{"id":142370,"date":"2019-09-09T12:00:51","date_gmt":"2019-09-09T11:00:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=142370"},"modified":"2019-09-16T11:00:05","modified_gmt":"2019-09-16T10:00:05","slug":"roger-waters-and-john-pilger-make-powerful-defence-of-julian-assange-in-london","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2019\/09\/roger-waters-and-john-pilger-make-powerful-defence-of-julian-assange-in-london\/","title":{"rendered":"Roger Waters and John Pilger Make Powerful Defence of Julian Assange in London"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

3 Sep 2019 – <\/em>Up to 1,000 people gathered last night in central London to hear internationally acclaimed musician Roger Waters deliver a musical tribute to imprisoned WikiLeaks\u2019 publisher Julian Assange.<\/p>\n

Performing outside the UK Home Office, just miles from Belmarsh Prison where Assange is being held as a Category A prisoner, Waters sang Pink Floyd\u2019s iconic song \u201cWish You Were Here.\u201d He was accompanied by guitarist Andrew Fairweather Low.<\/p>\n

Supporters filled the forecourt and pavement on both sides of Marsham Street, many carrying banners and placards demanding Assange\u2019s freedom and the release of imprisoned whistleblower Chelsea Manning. Spontaneous chants rang out, \u201cFree, Free Julian Assange!\u201d and \u201cThere\u2019s only one decision: No extradition!\u201d<\/p>\n

httpv:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=tMm9CCQOXnA<\/p>\n

John Pilger, a veteran filmmaker and investigative journalist and a personal friend of Assange, opened the event with an impassioned speech. Pointing in the direction of the Home Office, Pilger told the crowd: \u201cThe behaviour of the British government towards Julian Assange is a disgrace. A profanity on the very notion of human rights. It\u2019s no exaggeration to say that the treatment and persecution of Julian Assange is the way that dictatorships treat a political prisoner.\u201d<\/p>\n

Pilger said he had spoken with Assange over the weekend: \u201cWhen I asked Julian what he would like me to say today, he was adamant. \u2018Say it\u2019s not just me. It\u2019s much wider. It\u2019s all of us. It\u2019s all journalists and publishers who do their job who are in danger\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n

The meaning of Assange\u2019s extradition could not be clearer, Pilger said, \u201cno matter who you are or where you are, if you expose the crimes of governments you will be hunted down, kidnapped and sent to the US as a spy.\u201d<\/p>\n

httpv:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=iJcpUjB7CO8<\/p>\n

Pilger concluded: \u201cSeventeen out of the 18 charges that Julian faces in America refer to the routine work of an investigative journalist, which is protected under the First Amendment of the US Constitution\u2026. The whole thing is a sham. The US prosecutors know it\u2019s a sham, the British government know it\u2019s a sham, the Australian government know it\u2019s a sham.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s why Julian is locked up for 21 hours a day in a maximum-security prison and treated worse than a murderer. He is to be made an example of. What happens to Julian Assange and to Chelsea Manning is meant to intimidate us, to frighten us into silence.<\/p>\n

\u201cBy defending Julian Assange, we defend our most sacred rights. Speak up now or wake up one morning to the silence of a new kind of tyranny. The choice is ours.\u201d<\/p>\n

Julian\u2019s brother Gabriel Shipton was warmly received as he spoke from the stage. He recounted his visit to Belmarsh Prison last month. \u201cI hugged him, and he told me that this place he was in, was hell.\u201d<\/p>\n

httpv:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=i-ngQ8N1F3U<\/p>\n

Shipton continued: \u201cAfterwards, my daughter wanted to know why her uncle was locked up. \u2018Has he done something bad, dad?\u2019, she asked. I struggled to explain in a way a five-year-old could understand. As Julian\u2019s brother, and on behalf of his children, other brothers and sisters, nieces and nephews, mother and father, I call on the UK home secretary to block extradition to the USA.\u201d<\/p>\n

Waters took to the stage just after 6.30 p.m. He told the sea of supporters: \u201cTo see all you people here today is deeply, deeply moving. How do we put ourselves in the position of a Julian Assange in solitary confinement? Or with that kid in Syria, or Palestine or a Rohingya being blown to bits by these people in this building here [pointing to the Home Office]?\u201d<\/p>\n

Waters introduced \u201cWish You Were Here,\u201d the title track from Pink Floyd\u2019s 1975 chart-topping album, explaining the meaning of the song\u2019s lyrics, \u201cwould you exchange a walk-on part in the war for a lead role in a cage?\u201d He replied, \u201cWell, no, I wouldn\u2019t. This is my walk-on part in this war [pointing at the Home Office], and I would much prefer to be here with all of you, who are also making a walk-on part in the war rather than than accepting a lead role in the cage.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

