Update, 02:41+11, Monday 29 Mar 2021 : This article has been re-posted as a short article beneath Julian Assange could finally walk free—if we seize the moment (28/3/2021) by Scott Ludlum.

On Friday 26 March at 3:30pm, supporters of Julian Assange marched from Flinders Street Station to the British Consulate at 90 Collins Street in Melbourne's CBD and arrived there at 4:00pm. Outside the British Consulate, we shouted out our demands that: The British Government release Julian Assange from his illegal detention and torture at Belmarsh Prison; Julian Assange not be extradited to the United States where he would face a rigged trial hidden from public view; and Prime Minister Scott Morrison uphold his duty of care to Julian Assange and act to force the British government to release Julian Assange Several speeches were also given. (For one of the speeeches, see embedded video.)

CORRECTION (10:20am, Friday): The march will be to the British Consulate at 90 Collins Street Melbourne and not to the State Library. - apologies

Join us at 3:30pm Friday 26 March (today) at Flinders Street Station, from which Melbourne For Wikileaks (@Melbourne4wiki) will be marching at 4:00pm from Flinders Street Station to the British Consulate at 90 Collins Street, Melbourne. This March is to show our support of Julian Assange.

Victorian Kangaroos need your signature on this petition! They have been decimated by bushfires and the Victorian Government estimates of numbers are way out. The Mornington Peninsula contains a landlocked group of grey kangaroos that are menaced by several processes, including increased development, traffic, fencing, shooting, and the so-called Kangaroo Harvest Program (KHP). These animals need our help and protection. The petition calls upon the Victorian Government to suspend its 'harvest' program. See below.

In this video, BBC journalist Orla Guerin interviews Azerbaijan President Aliyev, assuming that Azerbaijan press and politics are heavily censored, and presses him on that. He denies the accusation, then asks her why Julian Assange has been held inhumanely for years, if the British and western press are so free. The BBC journalist simply won't acknowledge the situation for journalists and the media in her own country, kind of proving the president's point. Transcript below, with the pithiest bits emboldened.

Over the past year, the Center for a Humane Economy worked closely with United States Representatives Salud Carbajal, D-Calif., and Brian Fitzpatrick, R-Penn., to formulate legislation to ban the trade in kangaroo-sourced products into the United States. When the “Kangaroo Protection Act” was introduced into Congress on February 9, 2021, word spread quickly throughout Australia by way of the press (ABC, Leader, The Australian, Sydney Morning Herald) and social media, for which we have many organizations to thank.

[See videoed 10 min speech inside.] "The new administration in the USA needs to hear from us. I recently stood in the Australian Senate and made a plea to US President Joe Biden and newly appointed US Attorney General Merrick Garland to drop all charges against Julian Assange so we can bring him home to Australia. It was a lie and terrible deception that led us to war in Iraq - a manufactured deception about weapons of mass destruction by some of the most powerful people on this planet. It is terrifying that foreign nations like the US could extradite and charge journalists who have exposed their wrongdoings. If we don’t defend press freedoms and learn from the mistakes and lessons of history we are bound to repeat them. Without a value on truth, there is only one path left to tread, and it gets more dark and dangerous from here – we must continue the fight to free Julian Assange.

Joe Biden and Merrick Garland: please walk away from any decision to extradite Julian Assange now. It's in the interest of democracy and humanity for you to do so.

The illegal, unilateral invasion of Iraq was less than 20 years ago, but seems to be largely forgotten already.

I invite you [people in Australia] to rally for Julian Assange at this critical moment in the campaign to bring him home to Australia. For more info, visit: https://www.facebook.com/events/2757770894486415/#FreeJulianAssange"

This article can be printed on two sides of an A4 sheet from this file (but, please be warned, it costs a lot more to print it as colour rather than as black and white).

Dear Prime Minister Scott Morrison, I am writing to you concerning the imprisonment, psychological and physical torture, in Britain, of an Australian citizen, Julian Assange, who has committed no crime. So far Julian Assange has endured more than eight and a half years of this, and if the United States' government has its way, this will continue for the rest of his life. On 11 April 2019, shortly after Julian Assange was taken from the London Ecuadorian Embassy and placed under arrest, Foreign Minister Maurice Payne issued a statement:

"I am confident, as the United Kingdom Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt publicly confirmed in July 2018, that Mr Assange will receive due process in the legal proceedings he faces in the United Kingdom." [1]

If you, Prime Minister, or Marise Payne, have been able to closely follow the legal proceedings to which Julian Assange has been subjected for over one year now, in Woolwich Crown Court, you will be aware of the following:

Perth, West Australia: A delegation of community leaders will deliver over 25,000 messages calling for the South West forests to be protected at Dumas House tomorrow. The event is the, "Voices for the Forests - Grand Postcard Handover," Wednesday, 10th March, 12 noon, Dumas House, 2 Havelock St, West Perth. Professor Fiona Stanley, will be joined by climate scientist and IPCC lead author, Dr Bill Hare, acclaimed actor, Kelton Pell, and a number of other well-known and influential West Australians at the event.

"Stopping logging is something we can do immediately to improve climate change and environmental degradation," said Prof Stanley. "Continued logging and clearing of such carbon-dense and biodiverse forests really is a ludicrous situation which can be stopped immediately, and it has to be.

Video inside with Ian Lowe talking on the impact of war on carbon gas production, and Peter Catt asking for people's views on the connection between war and refugees. The general public is invited to give their opinion in this democratic inquiry. The Independent and Peaceful Australia Network (IPAN) is a national network of community, peace and faith organisations, environment groups, trade unions and individuals concerned about the social, economic, environmental, military and political costs of Australia’s involvement in US-led wars. IPAN advocates an independent and peaceful Australian foreign policy. IPAN is conducting a broad People’s Inquiry examining the costs and consequences of Australia’s involvement in US led wars and the US alliance.

