-tastes-freedom-at-last/news-story/05f6da4152e7d0f7ca010429fb0934b7

https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/68881226/united-states-v-assange/

https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.nmid.6474/gov.uscourts.nmid.6474.2.0.pdf

https://x.com/AlboMP/status/1805913003168305645

>>21094264

It took ‘creative nous’: Rudd on behind-the-scenes efforts to secure Assange release

Matthew Knott - June 27, 2024

US ambassador Kevin Rudd has suggested he played an important role in convincing Julian Assange to accept a plea deal with the United States Justice Department as a partisan stoush erupted over the WikiLeaks founder’s return to Australia.

The opposition accused Prime Minister Anthony Albanese of giving Assange, who pleaded guilty to a conspiracy charge, an overly warm welcome by calling him just after he touched down in Canberra on Wednesday night.

In his first public comments since Assange’s departure from London’s Belmarsh Prison, Rudd said it had taken “creative nous” from Australia to secure his release.

Asked if he persuaded Assange to accept a plea deal to bring the matter to a close, Rudd told the ABC: “You could say that, I couldn’t possibly comment. Ultimately, it was a matter for the parties.”

Assange’s lawyers have credited Albanese and Rudd with playing a pivotal role in securing their client’s release.

Rudd said he acted as the principal point of contact between the US Justice Department and Assange’s legal team after becoming ambassador in early 2023, adding it was crucial that Albanese had granted him a “clear prime ministerial mandate” to pursue the matter with the Biden administration.

Asked if he acted as a linchpin in the negotiations, he replied: “That’s your term, not mine.”

Rudd said he feared the Assange case would have become a “long-term irritant” in the US-Australia relationship if it continued to drag out through the courts.

Earlier in the day, opposition foreign affairs spokesman Simon Birmingham said Albanese had failed a test of judgment by speaking by telephone to Assange after his arrival in Australia.

“I don’t think it’s at all appropriate that Anthony Albanese picked up the phone to Julian Assange,” Birmingham told reporters.

“Yesterday, Julian Assange pleaded guilty in a United States court to charges under the US Espionage Act, and by nightfall, he was welcomed home by the Australian prime minister.

“That just sends all of the wrong signals and is irresponsible and inappropriate of Anthony Albanese to welcome home Julian Assange on the same day he’s pleaded guilty to US charges related to espionage.”

The US Department of Justice maintains that the 2010 release of thousands of classified US military documents put lives at risk as names were not redacted. Assange was indicted during the Trump administration and faced 18 charges carrying a total sentence of up to 175 years.

Birmingham said Assange should not be classified as a political prisoner and should not be treated as a hero for publishing sensitive US national security secrets.

“Julian Assange is not Cheng Lei, he’s not Sean Turnell, he’s not Kylie Moore-Gilbert,” he said, referring to other Australians who have recently returned from imprisonment overseas.

“He was not held in a Chinese jail or an Iranian jail or a jail in Myanmar against his will, without access to a court, legal representatives or a system of justice.”

Albanese posted a photo on social media platform X of him talking to Assange on the phone on Wednesday night.

“As prime minister, I have been clear – regardless of what you think of his activities, Mr Assange’s case had dragged on for too long,” Albanese said.

He has not met with Assange face-to-face.

Nationals MP Michael McCormack said the government was behaving “disgracefully” by welcoming Assange to Australia.

“What Mr Assange did was unforgivable – shamelessly publishing and handing our enemies uncensored information of actively serving defence personnel on a platter,” he said.

US judge Ramona Manglona said there was “no personal victim here” as a result of the information published by WikiLeaks, and Assange’s lawyers have insisted no human sources were harmed as a result of the website’s disclosures.

Opposition home affairs spokesman James Paterson said Assange spent so long in confinement because he evaded lawful extradition requests and had pleaded guilty to “very serious national security offences”.

“They’re offences against the Five Eyes intelligence gathering alliance, including Australia, because they put the sources of that alliance at grave risk,” he said.

