Open letter to members of the Bring Julian Assange Home Parliamentary Support Group: Please raise your voice for Julian Assange this week

Update, 8 Feb 2023: I have received a reply from Josh Wilson and responded further below. They both now precede my original "Open Letter" of 6 February, which is further below.

Josh Wilson's Reply

See below for my original open letter of 6 February to members of the Julian Assange Parliamentary Support Group. Josh Wilson's response is:

Thanks, James – I appreciate that advocacy, and I assure you I will continue speaking up for Julian Assange, not least in my role as Labor’s co-convenor of the Parliamentary Friends of Julian Assange Group, along with Andrew Wilkie and others.

The group will of course consider ways that we can bring greater visibility to Mr Assange’s plight, and ways in which we can argue for and support his release.

Kind regards,

Josh Wilson MP | Federal Member for Fremantle

My further reply ofThursday 9 February 2023

Dear Josh,

Thank you for your reply.

However, I fail to see how your reply has addressed the central issues I raised.

As I have pointed out in the 10 minute speech I gave in the video linked to in that email (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LBue00Ujix0), the continued imprisonment of Julian Assange, since May 2020, is without any legal basis whatsoever. His continued imprisonment in Belmarsh Prison violates both UK law and the First Amendment to the United States Constitution which guarantees free speech. It is illegal, because in May 2020 he had completed serving the 50 week maximum sentence for the trumped-up charge of 'skipping bail' to seek asylum in the London Ecuadorian Embassy.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese could make UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak free Julian Assange today, if he chose to. Were Rishi Sunak not to agree to the PM's request to free Assange, Albanese could take the UK government to the International Criminal Court ,which would almost certainly order Sunak to release Assange.

Yet, Prime Minister Albanese has not done this, nor has he made any other efforts to free Julian Assange, as far as I can tell. A response to Freedom of Information (FOI) request made on 23 January revealed that, since 23 May 2022, there has been no communication between either the PM or Attorney Mark Dreyfus and US President Joe Biden about Julian Assange (see https://michaelwest.com.au/documents-show-no-sign-albanese-government-lobbied-the-us-to-bring-julian-assange-home/).

This is contrary to what the PM said to independent Member of Parliament Monique Ryan, during Question Time on 30 November 2022. Albanese said to her, "... can I assure the member for Kooyong that I have raised this personally with representatives of the United States government. ... So I will continue to advocate, as I did recently in meetings that I have held."

Because FOI has since shown that there is no evidence to support the PM's assertion that he had (a) raised this personally with representatives of the US government, and (b) he had lived up to those commitments to 'continue to advocate' that he made to Monique Ryan over two months ago, I think that the Australian public is entitled to a full explanation on the floor of Parliament.

Furthermore, I think it is long past time for the whole issue of Julian Assange to be properly debated in parliament, without discussion being restricted to the small amounts of time permitted for statements to be presented, or the minuscule amounts of time allowed in Question Time, or for when petitions are presented.

As you are probably aware, both Julian Hill and Andrew Wilkie have tried to put motions to Parliament, both of which called upon the government of the day to act to free Julian Assange. Andrew Wilkie's foreshadowed motion of 2 December 2021 is included below as an Appendix. At the end of the motion, it calls on the Prime Minister to "speak directly with his counterparts in the US and UK to bring an end to this madness, including the US dropping all charges against Mr Assange and the UK allowing his immediate release" and "commit to not allow the extradition of Mr Assange to the US from Australia."

That Parliamentary procedural rules did not permit either this motion or Julian Hill's earlier motion to even be put, I consider an outrage. I think if more people here and overseas were aware of this they would be similarly outraged. All over the world, political leaders are calling out for Julian Assange's release. In Latin America, Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, Argentinian President Alberto Fernandez, Colombian president Gustavo Petro, and former Bolivian President Evo Morales, have all called for Julian Assange's freedom.

Seventy members of the German Bundestag have issued a call demanding Julian Assange's release and, within Australia, the Melbourne Council, the NSW Randwick Council and the Upper House of the Parliament of South Australia have all passed motions calling for the Australian Government to act, yet the Australian Parliament remains almost completely silent.

In the four days, that Parliament has sat this week, Julian Assange's name was mentioned only twice - once in a statement by Senator Shoebridge on Wednesday 8 February and one in a petition presented on Monday 6 February and little more has been said in all of 2022. Even Monique Ryan's exchange with the PM on 30 November 2022 lasted barely more than 2 minutes and covered only a very small fraction of the issues at hand.

