Once again (last visited Dec. 2012) on Wednesday 6th November, 2013, I had the privilege of having a private visit with Julian Assange, Founder of Wikileaks, who is currently seeking asylum in the embassy lest he be arrested by UK authorities, taken to Sweden for questioning on alleged sexual allegations, and then illegally extradited to USA to face a grand jury on alleged espionage charges.
I joined Hon. Gianni Pittella,First Vice-President of the European Parliament and Enzo Curzio, Vice president, of the Secretariate of the World Summit of Nobel Peace Laureates. We listened to Julian who enlightened us how we personally and our whole privacy has been eroded, and EU security and their sovereinty has been jeopardized by the use of USA/UK unethical surveillance. This conversation has taken my thinking to another level as to where we are going and what we are giving up to try and obtain personal and state security.
After listening to Julian, I realized that every movement we make through use of our credit cards, our mobile phone, our internet, we are being monitored. All this information when gathered in bulk from a country can make this country unstable. Outside influences have the power to control its Economic growth. This makes me feel people have to mobilize for world peace instead of World power. All this information being gathered is not to benefit humanity in some way, it is being gathered and used to control us. I came away from this meeting to advocate that the Europe protects itself, from external surveillance that can be used in a negative way to control the people of Europe, and other countries. The European Union must move to protect its political and economic sovereignty. From this meeting I tried to look for positive action and one of these should be the settling up of a ‘No spying treaty between EU and USA.’
How sad I felt to see Julian Assange an asylum seeker inside the embassy, (surrounded by British Police at a cost of millions to the British taxpayer) his crime of being a journalist who told the truth, and Wikileaks a media outlet which carried stories of governments’ war crimes, and upheld the publics’ right to know what their governments are doing in their names. I feel Julian should not be there and his human rights are being abused as his freedom is taken away from him. I realize how difficult it is for him and so many journalists when they speak truth to power, they have to seek exile in countries, such as Edward Snowden in Russia, and some journalists in Germany, as they are no longer able to act as journalists in countries such as UK or USA, due to repressive legislation now targeting journalists and their sources, civilians, etc., This situation is intolerable and we, the citizens of the world, have a right to all our freedoms, and the press have a right to freedom of information, etc. Without free press we are indeed in a very dark and dangerous world. We free citizens need to protect Julian Assange and all whistleblowers. The UK and Swedish Governments, on humanitarian grounds, can move to unblock the present impasse so Julian can answer the questions to be put to him re the Swedish case, and both governments can, regarding the US administration, protect Julian’s human rights by blocking any retaliation by US Administration against him,and guarantee his human rights.
Mairead Maguire