Finance Minister Katy Gallagher believed most Australians welcomed Assange’s return to Australia.

https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/opposition-blasts-government-for-picking-up-the-phone-to-assange-20240627-p5jp59.html

>>21094264

Australian leaders celebrate Julian Assange's freedom but opposition says he is 'no martyr'

Peter Hobson and Kirsty Needham - June 27, 2024

CANBERRA, June 27 (Reuters) - Julian Assange spent his first night in 14 years as a free man back at home in Australia as the conservative opposition on Thursday cautioned the government against hailing the WikiLeaks founder as a hero.

Assange landed in Australia to an ecstatic welcome on Wednesday evening after pleading guilty to violating the U.S. Espionage Act. He was then freed by a U.S. court on the remote Pacific island of Saipan, having served more than five years in a British high-security jail.

His wife, Stella Assange, said it was too soon to say what her husband would do next and requested privacy for him.

"Julian plans to swim in the ocean every day. He plans to sleep in a real bed. He plans to taste real food, and he plans to enjoy his freedom," she told reporters on Thursday.

Assange's supporters and free speech advocates view him as a victim because he exposed U.S. wrongdoing and potential crimes, including in conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq, when WikiLeaks published thousands of classified military documents and diplomatic cables in 2010.

However, the U.S. government has long said his actions were reckless and by publishing the names of government sources he had put agents' lives at risk.

Assange has not spoken publicly since being released. Overnight a judge in the U.S. state of Virginia formally dismissed all charges outstanding against him.

Australian lawmakers had called for Assange's release for several years, and his case was a rare point of tension in bilateral relations with the United States.

"For some time now, the incarceration of Julian Assange was a thorn in the side of that relationship, it was just niggling away on the margins," said independent lawmaker Andrew Wilkie, co-chair of a parliamentary committee that advocated for Assange's release.

"That has now been fixed, so I now see reason to be very optimistic about the bilateral relationship. That thorn has been pulled out," he told reporters.

Assange, who had holed up in the Ecuadorean embassy in London for seven years before going to jail, had battled extradition to Sweden on sexual assault allegations as well as to the U.S., where he faced 18 criminal charges tied to WikiLeaks' release of the classified U.S. documents.

(continued)

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'NO MARTYR'

Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, who supported Assange's release years before taking office in 2022, welcomed him home in a phone call. He said he "had a very warm discussion" with Assange.

However, the conservative opposition raised concerns about portraying Assange as a hero after he spent more than a decade trying to avoid prosecution and then pleaded guilty to one criminal count of conspiring to obtain and disclose classified national defence documents.

The opposition leader in the Senate, Simon Birmingham, welcomed Assange's release but said the WikiLeaks founder was "no martyr" for the mass data leak.

"That wasn't an act of journalism. It wasn't like these were edited or curated documents. It was simply a data dump, a data dump from a leak and a data dump that came with consequences for the U.S. in terms of how they managed their operations and their officials because of the safety risks that were created," he told Reuters in an interview.

He cautioned Albanese against meeting Assange and said the celebration of his release was likely to lead to disquiet among some members of the U.S. Congress.

"I do suspect that there are a few people in the Congress and elsewhere who would raise an eyebrow and think it inappropriate for Anthony Albanese to so publicly and personally welcome Julian Assange back to Australia," he said.

Foreign Minister Penny Wong told ABC Radio Assange's release posed no threat to Australia-U.S. ties.

The U.S. State Department on Wednesday said its involvement in the resolution of Assange's case was very limited and reiterated its position that his actions had put lives at risk, although the U.S. judge who accepted his guilty plea said there had been no personal victim.

The White House was not in any way involved in the case, national security spokesman John Kirby said, adding it was a Department of Justice matter.

https://www.reuters.com/world/australian-leaders-celebrate-julian-assanges-freedom-opposition-says-he-is-no-2024-06-27/

>>21094264

‘He needs time to heal after 14 years of hell’, says Julian Assange’s wife Stella

JOANNA PANAGOPOULOS - 26 June 2024

Julian Assange’s wife has made an emotional plea for the WikiLeaks founder to be given time to ­recuperate from a 14-year ordeal avoiding extradition to Sweden over rape allegations that were later dropped and the US over the release of classified documents ­relating to the Iraq and Afghanistan wars.

