Hacker News Reader

Comment by stenl | Hacker News Reader

From that link: "the Swedish authorities have never explained why they refuse to give Assange a guarantee that they will not extradite him on to the US under a secret arrangement agreed between Stockholm and Washington."

Weeeell, maybe because Sweden is a democracy and has no "authorities" that can guarantee the outcome of hypothetical future legal proceedings.

Also, note that Assange was obviously in Sweden when the rape allegedly happened, and only became conveniently afraid of extraditiom to US after those allegations surfaced.

View on HN

"maybe because Sweden is a democracy and has no "authorities" that can guarantee the outcome of hypothetical future legal proceedings."

An extradition is not a legal proceeding, it's a diplomatic one and being a democracy they can very well agree not to engage in a diplomatic exchange beforehand.

Extradition is a legal proceeding between two countries with an existing extradition treaty. It only becomes a diplomatic proceeding if extradition is sought for charges not covered by the treaty.

Treaties are not laws.

> Treaties are not laws.

Well, I don't know what treaties are to the United Kingdom and Sweden, so I can't speak to the relevant matter, but there is a general sense (insofar as "international law" can be thought of as an actual concrete thing) that treaties are laws. To the United States, for example, treaties are explicitly treated as laws (see http://law.justia.com/constitution/us/article-2/18-treaties-...). Most other countries take their treaty obligations very seriously, although the actual mechanics depend on each country's legal/political system.

In Sweden, it looks like these treaties at least are very similar to laws: extradiction would be handled by their judicial system and the decision would be ultimately up to their supreme court.

Source: http://sverigesradio.se/sida/artikel.aspx?programid=2054&art...

It's like asking Obama to ensure the Supreme Court finds in a certain way.

>Also, note that Assange was obviously in Sweden when the rape allegedly happened, and only became conveniently afraid of extraditiom to US after those allegations surfaced.

The allegations surfaced in August 2010, four months after Collateral Murder and one month after the Afghan War Diary was released. Also earlier that year the diplomatic cable releases began, and while most hadn't been released yet by August, some had, and they were a recently-known quantity by then.

The timing of the allegations was awfully convenient. Far more "convenient" than Assange's paranoia.

No, the charges are that the crimes were committed in August 2010. See the UK High Court appeal to the extradition[1].

[1] http://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/Admin/2011/2849.html

I'm not sure what your point is. The crimes were allegedly committed that August, the two women went to the authorities to ask about a compulsory STD test in August, and the investigation by the Swedish authorities of suspected rape began in August.

Because you made a claim that the "allegations surfaced in August" and that it was related to things that happened before and was "awfully convenient". But there appears to be no sinster motives to the timings.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com