{"id":140192,"date":"2019-08-12T12:00:24","date_gmt":"2019-08-12T11:00:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=140192"},"modified":"2020-02-18T07:27:43","modified_gmt":"2020-02-18T07:27:43","slug":"john-pilger-warns-do-not-forget-assange-or-you-will-lose-him","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2019\/08\/john-pilger-warns-do-not-forget-assange-or-you-will-lose-him\/","title":{"rendered":"John Pilger Warns: \u201cDo Not Forget Assange. Or You Will Lose Him\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em>9 Aug 2019 &#8211; <\/em>John Pilger issued a warning on Wednesday [7 Aug] that people \u201cmust not forget Julian Assange\u201d or they will \u201close him.\u201d The world-renowned investigative journalist outlined the WikiLeaks founder\u2019s deteriorating health, and the draconian conditions in which he has been held in London\u2019s Belmarsh Prison, since being illegally arrested by British police on April 11.<\/p>\n<p>In a tweet that has been shared more than 10,000 times, Pilger wrote:<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"500\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Do not forget Julian <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/Assange?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" >#Assange<\/a>. Or you will lose him. <br \/>I saw him in Belmarsh prison and his health has deteriorated. Treated worse than a murderer, he is isolated, medicated and denied the tools to fight the bogus charges of a US extradition. I now fear for him. Do not forget him.<\/p>\n<p>&mdash; John Pilger (@johnpilger) <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/johnpilger\/status\/1159101209971761152?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" >August 7, 2019<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>Christine Assange, Julian\u2019s mother, responded to Pilger\u2019s update with a series of tweets. She said she was in \u201cdeep pain and anguish,\u201d adding: \u201cMy journalist son has been framed, smeared, detained 9 years without charge, denied fair legal process, refused basic health needs, proper medical\/dental care, held years in solitary confinement &amp; tortured.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>She indicted those responsible for the \u201cslow murder\u201d of Assange, including the US, British, Swedish and Ecuadorian governments, and the corporate media. She also condemned the Australian government for refusing to defend her son.<\/p>\n<p>Pilger\u2019s post is the latest public indication of the immense physical and psychological damage inflicted on Assange by his decade-long political persecution.<\/p>\n<p>Last week, Jennifer Robinson, one of Assange\u2019s lawyers, confirmed that her client remained in the hospital wing of Belmarsh, where he was transferred in late May. She was \u201cvery afraid\u201d for Assange\u2019s health. He had likely suffered \u201cpermanent damage\u201d as a result of his seven years of arbitrary detention in Ecuador\u2019s London embassy.<\/p>\n<p>When Assange was first transferred to the prison medical wing, WikiLeaks issued a statement explaining that during the first seven weeks of his incarceration in Belmarsh, his health had \u201cdeteriorated\u201d and he had \u201cdramatically lost weight.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The British authorities have refused to ease Assange\u2019s conditions, despite his health issues. This is in line with the British government\u2019s attempts to facilitate the WikiLeaks founder\u2019s extradition to the US, where he faces the prospect of life imprisonment, or worse, for his role in exposing American war crimes, mass surveillance operations and global diplomatic conspiracies.<\/p>\n<p>The British government rejected, out of hand, a report in May by UN Special Rapporteur on Torture Nils Melzer, which found that Assange had been subjected to \u201cpsychological torture.\u201d Melzer pointed to the responsibility of the British authorities, who enforced Assange\u2019s confinement in the Ecuadorian embassy, by threatening to arrest him if he left the small building.<\/p>\n<p>In a letter to the British government in May, publicly released earlier this month, Melzer outlined the central role of the British state in facilitating Assange\u2019s arbitrary detention and his \u201cpublic mobbing\u201d by senior politicians and the press.<\/p>\n<p><em>_________________________________________________<\/em><\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 40px;\"><em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/john-pilger.png\" ><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft wp-image-140193 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/john-pilger-e1565425585898.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"150\" height=\"211\" \/><\/a><\/em><em>John Pilger has won an Emmy and a BAFTA for his documentaries, which have also won numerous US and European awards. His articles appear worldwide in newspapers such as The Guardian, The Independent, The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, The Mail &amp; Guardian (South Africa), Aftonbladet (Sweden), Il Manifesto (Italy). He writes a regular column for the New Statesman, London. In 2003, he was awarded the prestigious Sophie Prize for \u201930 years of exposing injustice and promoting human rights.\u2019 In 2009 he was awarded the Sydney Peace Prize. His earlier film is <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/johnpilger.com\/videos\/the-war-you-dont-see-trailer\" >The War You Don\u2019t See<\/a> (2010). His new film,<\/em> The Coming War on China, <em>is available in the U.S. from <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/www.bullfrogfilms.com\/\" >www.bullfrogfilms.com<\/a>. He can be reached through his website <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/www.johnpilger.com\/\" >www.johnpilger.com<\/a> <\/em><\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 40px;\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/04\/Julian-capa-1555095996.jpg\" ><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft wp-image-131576 size-thumbnail\" src=\"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/04\/Julian-capa-1555095996-150x150.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"150\" height=\"150\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 40px;\"><em>\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 40px;\"><em>Julian Assange<\/em><em> is the founder of <\/em>WikiLeaks<em>. His most recent book is <\/em><a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/exec\/obidos\/ASIN\/1781688745\/counterpunchmaga\" >The WikiLeaks Files<\/a> <em>(Verso).<\/em><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.wsws.org\/en\/articles\/2019\/08\/09\/pilg-a09.html?utm_medium=email&amp;utm_source=sharpspring&amp;sslid=MzM3MDYwMTc0MjcwBwA&amp;sseid=M7Q0MrUwNDc2MQcA&amp;jobid=0ba7429e-3d86-477b-941a-268c7b68a68e\" >Go to Original \u2013 wsws.org<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>9 Aug 2019 &#8211; In a tweet that has been shared more than 10,000 times, Pilger wrote: \u201cDo not forget Julian #Assange. Or you will lose him. I saw him in Belmarsh prison and his health has deteriorated. Treated worse than a murderer, he is isolated, medicated and denied the tools to fight the bogus charges of a US extradition. I now fear for him. Do not forget him.\u201d. Christine Assange, Julian\u2019s mother, responded to Pilger\u2019s update with a series of tweets.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":131562,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[45,65,62,51,60],"tags":[229,918,120,276,942,487,378,651,234,291,91,444,287,985,380,1109,911,454,572,249,639,292,70,126,118,172,921,113,75],"class_list":["post-140192","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-activism","category-anglo-america","category-media","category-europe","category-whistleblowing-surveillance","tag-activism","tag-assange","tag-conflict","tag-democracy","tag-ecuador","tag-human-rights","tag-journalism","tag-justice","tag-media","tag-military","tag-nato","tag-nonviolence","tag-power","tag-social-justice","tag-solutions","tag-spying","tag-surveillance","tag-sweden","tag-torture","tag-trump","tag-uk","tag-un","tag-usa","tag-violence","tag-war","tag-west","tag-whistleblowing","tag-wikileaks","tag-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/140192","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=140192"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/140192\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/131562"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=140192"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=140192"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=140192"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}