I think surely, in the 4 day sitting next week, it is possible for you and the other 39 members of the Julian Assange Support Group to find a way to make this Parliament lift its outrageous gag on the discussion of Julian Assange and have Andrew Wilkie's foreshadowed motion put, debated and then voted upon.

Could I suggest that once again, as Andrew Wilkie attempted over a year ago, you move for the necessary Suspension of Standing Orders? This time, should the vote be lost, call for a division. That way we will learn which MPs support free speech on the floor of our Parliament and which MPs use their votes to suppress debate on Julian Assange.

Even if the vote were lost, by just having being seen to have once again have tried to raise their voices for Julian Assange it would greatly help build the grass roots mass movement for Julian Assange out here which I am part of. It would also assist the constituents, that those MPs, who vote against the motion, supposedly represent, to hold them to account at the next federal election.

As said in Andrew Wilkie's motion of 2 Dec 2021, "the continuing incarceration of Mr Assange, and any extradition to the US, would ... be a severe threat to his health and life." By my understanding, Assange's health has got worse in the ensuing 13 months. This surely makes the issue more urgent than before.

So I urge you to (1) carefully consider all that I have put to you in the letter above and (2) attempt, next week, to have the case of Julian Assange debated in Parliament in the way I have suggested.

Yours faithfully,

James Sinnamon

My Original "Open letter" of 6 February 2023

Dear Senator Nick McKim,

The following is adaptation of an e-mail I sent you in the early morning of Monday 6 February. This time I have included a link to a short (10 minute) YouTube video of what I consider to be an important speech, spoken by myself, about Julian Assange.

The video is at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LBue00Ujix0

In this video I make the following points:

I argue that, in spite of the undemocratic rules of Parliamentary Procedure, which have, so far, prevented any substantial debate about Assange in Parliament , the [Bring] Julian Assange [Home Parliamentary] Support Group should still continue to make the effort and be seen to be making the effort to have the plight of Julian Assange and the government's [mis]handling of the case properly debated on the floors of both Houses of Parliament.

 

I ask that, in this two-week sitting of Parliament, which commenced today (Monday 6 February), members of the Julian Assange Support Group again move for a Suspension of Standing Orders so that an adaptation of Andrew Wilkie's foreshadowed motion of December 2021 (included below as Appendix 1) can be put.

Should a majority of members again vote against this procedural motion, call for a division, so that at least, this time, we will know the names of those members who support free speech in our Parliament and the names of those members who use their vote to prevent a debate about Julian Assange on the floors of our Parliament.

Should the Parliamentary Support group pursue this course, then, even if debate about Assange is stopped, those who vote to prevent debate about Assange on the floor of Parliament would rightly be seen by the Australian community and the broader global community as undemocratic and in collusion with the governments of the UK and the US in their monstrous treatment of Julian Assange. In time those members can be held to account to the Australian people for their conduct.

I believe that if the Julian Assange Support Group were to act on the suggestions I made in that video, it could just make the necessary difference that would cause the Australian Government to finally use the powers, vested in it, to make the UK government end the illegal imprisonment of Julian Assange and make the US government desist in its illegal and abhorrent efforts to extradite him.

Yours faithfully,

James Sinnamon

Appendix 1: Andrew Wilkie's foreshadowed motion of 2 December 2021

That the House:

(1) notes that:

(a) Walkley Award winning Australian journalist, Mr Julian Assange, remains incarcerated in HMP Belmarsh in the United Kingdom, despite a British Court earlier this year finding that Mr Assange could not be extradited to the United States of America for health reasons;

(b) the US continues to pursue Mr Assange and has recently been back in court in the UK appealing the earlier decision to refuse the extradition;

(c) the reason for the US's determination to extradite Mr Assange is limited to Wikileaks' exposes in 2010 and 2011 of US war crimes and other misconduct in Iraq and Afghanistan, and in Guantanamo Bay, including the release of the 'Collateral Murder' video in which a US helicopter in Iraq gunned down innocent civilians including journalists;

(d) recent revelations in the media show the Central Intelligence Agency developed plans to abduct and assassinate Mr Assange; and

(e) the continuing incarceration of Mr Assange, and any extradition to the US, would not only be a grave injustice but a severe threat to his health and life; and

(2) calls on the Prime Minister to:

(a) speak directly with his counterparts in the US and UK to bring an end to this madness, including the US dropping all charges against Mr Assange and the UK allowing his immediate release; and

(b) commit to not allow the extradition of Mr Assange to the US from Australia.

