By that token, treaty law does not exist because a country can choose to ignore its own treaty obligations and it might not be invaded. So, Terr’s argument that treaty obligations exist, but jus cogens does not, does not withstand scrutiny.
Really Not All That Bright you seem to be saying that the UK has to follow an international law that the UK hasn’t ratified simply because other countries say it does.
Surely then the law doesn’t exist as far as the UK is concerned. You could therefore say that from the UK perspective it’s more a case of “Just because you say it exists it doesn’t mean it does”.
Or maybe I’m missing the point.
It’s atiny embassy in central London miles from anywhere a jet could land.
This is a fair point, in GQ, we shouldn’t be arguing philosophically. If this issue comes up in GD, I’ll weigh in. This thread should be about the facts regarding this topic in international law, not theory around international relations.
You’re slightly missing the point. I’m not aware of anything that would indicate that countries are compelled to give safe passage to people who were granted asylum in a different country.
However, there is a category of international law that countries are obligated to adhere to whether or not they have signed a treaty on certain standards of behavior. So, for example, every country is obligated not to commit genocide or war crimes whether or not they have signed treaties on those subjects. As has been stated many times, this is not in any way a controversial area of law, but there may be disagreements on what types of activities are covered by this compulsory type of law.
Could they put him in a large crate and call it a diplomatic pouch?
As Ravenman notes, that’s sort of what I’m saying (though I am saying that the UK might have to follow the law, not that it does).
Like I explained on the preceding page, India is generally accepted to have violated international law by detonating a nuke in 1998. This is true even though India has not ratified any treaty prohibiting the test.
Sure. It’s been done before. The person in the crate wasn’t always in there willingly.
What if they land a helicopter on top of the embassy and try to spirit him away in that? (Say, to a waiting ship offshore in international waters.) How would that fly?
Could (and would) the British Air Force send interceptors to escort the helicopter to a nearby airport, or else shoot it down while in British air space? Can the entire helicopter be claimed as a diplomatic pouch? Might they demand an explanation of what’s in that helicopter, and if so, what happens if the Ecuadorians refuse to answer?
Nazis lost. Winners make the laws.
See below.
In this particular case that wouldn’t be feasible, I think; I’ve never been to the Ecuadorian embassy, but I know it is only one part of a very old building which doesn’t have a flat roof or a garden or any outside space at all. It would be logistically difficult if not impossible to get a helicopter in there.
Shooting the helicopter down obviously wouldn’t be an option - quite apart from the diplomatic furore and killing everyone on board, there’s no way they’d be able to shoot it down without having a really high likelihood of killing people on the ground too. The land between the embassy and any airport is too full of people. I know you didn’t mean this as a serious proposition, btw.
Anyway, if Ecuador were willing to go to smuggle Assange out by helicopter and it were feasible, then the British govt would probably sit back and wash their hands of it, happy to have an excuse not to have Assange in the country any more.
We Americans don’t have a dog in this particular fight. It’s Sweden on whose behalf the UK arrested Assange, for sexual assault.
Which is why, if we did sic the dogs on him, the charges would something ranging from to hacking to espionage, not treason.
Any Australians care to chime in on whether they would prefer Assange to be back home in Australia, versus visiting/hiding anywhere but Australia? 
Officially the Australian current labour (left wing) government doesn’t want to get involved at all. The minority Green Party (who actually has some seats and some power in Australia) officially has expressed support for him. If he gets out of this mess he’s expressed interest in running for an Australian senate seat as an independent and the numbers on this article give some level of support for him in the Australian community.
FWIW the NPR report this am stated as without hesitation that he’d be exempt from the rules of diplomatic immunity once he exited the embassy grounds unless the U.K. granted him passage.
They could be wrong but the concept that a small subgroup of states (in this case the Organization of American States) could sign something that would be somehow binding on all other states in the world is absurd. By that logic the Arab League could pass a law, any law, and all other states, would be bound by it. There is no doubt that the claim
is false.
Really RNATB claiming that you were actually
is a bit disingenuous. Is it so hard to admit you made an honest mistake?
I’m betting he ends up in Sweden and beats the charge but would be unsurprised if he actually goes to jail for sex crimes there. And I am thinking he is more running from that than from fears of American authorities geting hold of him.
Suppose Ecuador goes a step further and issues him an Ecuadorean passport and then appoints him Ecuadorean consul to Townsville, Australia. They then ask the UK to let him travel to his new consular post. (Townsville is where Julian is originally from).
He still wouldn’t have diplomatic immunity in UK. He would have diplomatic immunity in Australia (only if Australia accepted his credentials).
As another Ozzie, I will confess to having little sympathy. But since this is GQ I’ll stop there.
The whole kurfuffle seems to hinge on a very strange set of linkages, the most critical of which is pure speculation. Were it not for Wikileaks, Assange would be facing trial in Sweden for sexual assault. Pure and simple. The linkage is that he asserts that the entire charge is due to the US government applying pressure onto the Swedish government to provide a mechanism by which he can be arrested and then extradited to the US to face as yet un-named charges - which today he has escalated to include the death penalty.
So, talking death penalty bit he does start to invoke the usual set of “won’t extradite to the US” exceptions most countries have with extradition treaties with the US. But then again, since the US has not actually said anything about him at all, things get pretty tenuous.
The UK would almost certainly be most pleased to be shot of him. They don’t have a dog in this fight. They are applying excruciating legal process, and probably being very careful to stay as far away from any political leaning as possible. They are in something of a bind in that he has broken his bail conditions, and thus is subject to arrest under the law. But idiotic spy movie style escapades are clearly not on the agenda. They are not going to shoot a helicopter down because he broke bail. Which is the only offence he has committed on UK soil. If Ecuador do decide to get him out I would bet that the UK will make a formal protest and let him go. It just isn’t in their interests to do any more. Sweden might be more upset. But they can take it up with Ecuador.
The key players are really Sweden and the US, which have been mute. He is legitimately charged in Sweden with a serious offence. The US are the big bogeyman, and probably regard this whole thing with some amusement. Charging Assange in the US would be a real political issue. Success probably hinging on a whole set of precedents, and questions about the nature of publication on the Internet, jurisdiction, and simple question of likely success of prosecution. He isn’t going to be spirited off to GitMo. The US could defuse the whole thing by denying any intent to charge or seek extradition. However, I doubt that they would want to. Not understanding the intricacies of the US legal system at it affects such charges, I suspect that they probably are not able to anyway.
Assange has proven to be reasonably adept at milking publicity, and one could cynically suggest that he is playing this for as much as he can on order to springboard a political career. He could possibly win a Senate seat in Oz on the back of this in the current political climate. (Mostly no-one likes any of the major parties, and the near hung parliament carries the risk of a double dissolution or parliament, something that vastly increases the chance of a minor player getting a seat in an election.)
INTERNET GAMBLING!!!
For shame. Please report to the nearest AG’s office to surrender yourself.
[QUOTE=Francis Vaughan]
He is legitimately charged in Sweden with a serious offence.
[/QUOTE]
I don’t think that’s right - he’s only wanted for questioning by the prosecutor, who under Swedish law has the power to request his extradition. I’ve not read the British Supreme Court decision, but I understand that was part of Assange’s argument in the British courts - that it should only be the courts who can request extradition, not a prosecutor. But the reply was that in the Scandinavian court systems, it is the prosecutor who has that power, and the British courts could not impose their ideas of appropriate extradition procedure on another European country.