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They have a whole page dedicated to him: https://apnews.com/hub/julian-assange
I also get a chuckle when people attack the AP. I guess non profit collectives are threatening to communists. ;)
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Hexbear sees something they disagree with and cleverly evades thinking by blaming the CIA.
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Liberals are insecure about their casual connections to the intelligence community, and afraid of actual leftists noticing and getting scared off, so they pretend we think EVERYTHING’s controlled by the CIA so we’ll look crazy in comparison. Classic lazy hyperbole.
Hmm so you’re agreeing that even free speech and democracy will not stop authoritarianism?
Jimmy lai, pro democracy, smell like three letter agency.
Certainly not CCP considering he is pro-democracy. 🙂
CCP
Who? Communist Party of Canada?
What did we do, lend him our last printing press? 🤣
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What is the context behind this?
2019 HK protests and CCP’s crackdown on its free press.
I know that, what did this guy actually do?
It’s in the headline: “pro-democracy publisher”.
He was a newspaper publisher in Hong Kong who refused to get in line. That’s all.
What did he actually do though?
He published newspapers. He was a newspaper publisher.
There’s no free speech in China. Publishing a newspaper that doesn’t follow the line of the Chinese Communist Party is a crime, and after the CCP took control over Hong Kong that applied to him as well.
You could get arrested (rightfully and not) in most of the world for publishing a myriad of things while still calling yourself “pro democracy” (see jan. 6 protests in the US)
I just wanted to know what he was actually saying to motivate this arrest…
The Jan 6 people were not arrested for publishing a newspaper.
The arrest itself was actually “motivated” by what they referred to as unauthorised assembly during the pro-democracy protests. This 73 year old man went somewhere he shouldn’t have, and clearly threatened the mighty CCP enough to warrant 20 months in prison in the process. Additional charges up to life are being stacked on top following from the “security law” meant to silence pro-democracy voices in Hong Kong, but as far as I know these charges have not been made public. His newspaper was published daily though, so the nature of his crime was quite public if you’re really interested.
Here’s a BBC story on the history of the newspaper.
I’m sorry I couldn’t find anything published by Xinhua News Agency, I have a feeling you might have appreciated that more.
Literally ran a newspaper which espoused democracy and independent governance (Hong Kong status quo at the time).
You might also be interested to learn that democratically elected legislators in Hong Kong were arrested en masse from the floor of their legislative building for the exact same reason. It’s as bad as it sounds.
Link me that information from any source that actually reports on it fully. I’m just trying to understand what actually happened there.
He was accused of collaborating with foreign actors.
That IS illegal.
Did not kiss Winnie the Pooh’s ass.
Do not kiss Uncle Sam’s ass. I’m not about to believe anything based on hearsay.
We will never know the details of the charges, because all the legal proceedings will be secret, which is the standard in China.
Someone below posted the charges btw.
Not seeing any evidence of public court proceedings in this thread.
He ran a prominen newspaper called Daily Apple, which was shut down by the government.
Looks like he’s in prison for 2 years on shakey, but mostly self acknowledged fraud charges, and also facing new charges detailed in another comment below.
Dumb questions here. Why are they hiring a British lawyer and testifying in front of the US congress? Like i understand the actual why of that second one, but it’s not like the house of representatives in the US has any actual power to save the guy that they would exercise. Like would a British lawyer have any more luck in getting him out than a Hong Kong lawyer? Are they worried no one will take the case?
The British lawyer might have more relevant training among western lawyers depending on how old he is and if he dealt with old HK law. One needs to conclude that either no HK lawyer is willing to take the case (perhaps due to fear of retribution) or the westerners think it would be a bad move (for example, if a HK lawyer simply tells the truth to Congress and does not get punished back in HK). I’m just speculating, though.
Back to your point about abuse, though,
… except you don’t. Trial by jury is a decent system that decouples justice from political power. In this case, the politicians decided that was an inconvenience and did away with it.
What we should be worried about it is actual abuses, not potential abuses.
Agreed. This was an actual abuse.
