Free Assange, Drop The Charges Against the Uhuru 3
The hearings for the ""legal pretext"" / pompous illegitimate obfuscation under which WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange is being hunted by the US imperialist regime will happen on Tuesday and Wednesday. I am planning to attend a vigil in front of the UK embassy here on Tuesday. There are other Day X protests around the world:
CourageA
Within two hours of the death of the fringe Russian political figure Alexei Navalny, dozens of Western politicians wondrously lined up to condemn Russia and Russian president Vladimir Putin – see below — and yet where are they when it comes to the imprisonment and torture of Julian Assange, the most accomplished journalist of his generation who is possibly within days of being extradited to the US?
Statements blaming Moscow came within minutes and seemed to follow a template […]
Western reactions “once again demonstrated their hypocrisy, cynicism and lack of principles,” the Foreign Ministry in Moscow said in a statement.
The Federal Penitentiary Service of Russia for Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous Region announced Navalny’s death at 2:19pm Moscow time, and “a torrent of carbon-copy accusations began pouring in literally 15 minutes later.”
The first message came from Swedish Foreign Minister Tobias Billstrom (“heinous crime”) and Norwegian Foreign Minister Bart Eide (“heavy burden of responsibility”) at 2:35pm, while Latvian President Edgars Rinkevics chimed in with (“brutally murdered”) six minutes later.
Czech FM Jan Lipavsky followed suit, accusing Russia of being “a cruel state that kills people who dream of a beautiful, better future.” A minute later, France’s Stephane Sejourne claimed Navalny had fought “the system of oppression.”
The EU “holds the Russian regime solely responsible for this tragic death,” European Council President Charles Michel said at 3:02pm. Eight minutes later, Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky claimed that Navalny was “obviously killed by [Russian President Vladimir] Putin.”
The litany was continued by Dutch PM Mark Rutte (“unprecedented cruelty”) at 3:20pm, Moldovan President Maia Sandu (“blatant oppression”) ten minutes later, and German FM Annalena Baerbock five minutes after that, declaring that Navalny “had to die” because he was “a symbol of a free and democratic Russia.”
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen piped up after that, followed by German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, and finally French President Emmanuel Macron, at 5:28pm.
Within just two hours, Western politicians and media were able to “obtain the results of a forensic examination that had not yet been carried out, conduct an investigation, blame Moscow and render a verdict,” the Russian Foreign Ministry noted, suggesting that the reactions must have been prepared ahead of time and according to a “blame Russia no matter what” template.
“We might be able to believe in this incredible, miraculous speed if the whole world had not just watched the helpless ‘investigation’ of terrorist attacks on the Nord Stream gas pipeline that stretched out over many months and turned up empty,” the ministry added.
[Source: Russian Foreign Ministry comments on Western reactions to Navalny’s death on RT]
Everything that they accuse Russia of is exactly what the US is and does.
Despite how little I share with Navalny's political views and in fact deplore them – he attended multiple neo-Nazi rallies where he infamously called for Muslims in Russia to be deported and called them cockroaches (as Nick from Revolutionary Blackout Network describes in the video below) and collaborated with the Western psy-op Bellingcat – I hate the conditions of medical neglect in which Navalny died, in which US-Chilean journalist Gonzalo Lira died, and in which Assange is being chained.
Where were all those oh-so-fabulous, freedom-loving Western politicians when Lira had recently died of pneumonia after being locked up by their darling Ukrainian regime, for publishing content critical of the government? Where are they when it comes to Assange who has been locked up in the harshest of conditions and is under psychological torture, as described by former UN Special Rapporteur on Torture Nils Melzer, for publishing about US war crimes, while all the war criminals live comfortable retirements?
Where are they when it comes to the Uhuru 3, dissidents and revolutionaries within the U.S. colonial borders whose homes and offices have been raided by the FBI and are facing imprisonment? Here is some of what Chairman Omali Yeshitela said in an interview with journalist Glenn Greenwald:
Extended segment starts at 1:02:59. Interview with Chairman Omali Yeshitela and Attorney Leonard Goodman starts at 1:22:47
Did this attack come as a surprise for you?
It was surprising in terms of when it happened and how it happened, because it was a very violent attack on my home–threatened my life and the life of my wife.
Tremendous amounts of resources were stolen, property damaged and things like that. It was a pre-dawn raid. And so we were surprised by that.
But in the history of our struggle–they raided my home at 5 a.m., and when I came at their command out of my house, with my hands up as they commanded, and faced armored vehicles and assault weapons carrying camouflage-donned men who were pointing these weapons with the laser targeting devices bouncing off my chest–what came to my mind was 1969 when in December the FBI raided the home of Fred Hampton in Chicago where he was assassinated.
And so I thought I was going to die when I walked out of that house.
My point being that with the treatment of people like me, who moved from a particular politic that has prevailed for a long time in this country–especially since people like King, Malcolm X, and Fred Hampton and others have been assassinated–there is that history and there’s that tradition.
So I'm not surprised that the U.S. government attacked me.
We have incredible programs where we’ve done incredible projects, particularly in the city of St. Louis where we actually redeveloped much of the north side of St. Louis which is a predominantly African community that's been left to deteriorate.
Not just deteriorate, but a policy they characterize as benign neglect has been imposed on this community and so this is the work that we’ve been doing.
We knew that it wasn't something that the government was happy with, but the population–the community–was happy with it. So I'm not surprised.
And we expect to be attacked by the government, but not because we [committed] a crime.
And this is the thing that makes this extraordinarily interesting to us, is that we find ourselves in the position of having to fight in defense of the U.S. constitution and the right to free speech against the very government that says it's about free speech; and upholding the constitution against the institutions like the FBI, and the presidency of this country that’s supposed to uphold the constitution–I think they have to take vows to that effect.
So here we are as an organization that has come to the conclusion some time ago that we have to be free from the colonial domination of the U.S. government, and are in the position of fighting fiercely–and have fought fiercely–for the rights to free speech as according to the constitution [and] freedom of assembly according to the constitution.
So I’m not shocked by the attack–as I said the way the attack occurred on this occasion was shocking and unexpected.
My wife and I were sitting up at the table and she was preparing to come to our headquarters, here in St. Louis, to preside over a program [where] we are training black women as doulas, to be able to help women and children have safe births in a city that has a situation where enough black babies die every year to fill fifteen kindergarten classes.
We were talking about this, when this noise came out of the dark telling us to come out with our hands up and flash-bang grenades exploding all around, ultimately coming into the house and things like that.
And then to be confronted with this armed force out there, that was a surprise.
I have been volunteering with Uhuru again as a proofreader for their newspaper and political organ, The Burning Spear. You can visit handsoffuhuru.org to contribute to the legal defense fund:
