Nordic News Network, November 15th 2019
U.N.’s special rapporteur on torture and other serious crimes repeats: Sweden guilty of collaborating in ”a concerted effort to
isolate, demonize, harass and, ultimately, to silence Julian Assange”.
For the second time in less than half a year, the U.N.’s special rapporteur on torture etc. has accused Sweden of serious crimes against the human rights of Julian Assange.
The first time was on 23 May, when rapporteur Nils Melzer wrote to the four governments, among them Sweden, which for nearly a decade have collaborated in plaguing and persecuting Assange. The Swedish government responded with a brief letter consisting largely of untruths, evasions and glaring omissions.
Nils Melzer therefore wrote a follow-up letter to the government to convey ”additional observations and clarifications, and to reiterate or further detail my queries”. That letter was sent on 12 September and, in accordance with U.N. praxis, made public after 60 days
The follow-up letter includes Melzer’s conclusion that ”the manner in which the preliminary investigation against Mr. Assange has been conducted by the Swedish prosecution appears to have contributed significantly, if not decisively, to various patterns of cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment which Mr. Assange has been exposed to since 2010”.
Among other things, ”the Swedish prosecution appears to do everything to maintain the unqualified ’rape suspect’ narrative it has been disseminating, while at thesame time avoiding to expose the evidentiary merits of this narrative totransparency and independent public scrutiny”.
For these and other reasons, rapporteur Melzer concludes that ”acts or omissions of the Swedish authorities defeat thepresumption that the preliminary criminal investigation against Mr. Assange has been, and currently is being, conductedingood faith and in compliance with the fundamental principles of due process and ofjustice”.
There ”appears to have been a deliberate, sustained and concerted effort by theUnited States, Sweden, the United Kingdom and, more recently, Ecuador, with a view to isolating, demonizing, harassing and, ultimately, silencing Mr.Assange.”
Why? ”I am gravely concerned that Mr. Assange is being prosecuted and abused for having published evidence for seriousmisconduct of State officials, including international crimes involving torture and other cruel, inhuman or degradingtreatment or punishment, whereas the incriminated officials themselves are being granted impunity in flagrant violation ofthe most basic principles of justice, human dignity and the rule of law.”
That and much more is documented in a detailed bill of particulars, including sections on:
• Proactive manipulation of evidence
• Disregard for exculpatory evidence
• Disregard for requirements of necessity and proportionality
• Pervasive procedural procrastination
• Arbitrary detention and torture.
The government responded on 11 November with a brief note which referred the U.N.’s rapporteur to the above-noted disgraceful reply to his first letter: ”The Government has no further observation to make”.
Nils Melzer’s follow-up letter is available in PDF format here
Related Reading
Media vs. Melzer: Censorship by Omission
Nils Melzers correspondence with USA concerning Julian Assange