The relentless persecution of Julian Assange

Letters / Opinions

Julian Assange’s recent arrest in London, UK, is being widely reported in the media, writes Bhagawati. (The article includes a video-interview by journalist, author and documentary filmmaker, John Pilger.)

Comments range from witch hunt to farce to vindictive, from travesty to deception, and it is perceived as a high threat to press freedom, if not to the freedom of all citizens on this planet. Of course there are also many who sidle up to those who keep on condemning him while ignoring the facts that speak for him.

John Pilger, world-renowned British journalist, author and documentary filmmaker, gave a video-interview yesterday, which was published on RT and might not be as widely distributed as are the ‘politically correct’ statements.

If we lose the Assanges – and there aren’t many of them, a handful maybe and certainly no one like him – if we lose the WikiLeaks, then we lose a whole stratum of freedom. We stop questioning.



With bizarre timing yesterday in Brussels, April 16th 2019, 591 MEPs (out of 751) overwhelmingly voted ‘yay’ for a law on protecting whistleblowers. This new law passed by the European parliament requires member states to adopt national legislation that would offer comprehensive protection for whistleblowers. Presently, only 10 EU nations, including the UK, have such laws in place now and the numbers will probably change soon. And this a mere week after the shameful extraction of Julius Assange from the Ecuadorian Embassy in London.

The proposed directive says “protection of whistleblowers as journalistic sources is crucial for safeguarding the ‘watchdog’ role of investigative journalism in democratic societies,” and requires that not only those exposing misdeeds of their employers, but also other individuals must be protected by the law from retaliation.

Will the people on this planet take a stand for Julian Assange? This will mean making a conscious choice for human rights and the freedom of expression.

Related article on Osho News: The strange case of Julian Assange, containing Osho’s discourse excerpt on how and why he was deported from Uruguay

BhagawatiBhagawati is a regular contributor

More articles by the same author on Osho News


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