<< The US should aim to protect Julian Assange, whether he is in Britain, Somalia or Sweden. For if harm should befall him, rightly or wrongly, they will be blamed and the fallout from that will be greater than the leaks. >>

Spot on Bruce.

As Assange took a calculated risk to release these stolen documents, he should be prepared to bear the consequences. If he were prudent, he would have taken insurance cover, in view of the lucrative payments/donations that he stands to make from his action. The Australian taxpayer should not be expected to support his defence, under any circumstances.

Raycom,

Can you enlighten us as to which law Assange has broken in regard to Wikileaks?

Poirot, you misread my comment.

What evidence can you produce that the documents were not stolen?

Raycom,

Assange did not steal the documents.

Mr Assange has the services of Geoffrey Robertson QC and seems to believe in the quality of British justice, with its respect for due process and rights of the accused like habeas corpus.

It would be a far different situation in the U.S.

After that, he can try his luck with Swedish justice.

I hope Wikileaks has deep pockets because representing him could become quite costly, but not representing him would be far far worse.

Poirot
You are not living up to the rigorous approach of your namesake. Again, I did not say that Assange stole the documents.

Raycom
In the recent federal election Laurie Oakes released leaked confidential cabinet information.
What would you propose he be charged with?

Raycom
You have the onus of proof back-the-front.

Talking of the onus of proof being back to front, I totally agree with Independent MP Andrew Wilkie, who today said that …

< Julia Gillard is showing contempt for the rule of law by failing to give Australian WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange the presumption of innocence. >

He said;

< I believe the Prime Minister is showing a contempt for the rule of law - the way she has ruled out the presumption of innocence and instead there seems to be a presumption of guilt when it comes to Mr Assange, >

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/12/09/3089510.htm?section=justin

Quite amazingly, Kevin Rudd has today come out with a much more reasonable approach than Gillard; defending Mr Assange and diverting the blame to the Americans!

http://www.csmonitor.com/World/terrorism-security/2010/1208/Australia-s-Kevin-Rudd-WikiLeaks-founder-Julian-Assange-not-responsible-for-cable-release

Foyle
As the confidential cabinet information was probably leaked by a Government official, which is not unusual, why are you suggesting that Laurie Oakes be charged?

Raycom - In his Quarterly Essay on Kevin Rudd, author David Marr revealed that the former PM observed that we were being ratf*ed in Copenhagen by the ratf*ing Chinese.

This is not dissimilar to the chatter in the leaked cables.

Should we "charge" David Marr? Or whoever leaked this information to him?

Assange has done nothing more than what every newspaper does when it gets a scoop. Just on a bigger scale because he was given a bigger scoop.

Why not suggest charging the Guardian, the New York Times, the Sydney Morning Herald for publishing this leaked material? Why just Assange?

That is, if there was any law under which to charge them, which there isn't.

Sorry, hadn't finished that post - there is no question of taxpayers funding Assange's defense in the Swedish matter - he's receiving the consular assistance any Australian is entitled to - and as he can't be charged on any other matter in this country or the US, I don't know what you are worrying about.

But in the event of all the media outlets who published the leaked documents being charged with something, I think my tax dollars would be very well spent contributing to their defense.

However as the charges would most likely be brought by the government, it's not likely they'll be using public money to defend the action as well.

It appears that the Gillard Government is sticking to its guns on this one:

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/in-depth/wikileaks/wikileaks-acts-illegal-gillard-government/story-fn775xjq-1225968584365

Is there a statute that proscribes the publication of diplomatic cables, either here or in the U.S.?
The governments in both countries seem to be desperately seeking any avenue to find one. Might prove a bit of a challenge according to this.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-11952817

I see two areas of bitter sweet irony building here stemming from the leaks.

The thousands of diplomatic documents must cover every conceivable topic, because that’s what diplomats do. So there must be diplomatic cables covering not only security, diplomacy and military actions, but also such topics as the GFC, EU Economic Policy, the UN and all its agencies, Bank world, international trade and NATO just for starters?

Irony Number 1. If all these topics and many more are indeed covered, who is deciding what and when it is released? Is it possible that Wikileaks is at the very least being “selective” or at worst “censoring” in support of its own agenda?

Time will tell I suppose when we look for other hot topics to be covered, but wouldn’t it be “ironic” if the bastion of free speech was not covering all the topics in the diplomatic world.

The civil rights movement, media and social activists are getting hot under the collar about the persecution of Julian, and I do have serious issues as to whether or not he is getting a fair go. However, wouldn’t it be interesting if these documents also covered, as they surely must, the hot topic of climate change at a diplomatic level? Unimaginable this topic is not covered between diplomats; it has been a diplomatic topic since Kyoto.

Irony Number 2.

If the diplomatic dialogue does cover climate change in the same vein as other topics, telling the truth, then the very people defending Wikileaks might just be the ones with the most to lose.

I don’t have a problem with Wikileaks publishing diplomatic papers and I don’t know what periods they cover, but I do know that there is much “power” in having such information and publishing it. We also know that power corrupts and most of us suspect that there is an agenda, a volatile combination?

250,000 documents to go however, if these topics don’t get a mention from Julian, we might just have to question what “truth” we are being asked to “believe”.

C’mon Julian, more topics please.

Raycom
Are you suggesting that whoever leaked the diplomatic emails to Wikileaks was not a government official?

Whoever it was might not been as high up the government food chain as the leaker to Oakes but he or she was doing it to embarrass the government or achieve a political aim as was the leaker to Oakes.

Laurie Oakes just topped the Walkley Awards for his effort. But then, Assange might make Time's Man of the year.