Assange embraced his ­family as a free man for the first time in 14 years after he touched down in Canberra on Wednesday night.

Holding back tears, Stella Assange said: “Julian wanted me to sincerely thank everyone. He wanted to be here. But you have to understand what he’s been through. He needs time. He needs to recuperate. And this is a process.

“Julian needs time to recover. To get used to freedoms. Someone told me yesterday who had been through something similar that freedom comes slowly. And I want Julian to have that space to rediscover freedom.

“I ask you – please – to give us space, to give us privacy. To find our place. To let our family be a family before he can speak again at a time of his choosing.”

Ms Assange said “things finally started to move” towards a plea deal as an extradition appeal was set to be heard in the UK High Court. “I think that it revealed … how uncomfortable the United States government is, in fact, of having these arguments aired, because this case … is an attack on journalism,” she said.

“It’s an attack on the public’s right to know. And it should never have been brought. Julian should never have spent a single day in prison. But today we celebrate ­because today Julian is free.”

Ms Assange thanked Anthony Albanese and the Australian people “who have made this possible”.

“Without their support, there would not be the political space to be able to achieve Julian’s freedom,” she said.

“And that support is across the board. I thank the opposition for also supporting Julian’s release.

“It took all of them, all of them … It took millions of people. It took people working behind the scenes, the people protesting on the streets for days and weeks and months and years.”

Ms Assange declined to comment on whether her husband planned to return to work with WikiLeaks.

Assange was greeted at Canberra airport by his wife, his young sons, Max and Gabriel – who were meeting their father for the first time out of ­detention – and his ­father, John Shipton.

Ms Assange was in tears earlier on Wednesday, as her husband walked out of Saipan Federal Court in the US juris­diction of the Mariana Islands a free man.

“I can’t stop crying,” she wrote on social media.

She provided social media updates on the proceedings throughout the day, as her husband entered a guilty plea to one count of “conspiracy to obtain and disseminate national defence ­information”.

“The judge’s sentencing ­remarks have finally put an end to this baseless smear,” she wrote.

As Deputy Prime Minister Richard Marles confirmed the government would not pay for the cost of Assange’s $782,190 private jet home, Ms Assange shared a crowdfund by the group Free ­Julian Assange to raise the funds, saying his “freedom comes at a massive cost”.

“Julian will owe $US520,000, which he is obligated to pay back to the Australian government for charter Flight VJ199. He was not permitted to fly commercial airlines or routes to Saipan and onward to Australia. Any contribution big or small is much appreciated,” she wrote.

Assange’s brother, Gabriel Shipton, said the family was “very much looking forward to having him home and safe on ­Australian soil”.

Mr Shipton said he expected his brother would want to live “a quiet life” with his family.

“I imagine he wants to be somewhere he will be left alone to just chill out for a bit,” he said. “So I imagine (he’ll be based) somewhere quite remote in the countryside or the bush.”

Assange’s father, who arrived in Canberra on Tuesday night, said he was excited to watch his son live an “ordinary life” with his family.

“There may be some questions to be resolved by the lawyers and the diplomats in the future, but having Julian home to an ordinary life after 15 years of incarceration in one form or another – house ­arrest, jail and asylum in an ­embassy – is pretty good news,” John Shipton told ABC News.

“As you can easily imagine, his spirits have lifted.

“(He will) be able to walk up and down the beach and feel the sand through his toes in winter, that lovely chill, and be able to learn how to be patient and play with your children for a couple of hours. All of the great beauty of ­ordinary life.”

https://www.theaustralian.com.au/nation/julian-assange-returns-home-for-the-ordinary-life-with-family/news-story/1f216f6e2f31c9548e9004a6ab8f8de9

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Settling Assange's case helps US consolidate ties with Australia, strengthen small cliques in Asia-Pacific: expert

GT staff reporters - Jun 26, 2024

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The curtain has closed on Julian Assange's saga as the WikiLeaks founder pleaded guilty to violating US espionage laws and walked out of court as a free man on Wednesday. Yet his case has exposed the hypocrisy of the US' long-flaunted freedom of speech and the ugliness of the country's relentless efforts to crush those who have "got in the way."

