Julian Assange is finally free (Le Monde Diplomatique, June 2024)

Jrestoration Assange is free. After twelve years of deprivation of liberty – first in the Ecuadorian embassy in London, then in a British prison – on the grounds that the media WikiLeaks had revealed to the public true information much more significant than the gossip we read usually in the press. It was about espionage and war crimes whose culprits were not bad guys. illiberal regimes » but the beautiful American democracy and the allies it had taken with it in the invasion and destruction of Iraq. Gold “ the first to tell the truth must be executed. His tongue is cut out, he is said to be crazy ”, as the song says. Assange therefore experienced all kinds of accusations, often far-fetched, intended to keep him detained.

Why is the administration of Mr. Joseph Biden finally agreeing to drop the espionage charges initiated by that of his predecessor, Mr. Donald Trump ? We can imagine that the American denunciation, entirely justified moreover, of the incarceration of a journalist from Wall Street Journal Evan Gershkovich, accused of espionage by Moscow and soon to be tried, suffered from the persecution carried out by the White House against Assange. Australia, whose strategic role is growing as Sino-American relations deteriorate, was also in solidarity with its compatriot. Now free, Assange will undoubtedly tell us what it is all about. And what he thinks of Western journalists who fed on information from WikiLeaks before defaming him to better ignore his fate.

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