Appendix 2: Example of an email I sent to members of the Bring Julian Assange Home Parliamentary Support Group on 6 February 2023

Dear Andrew Wilkie,

I write to you to urge you to, in the forthcoming sitting of Parliament commencing today, Monday 6 February, to, this time, help make Parliament properly debate the issue of Julian Assange. The debate would include discussion of the monstrous treatment of Julian Assange by the governments of both the United Kingdom and the United States. It would also include discussion of the failure of this current Labor Government to use the power vested in it to make both the US and the UK cease this conduct and to allow Julian Assange to come home to Australia to be with his wife Stella and his two children.

I have posted to YouTube, a 10 minute speech in which I argued for this last Friday 3 February at the weekly vigil for Julian Assange outside Melbourne's Flinders Street Station.

Whilst Anthony Albanese has claimed on several occasions that his government does not have the power to make the UK end its imprisonment and torture of Julian Assange, a proper debate on the floors of Parliament would show to Australians and to the rest of the world, that this is a lie.

I appreciate that members of the Julian Assange Parliamentary Support have tried, on a number of occasions, to use Question Time, Parliamentary Statements and the presentation of petitions to raise the profile of Julian Assange. However, as far as I can tell, none of this has succeeded in making clear to the Australian public, that:

1. The imprisonment in of Julian Assange, who is guilty of no crime, by the British government is illegal; and

2. That, if it chose to, the Australian government could make the British Government free Julian Assange today and could also make the US government desist in its illegal efforts to extradite Julian Asange to face imprisonment in solitary confinement for the rest of his life.

This cannot be shown conclusively in the 2 minutes that is allowed for each question in Question Time nor by the presentation of petitions. Whilst Statements and petitions are two other means for MPs to put on the record some facts about the Julian Assange case, government ministers are not required to respond and have not responded as far as I can tell.

Only through a proper debate can the case for Julian Assange be shown to be both factual and overwhelming, but, as you are aware the major parties have colluded to prevent real debate on Assange. In June 2021, the then Parliamentary Selection Committee refused to allow Julian Hill to put a Private Members Motion in support of Julian Assange.

Then, in December 2021, Andrew Wilkie's procedural motion for the Suspension of Standing Orders to allow him to put his motion in support of Julian Assange was defeated. Wilkie's foreshadowed motion was

That the House:

(1) notes that:

(a) Walkley Award winning Australian journalist, Mr Julian Assange, remains incarcerated in HMP Belmarsh in the United Kingdom, despite a British Court earlier this year finding that Mr Assange could not be extradited to the United States of America for health reasons;

(b) the US continues to pursue Mr Assange and has recently been back in court in the UK appealing the earlier decision to refuse the extradition;

(c) the reason for the US's determination to extradite Mr Assange is limited to Wikileaks' exposes in 2010 and 2011 of US war crimes and other misconduct in Iraq and Afghanistan, and in Guantanamo Bay, including the release of the 'Collateral Murder' video in which a US helicopter in Iraq gunned down innocent civilians including journalists;

(d) recent revelations in the media show the Central Intelligence Agency developed plans to abduct and assassinate Mr Assange; and

(e) the continuing incarceration of Mr Assange, and any extradition to the US, would not only be a grave injustice but a severe threat to his health and life; and

(2) calls on the Prime Minister to:

(a) speak directly with his counterparts in the US and UK to bring an end to this madness, including the US dropping all charges against Mr Assange and the UK allowing his immediate release; and

(b) commit to not allow the extradition of Mr Assange to the US from Australia.

Unfortunately, Andrew Wilkie did not call for a Division of the House. Had he done so, we would know the names of those members who support free speech in parliament and the names of those members who used their votes to suppress free speech.

I request of you that, in this coming sitting of Parliament that you and other members of the Support Group once again attempt to put the above foreshadowed motion, or else an updated version of that motion, put. Even just moving the procedural motion for the necessary Suspension of Standing Orders would enormously raise the profile of the Julian Assange.

Were the procedural motion carried, then even if the motion failed to win a majority of votes, the logical argument for Julian Assange would be seen by members of the public to have been easily won during the course of the debate.

Of course, I think it is, unfortunately, far more likely that the motion for the Suspension of Standing Orders will be defeated, but, If this occurs, this time a division should be called for so that al least, this time, the Australian public can find out the names of those MPs who support free speech in Parliament and the names of those who do not. This time around, I think a far greater proportion of the public will be watching.

Yours faithfully,

James Sinnamon