The US' gains from settling this high-profile case are multi-dimensional. Not only did the US intimidate people trying to expose US' dirty laundries, but it also removed one obstacle in its relationship with Australia, where Assange is from and where there has been advocacy for his release, observers noted. Consolidating coordination with Australia can help the US counter China's influence in the Western Pacific region through the creation of alliances, said experts.

Assange walked free on Wednesday from a court on the US Pacific island territory of Saipan after pleading guilty to violating US espionage law, in a deal that allowed him to head straight home to Australia, per Reuters.

His release ends a 14-year legal saga in which Assange spent more than five years in a British high-security jail and seven years in asylum at the Ecuadorean Embassy in London battling extradition to Sweden on sexual assault allegations and to the US, where he faced 18 criminal charges.

Those charges stemmed from WikiLeaks' release in 2010 of hundreds of thousands of classified US military documents on Washington's wars in Afghanistan and Iraq - one of the largest breaches of secret information in US history.

During a three-hour hearing in Saipan, Assange pleaded guilty to only one criminal count of conspiring to obtain and disclose classified national defense documents but said he had believed the US Constitution's First Amendment, which protects free speech, shielded his activities.

"He [Assange] has suffered tremendously in his fight for free speech, for freedom of the press, and to ensure that the American public and the world community gets truthful and important newsworthy information," Assange's US lawyer Barry J Pollack said outside court in Saipan, Australian media reported.

The decades-long saga basically tells the world US political power can crush any form of freedom and legal terms, Lü Xiang, a research fellow at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, told the Global Times.

Assange has endured a great deal over the past 14 years, yet his power and resources are too limited to effectively combat the US political machine, said Lü. While Assange's guilty plea is unjust and unfortunate, his experiences, along with WikiLeaks, have further exposed the real US to the world.

The case of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange shows the world what US-style "freedom of the press" really is, said Wang Wenbin, then spokesperson for the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs, at a press briefing in May.

Wang said the case shows the US believes exposure of other countries' secrets should be rewarded, but exposure of its own should be punished. The remarks came after Assange won a victory in his ongoing battle against extradition from the UK to the US, after the High Court in London granted him permission to appeal.

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Secret diplomatic maneuvers

Behind closed doors, an Australia-US-UK diplomatic dance opened the way for a plea deal to free the WikiLeaks founder, analysts and a diplomat previously involved in the case told AFP.

The tide shifted strongly in Assange's favor after Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese was elected in May 2022 and made his release a priority, a diplomat who did not want to be named told the AFP.

Assange and his family had been advised previously that he should plead guilty and strike a deal because it would be difficult for the US to drop the charges, said the diplomat.

In February this year, Albanese said he hoped for an amicable end to the prosecution of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange after Australian lawmakers ramped up pressure on the US and UK by passing a motion calling for Assange to be allowed to return to his home country.

The release of Assange has helped to remove a major obstacle between Washington and Canberra, strengthening their coordination. Washington had the current Asia-Pacific situation in mind when deciding to settle the case, Li Haidong, a professor at the China Foreign Affairs University, told the Global Times.

The US and Australia have strong cooperation in both political and security aspects. Strengthening cooperation with Australia can help US counter China's influence in the Western Pacific region through the creation of alliances, Li explained.

"I think part of the reason this has happened today is because it was becoming a significant issue for the relationship," Emma Shortis, senior researcher in international and security affairs at The Australia Institute thinktank, told media, noting that notably since London, Washington and Canberra agreed on a nuclear-powered submarine pact, AUKUS.

Li said after 14 years, the US has come to the conclusion that continuing to pursue the Assange case is no longer worth the effort. Therefore, Assange's confession and return to Australia are seen as a means for the US to save face and for the relationship between the US and Australia to be repaired.

What is even more tragic than Assange's guilty plea is that his fate is not the outcome of his own actions, but rather the result of a compromise and coordination among various governments for geopolitical reasons, said Li.

https://www.globaltimes.cn/page/202406/1314843.shtml

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>>21094264

>>21094541

Tucker Carlson Tweet

Meet the Australian media.

https://x.com/TuckerCarlson/status/1806034521369776406