"Are human rights and freedom of press universal western values?"
No, they are not. They are both dusted off and held up as shinning lights on the hill when commenting on and planning regime change in those places of designated evil like Libya and now Syria, but neither has anything to do with how the game is played closer to home.
Consider the loud support we give to dissidents in China, for example, or Myanmar. But we turn on our own like rabid dogs.
Assange's only hope lies with the European Court. If he goes to Sweden all expectations are he will be extradited to the USA. If that happens, he can kiss the street good-by, probably forever.
Australia has seldom shown herself so pathetic, or such a lackey.

Assange claims Journalistic privilege?
Journalists are normally required to validate their info, and protect their sources! Assange's source is languishing in jail! Strike one.
His publish and be dammed don't ever validate the info, vigilante approach, needlessly exposed some very vulnerable people to violent criminal reprisals.
He's probably lucky he is a "western dissident"; given, if he were either a Russian or "eastern dissident" he would have simply disappeared? Or wound up deceased, lying in a pool of his/her own blood, as has been the largely reported outcome, for many Russian reporters, or very many Tibetan dissidents!
Why even someone as peaceful and non confrontational as the Dali Lama, would be arrested on sight, if he ever dared return to his annexed homeland.
Don't lecture us on human rights!
Our own reporters exposed Abu Grabe and other war crimes?
We still don't know their sources and probably never ever will.
This is why Assange is reviled amongst the very community he claims to be part of.
His claim of fear or extradition is a complete furphy; given, it is far easier for the US to extradite criminals from England, than a far more liberal Sweden!
If he is entirely innocent, the Swedish courts and almost any competent counsel, will prove it to be so!
He should simply allow due process to deal with current matters and stop trying to connect it with a claimed conspiracy. This, I believe, is patently not how a truly innocent man behaves?
Rhrosty.

Assange is the hero of our age, whom many of his entourage worship.

And to think Swedes are attempting to try this prophet for raping two women as though he were a normal person!

Assange expected our Prime Minister to represent his interests personally but she failed him. What WAS she thinking? http://www.thepowerindex.com.au/head-to-head/julian-assange-gillard-govt-unaccountable/20120109912

To top it off he is under mansion arrest:

"One of his lawyers, Mark Stephens, has repeatedly referred to his bail conditions as putting him under "mansion arrest."

Assange will be staying with Smith on his 650-acre estate in a Georgian Mansion, called Ellingham Hall. "Ellingham Hall is a superb venue for beautiful lakeside wedding receptions, within a traditional parkland and with the optional support of our own first-rate catering.""

see http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-503543_162-20025866-503543.html

I to wish I was under mansion arrest.

Planta

If you think Assange is getting a raw deal, then think of those who in our liberal western democracies are labelled: hater, Holocaust denier, antisemite, racist, Nazi!

In Germany Horst Mahler is spending 12 years for daring to challenge the official Holocaust narrative.

Years ago I warned individual journalists they would be next and at that time they gleefully bent to Jewish pressure and labelled me as Mahler is labelled.

Those who use the above six words to close down public discussions are the real haters of freedom of thought.

Assange is a hero and his detractors are fools and sheeple.

Assange, with great courage, showed the world a glimpse of how corrupt and immoral the U.S. is as it goes about its imperialist endeavors.

The Western Press, busy with promoting capitalism and endless war, did a job on him, turned him into a villain, a traitor. Our own Prime Minister, an American apologist, condemned him.

His crime? To show to the world some of the truth about America, the world's biggest warmonger and rogue nation.

Assange should be honored, not pilloried.

Hi David,

I might have missed some of the news today, but has Assange been charged by either the British or US governments of any offense ? Are they treating him like a criminal ? Yet ?

If he is to be charged with committing some offenses in Sweden, that it entirely up to the Swedish authorities: if two women have laid complaints against him alleging offenses committed in Sweden, then that is also their right. The Swedish system does not have a reputation for corruption or for being manipulated by the US, so let's put aside the hysteria for a more appropriate time.

Or, as been noted above, is he above the law ? Is that the point ?

That a Chinese writer should be so judgmental about western systems of justice is laughable: if someone in Chinese military intelligence had released hundreds of thousands of classified documents to the media, do you think he or she would ever be seen again ?

Get a grip.

Cheers,

Joe