[GPSCC-chat] Ambassador Craig Murray on Assange

Sun Aug 19 20:20:37 PDT 2012

Julian Assange and some of his supporters gave speeches in front of the Ecuadorian embassy in London on Sunday, August 19, 2012.  The 45 minute youtube video is here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yr8d8BLBymI  Happy viewing!

John Thielking

--- On Thu, 8/16/12, John Thielking <pagesincolor at yahoo.com> wrote:

From: John Thielking <pagesincolor at yahoo.com>
Subject: Re: [GPSCC-chat] Ambassador Craig Murray on Assange
To: "sosfbay-discuss at cagreens.org" <sosfbay-discuss at cagreens.org>, "Brian Good" <snug.bug at hotmail.com>
Date: Thursday, August 16, 2012, 9:08 PM

The blog posting that you are referencing is from 11:30AM August 16, 2012.  Word came of Assange getting asylum at 1PM in London on August 16, 2012.  According to the broadcast on www.rt.com at about 12PM PST August 16, 2012, the spokesperson for the UK rescinded the threat to storm the embassy.  Also, an article published at 17:00 EST August 16, 2012 here 
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2189515/The-WikiLeaks-siege-fiasco-As-tiny-Ecuador-saves-Assange-extradition-granting-asylum-40-police-surround-embassy--steps-outside-ll-pounce.html

says that the threat to storm the embassy was a mistake.

Currently, the only news is that 4 hours ago wikileaks tweeted onto Facebook that 35 police officers were still surrounding the embassy (12:30AM London time August 17, 2012).

Both live streams that were covering the situation in the early morning of August 16, 2012 are currently not broadcasting live feeds.  They are located at:
http://bambuser.com/v/2905636
(this one is currently broadcasting a recording from August 16, 2012)

and

http://www.ustream.tv/channel/occupynewsnetwork

According to the rt.com broadcast just now, Mr Hauge of the UK Foreign Office denied that his office ever issued a threat to storm the embassy.  Ecuador says that they recieved a letter saying that the UK might storm the embassy.  The rt.com web site is currently too busy to handle requests.  rt is broadcast on Comcast channel 103. That is all for now.

John Thielking

--- On Thu, 8/16/12, Brian Good <snug.bug at hotmail.com> wrote:

From: Brian Good <snug.bug at hotmail.com>
Subject: [GPSCC-chat] Ambassador Craig Murray on Assange
To: "sosfbay-discuss at cagreens.org" <sosfbay-discuss at cagreens.org>
Date: Thursday, August 16, 2012, 4:54 PM

Ambassador Craig Murray (former British ambassador to Uzbekistan), blogs (red bold mine):
http://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2012/08/americas-vassal-acts-decisively-and-illegally/

America’s Vassal Acts Decisively and Illegally

I returned to the UK today to be astonished by private confirmation from within the FCO that the UK 

government has indeed decided – after immense pressure from the Obama administration – to enter 

the Ecuadorean Embassy and seize Julian Assange.

This will be, beyond any argument, a blatant breach of the Vienna Convention of 1961, to which 

the UK is one of the original parties and which encodes the centuries – arguably millennia – of practice 

which have enabled diplomatic relations to function. The Vienna Convention is the most subscribed single
international treaty in the world.

The provisions of the Vienna Convention on the status of diplomatic premises are expressed in
deliberately absolute terms. There is no modification or qualification elsewhere in the treaty. 

Article 22

1.The premises of the mission shall be inviolable. The agents of the receiving State 

may not enter them, except with the consent of the head of the mission.

2.The receiving State is under a special duty to take all appropriate steps to protect the premises
of the mission against any intrusion or damage and to prevent any disturbance of the peace of the
mission or impairment of its dignity.

3.The premises of the mission, their furnishings and other property thereon and the means of
transport of the mission shall be immune from search, requisition, attachment or execution.

Not even the Chinese government tried to enter the US Embassy to arrest the Chinese dissident Chen 

Guangchen. Even during the decades of the Cold War, defectors or dissidents were never seized from 

each other’s embassies. Murder in Samarkand relates in detail my attempts in the British Embassy to 

help Uzbek dissidents. This terrible breach of international law will result in British Embassies being 

subject to raids and harassment worldwide. 

The government’s calculation is that, unlike Ecuador, Britain is a strong enough power to deter such
intrusions. This is yet another symptom of the “might is right” principle in international relations, in the
era of the neo-conservative abandonment of the idea of the rule of international law.

The British Government bases its argument on domestic British legislation. But the domestic legislation 

of a country cannot counter its obligations in international law, unless it chooses to withdraw 

from them. If the government does not wish to follow the obligations imposed on it by the Vienna 

Convention, it has the right to resile from it – which would leave British diplomats with no protection worldwide. 

I hope to have more information soon on the threats used by the US administration. William Hague 

had been supporting the move against the concerted advice of his own officials; Ken Clarke has been 

opposing the move against the advice of his. I gather the decision to act has been taken in Number 10. 

There appears to have been no input of any kind from the Liberal Democrats. That opens a wider 

question – there appears to be no “liberal” impact now in any question of coalition policy. It is amazing
how government salaries and privileges and ministerial limousines are worth far more than any belief 

to these people. I cannot now conceive how I was a member of that party for over thirty years,
deluded into a genuine belief that they had principles.

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