The audience standing in the road that was closed to traffic opposite the Home Office as its size grew.<\/p><\/div>\n

As Waters sang, the audience joined in, the lyrics taken up as a statement of political solidarity with Julian Assange.<\/p>\n

Concluding the event, Waters thanked the audience and called out, \u201cJulian Assange we are with you! Free Julian Assange!\u201d, with the crowd responding \u201cFree Julian Assange! Free Julian Assange!\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

WikiLeaks editor-in-chief Kristinn Hrafnsson<\/p><\/div>\n

WikiLeaks editor Kristinn Hrafnsson spoke to the WSWS after the event: \u201cI was heartened by how many people showed up. When you\u2019re trying to take part in the campaign to free Julian it\u2019s so important to meet the people who actually do support him. My feeling is that despite the hostility of the mainstream media, the support is growing. We have a fight ahead of us and Julian knows that, but for him to get this message is so important. It gives me hope and optimism.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hrafnsson saw Assange 10 days ago and spoke over the phone with him for the first time the night before: \u201cIt took all this time to clear my number with the prison authorities. He\u2019s not in a good place and he\u2019s definitely not in a place where he should be\u2014and this has to change.\u201d<\/p>\n

He added: \u201cWe can\u2019t rely on the mainstream media, we can\u2019t rely on politicians, we certainly can\u2019t rely on the judiciary here. People really have to understand how important this is.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

John Pilger<\/p><\/div>\n

John Pilger told the WSWS shortly before the rally that the concert was Waters\u2019 idea: \u201cRoger emailed me and said he\u2019d like to play \u2018Wish You Were Here\u2019 for Julian outside Belmarsh prison. But we had a look and it\u2019s just not possible. The closest you can get is the motorway, so we decided the next best thing was the Home Office.\u201d<\/p>\n

Pilger warned that Assange\u2019s condition was a matter of grave concern. \u201cI worry a great deal about him if he spends many months in Belmarsh,\u201d he said. \u201cThe regime there is imposing a kind of isolation on him that is deeply psychologically wounding. He\u2019s in a small cell in the hospital ward. They seem not to know what to do with him. Of course, what they should be doing is letting him out. He certainly should not be in a maximum-security prison.\u201d<\/p>\n

Emmy Butlin from the Julian Assange Defence Committee (JADC) also spoke with the WSWS.<\/p>\n

\u201cJohn Pilger and Roger Waters stirred our emotions tonight with their amazing words and song of solidarity with Julian Assange,\u201d Butlin said. \u201cThey spoke of empathy, of peace, against war and its profiteers whose interests WikiLeaks has challenged. We are very grateful for the wonderful turnout, a testament of the support we always find in the streets of Britain and we continue our solidarity work on Saturday the 28th of September at 2:00 p.m. outside Belmarsh Prison.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs the JADC, we are very grateful for the work the SEP is doing globally for the Free Assange campaign and for the constant participation and assistance they offer to our events. The WSWS offers accurate reporting in the Assange case and helps spread the solidarity campaign internationally far and wide. A very big thank you.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

A section of the audience at the event.<\/p><\/div>\n

Underscoring the point made by Kristinn Hrafnsson about the mainstream media, no major British television station reported on the event on their evening news broadcasts. Today, in further flagrant and conscious censorship, no British, Australian or American newspaper is carrying a report on Waters\u2019 initiative and the rally.<\/p>\n

Via social media and publications such as the WSWS, however, reports and video of Waters\u2019 performance, Pilgers\u2019 speech and the statements of Gabriel Shipton are circulating widely and will be viewed by hundreds of thousands of people internationally over the coming days.<\/p>\n

Go to Original \u2013 wsws.org<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

3 Sep 2019 \u2013 Thousands of people gathered last night in central London to hear Pink Floyd\u2019s Roger Waters deliver a musical tribute to imprisoned WikiLeaks\u2019 publisher Julian Assange. John Pilger, a veteran filmmaker and investigative journalist and a personal friend of Assange, opened the event with an impassioned speech.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":142587,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[58,65,62,51,45,139,60,167,141],"tags":[229,910,120,276,942,487,378,651,234,291,91,444,287,985,380,1109,911,454,572,249,639,292,70,126,118,172,921,113,75],"class_list":["post-142370","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-anglo-america","category-media","category-europe","category-activism","category-justice","category-whistleblowing-surveillance","category-arts","category-music","tag-activism","tag-big-brother","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\/142370","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=142370"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/142370\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/142587"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=142370"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=142370"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=142370"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}