Published time: 11 Apr, 2019
12:21Edited time: 12 Apr, 2019 08:09
Julian Assange’s arrest was
not a sudden development, cultural philosopher Slavoj Zizek told RT. Instead it
was well planned and the final step in a long and ugly smear campaign against
the WikiLeaks founder.
After sheltering in London’s
Ecuadorian embassy for six years, Assange was dragged out of the building by
British police on Thursday morning. The arrest comes after Ecuador’s new pro-US
president withdrew Assange’s asylum claim, and after WikiLeaks Editor-in-Chief
Kristinn Hrafnsson claimed that an extensive spying campaign was conducted
against Assange, designed to get him out.
“I was not surprised,” Zizek
told RT. “The problem for me is how people will simply accept this as the
result of the long, systematic, character assassination campaign.”
The first step in the
campaign, Zizek said, was to connect WikiLeaks – an independent journalistic
outlet known for leaking classified materials, which also prides itself on
having never published false information – with Russia and Vladimir Putin. The
next step was “character assassination.” Assange, Zizek said, was
painted as “arrogant,” “paranoid,” and even a rapist, despite Swedish
authorities dropping all charges against him in 2017.
Then the gossip against Assange sank to an “incredibly
dirty personal level, that he doesn’t clean his toilet, that he smells bad and
so on. Can we imagine anything lower?” WikiLeaks has argued the same, calling
Assange the victim of “a sophisticated effort to dehumanize, delegitimize
and imprison him.”
This man is a son, a father, a
brother. He has won dozens of journalism awards. He's been nominated for the
Nobel Peace Prize every year since 2010. Powerful actors, including CIA, are
engaged in a sophisticated effort to dehumanise, delegitimize and imprison him.
#ProtectJulian
Assange’s arrest, Zizek
continued, has “nothing to do with vengeance.” Rather, the WikiLeaks
head was made an example of in the ongoing fight to clamp down on the free flow
of information. Just like the European Union’s new copyright directive
threatens to censor almost all free expression online, neutering organizations
like Wikileaks is a step towards controlling what information we can and cannot
access.
“All our lives today are
somehow regulated through digital media,” he said. “So it’s
absolutely crucial who controls this digital media. This is the greatest threat
to our freedom.”
“We are not even aware of it
as we don’t experience it as unfreedom. It’s not like the old days of the
police state, where you look over your shoulder and see a man following you.
You feel totally free, but your every move is registered and you’re subtly
manipulated.”
“Wikileaks embodied resistance
to this,” Zizek added.
Assange’s lawyer Jen Robinson
confirmed on Thursday that Assange’s arrest was made in relation to a US
extradition request. Assange is accused of conspiring with US Army
whistleblower Chelsea Manning – herself currently behind bars in Virginia
for refusing to testify against WikiLeaks – to leak
classified footage of US military war crimes in 2010. This footage showed a US
Apache helicopter gunship opening fire on and killing 12 people, including two
Reuters staff.
Just confirmed: #Assange has been
arrested not just for breach of bail conditions but also in relation to a US
extradition request. @wikileaks @khrafnsson
“I wouldn’t blame Ecuador too
much,” Zizek concluded. “Ecuador was under terrible pressure from the
United States. Forget about these B-level countries. This is all about the
United States.”
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