A prison van, believed to be carrying Julian Assange, leaves London's Westminster Magistrates' Court / AFP
Assange's supporters - including scholar Noam Chomsky, journalist John Pilger, author Christos Tsiolkas, and Greens leader Bob Brown - have urged the Prime Minister to support Assange after he was arrested in Britain on sex assault charges.
Today the office of the Swedish prosecutor pursuing
Assange came under cyber attack in the latest salvo by his online supporters,
the "cyber hacktivist" group called "Anonymous". Attempts to connect to the
aklagare.se website around 9am (AEDT) were unsuccessful.
The arrest
Assange has been been refused bail and remanded in custody following his arrest by British police on sex assault charges.
The 39-year-old, who voluntarily surrendered to police last night, faced an extradition hearing at London's Westminster Magistrates Court.
During his court appearance the Australian vowed to fight attempts to extradite him to Sweden, where he faces the sex offence allegations, while his lawyer confirmed Mr Assange would make a renewed bid for bail.
He was asked if he understood that he could consent to be extradited, to
which he replied: "I understand that and I do not consent."
Judge Howard Riddle remanded him in custody and ordered him to return to court
on December 14.
Rudd criticised
The court drama played out as new information emerged from the secret US diplomatic cables released by WikiLeaks on former Prime Minister Kevin Rudd.
Mr Rudd was branded a mistake-prone control-freak and "a micro-manager obsessed with managing the media cycle rather than engaging in collaborative decision-making".
The cables showed how favourable US impressions of Mr Rudd, once described as "a safe pair of hands", were replaced by criticism of his micro-management and mishandling of diplomacy as he focused on media opportunities, AAP reported.
"Rudd undoubtedly believes that with his intellect, his six years as a diplomat in the 1980s and his five years as shadow foreign minister, he has the background and the ability to direct Australia's foreign policy," the US embassy observed in November last year.
Hiding out
Before last night, Mr Assange had not been seen publicly for over a month and was believed to have been hiding with friends in southeast London.
His arrest came after Scotland Yard contacted his lawyer Mark Stephens after
receiving a fresh European Arrest Warrant from the Swedish authorities.
A previous warrant, issued last month, was invalid, as officials had failed to
fill in all the charges on the form.
Detectives in Sweden had been searching for Mr Assange to question him in
relation to claims made by two women - whom he met when he was visiting for
lectures in August.
A Metropolitan Police statement said he was "accused by the Swedish authorities
of one count of unlawful coercion, two counts of sexual molestation and one
count of rape, all alleged to have been committed in August 2010".
The women claim he sexually attacked them. Both said they had consensual sex
with the notorious campaigner, but that it became nonconsensual when he refused
to wear a condom.
Fight continues
Mr Stephens said Mr Assange was keen to face the authorities to begin clearing
his name.
"It's about time we got to the end of the day and we got some truth, justice and
rule of law," Mr Stephens said.
"Julian Assange has been the one in hot pursuit to vindicate himself to clear
his good name.
"He has been trying to meet with her (the Swedish prosecutor) to find out what
the allegations are he has to face and also the evidence against him, which he
still hasn't seen."
Speaking to the media before the court appearance, Mr Stephens said Mr Assange
was “fine". "He’s in good spirits.”
Arrest outrage
But after bail was denied, the WikiLeaks website immediately posted a message on
its Twitter page. "Let down by the UK justice system's bizarre decision to
refuse bail to Julian Assange," it read.
The website said the release of confidential US diplomatic cables would
continue.
"Today's actions against our editor-in-chief Julian Assange won't affect our
operations: we will release more cables tonight as normal," it said.
Outside court, UK-based Australian journalist and documentary filmmaker John
Pilger spoke in support of Mr Assange, describing the case against him as
"outrageous".
"This shouldn't have happened today," he said.
"This is an innocent man. This is a man who has made some very serious enemies
for the very best of reasons. Any journalist who feels anything about what we do
should be supporting him 100 per cent."
Prior to Mr Assange's arrest, Australian Attorney-General Robert McClelland said
he was entitled to return to his home country and to receive consular help from
Australian officials should he be arrested overseas.
Assange speaks out
In an article written by Mr
Assange for today's edition of The Australian, the WikiLeaks boss
quotes the chairman of News Corporation: "In 1958, a young Rupert Murdoch, then
owner and editor of Adelaide’s The News, wrote: 'In the race between
secrecy and truth, it seems inevitable that truth will always win.'"
He wrote that WikiLeaks was "fearlessly publishing facts that need to be made
public".
"The Gillard government is trying to shoot the messenger because it doesn't want
the truth revealed, including information about its own diplomatic and political
dealings."
The alleged sex crimes may be only the beginning of Mr Assange's criminal
charges.
The US Government was also yesterday increasing their efforts to prosecute Mr
Assange for criminal activity over WikiLeaks' release of the diplomatic cables.
The US Justice Department had "a very serious, active, ongoing investigation
that is criminal in nature" into Mr Assange, US Attorney General Eric Holder
said.
US defence secretary Robert Gates welcomed Mr Assange's arrest, saying it
"sounds like good news."
In reply to the US arrest threats, the Australian sent a chilling threat, saying
if he was prosecuted or assassinated he would unlock a 'poison pill' - the
entire archive of internal cables which have been downloaded in a secret
document by more than "100,000 people".
Since last Monday WikiLeaks have released just 1000 of the 251,287 internal
cables.
Commentary by the Ottawa Mens Centre
What is chilling is the psychopathic lack of empathy of Julian Assange who
very obviously has a serious personality problem and probably, a mental health
problem that goes with genius IQ, if that is true.
If he has brains upstairs , he sure did not engage them prior to forcing willing
participants to PROTECTED SEX into unprotected sex. Its RAPE, and the evidence
is damming.
What makes it incredible, is that Assange is claiming to be a victim, despite
fleeing Sweden two days before a hearing he agreed to attend and apparently, he
does not deny the substance of the allegations, he simply thinks he is above the
law and no wonder why.
He also released the names of informants knowing full well that to do so was a
virtual death sentence.
He has a lot to answer for and hopefully, a lot of time in cell to think about
his actions.
www.OttawaMensCentre.com