The Inquiry aims to give a voice to the community and increase public discussion on the social, economic, financial, environmental and political impacts. It seeks to inform and promote debate in the Australian community. The national Inquiry invites organisations and community members to make submissions on their views and concerns. We also invite submissions offering alternatives for the future. We are keen to develop a coherent and persuasive case for an independent and peaceful Australian foreign policy, and military and defence spending priorities. (See here for earlier information about the inquiry.)

An Australian tale of retribution, revenge, redemption and reconciliation. (Trailer inside article.) Screening and Q&A session at Rosebud Cinema, 7 PM Saturday 13th March of The Flood by screenwriter, director and producer, Victoria Wharfe McIntyre.The movie was mainly filmed around Kangaroo Valley NSW, it has become a stunning visual record of so much that was lost in the Southern NSW mega fires. Click on this link for tickets.

Click on this link for tickets.

US President Joe Biden ordered military airstrikes against facilities belonging to anti-terror resistance groups on the Iraqi-Syrian border. The military action, the first of its kind under US President Joe Biden, has been met with negative reactions, with many observers likening Biden's approach to that of his predecessor, Donald Trump.

The military action was said to be in retaliation for recent attacks against American bases and missions in Iraq, which Washington has blamed on so-called "Iran-backed" Iraqi resistance groups. Australian mass-media has uncritically repeated these pretexts. Iran has, however, repeatedly rejected any role in the attacks targeting American bases in Iraq. Iraqi resistance forces have been fighting remnants of the Takfiri Daesh terror group across border regions of Iraq and Syria in coordination with the governments in both Arab countries. Damascus has censured the US air raid describing it as "cowardly" and a "bad sign" from the new US administration.

In the introduction, Mohammed Ali, in Damascus, Syria, gives that state's response to the attacks.

Discussing the issues with compere, Bardia Honardar, are Sara Flounders, National Co-Director, International Action Center, an activist group founded in 1992 by former United States Attorney General Ramsey Clark. It supports anti-imperialist movements around the world, and opposes U.S. military intervention in all circumstances; and Daniel Kovalic, lawyer and adjunct Professor of labour law, University of Pittsburg, campaigner in International Human Rights, particularly in Columbia, where he has exposed murder and destabilisation programs by the United States and corporations.

In this video, on Friday 26 February 2021, John Shipton, Julian Assange's father, launches the Julian Assange road-show, with an interesting and moving speech on human rights, history, and current trends. The bus you can see behind Mr Shipton, will travel from Melbourne to Canberra, via Broadford, Castlemaine, Bendigo, Albury, Wogga - and other country towns, reaching Canberra within a few weeks, in time for opening of the second session of Parliament. There the road-show members will work with the Australian Parliamentary Friends of Julian Assange, to try to convince the Scott Morrison Australian government to bring Julian home.

A fundamentally flawed proposal to bust open super for first home buyers housing deposits could hike the nation’s five major capital city median property prices by between 8-16%, preliminary analysis from Industry Super Australia shows.

Allowing couples to take $40,000 from super would send property prices skyrocketing in all state capitals, but the impact would be most severe in Sydney, where the median property price could lift a staggering $134,000. (see table 1 below)

On Friday 26 February, Julian Assange's father John Shipton (pictured), is to embark on his #HomeRun4Julian tour. He will be touring regional Victorian and New South Wales towns on his way to Sydney and Canberra to demand justice for his son, Julian Assange.

The rally will be addressed by John Shipton, amongst others. From there, John Shipton will be embarking on his #HomeRun4Julian tour of regional Victorian and New South Wales towns on his way to Sydney and Canberra to demand justice for his son, Julian Assange.

Sustainable Population Australia (SPA) are partnering with filmmaker Maxine Trump on the Australian premiere of her award winning film To Kid or Not to Kid in Melbourne and Perth on the 26 and 27 February. The documentary is being screened as part of SPA’s ‘Stop at Two’ campaign. This will be the first time the film will be screened in theatres before being released on Amazon Prime on February 27th.

Update:12:45am Mon 22 Feb 2021 - The transcript of my 7 minute speech has been added as an Appendix.

Melbourne for Wikileaks (@melbourne4wiki) holds vigils for Julian Assange, every Friday, from 6:30pm until 8:30pm, under the clocks at Melbourne's iconic Flinders Street Station. Yesterday, Friday 19 February, I unfurled a canvas banner, 5 meters wide and 1.7 meters deep, with a big picture of Assange on it. No sooner had we raised this banner than we heard loud cries of support for Julian Assange. Support also came from cars, whose drivers tooted their horns, as they drove past the station. (See video inside.)

The article below is an adaptation of a double-sided A5 leaflet I wrote to be distributed at the Friday Night Vigil for Julian Assange held in front of Flinders Street Railway Station from 5:30pm until 7:30pm. The 210K PDF file is attached to the article Barraitser's 'compassion' towards Julian Assange a ploy to avoid judicial scrutiny of the United States' illegal war on journalism? (12/1/21). I have since handed out this same leaflet, so far, at three subsequent Friday night vigils.

End the illegal detention and torture of this Australian hero.

Why won't the Australian government act to get Julian Assange out of the Belmarsh hellhole?

By its stated intention to imprison the visionary Australian journalist and publisher, Julian Assange, for 175 years, the United States government has confirmed the criminality and malevolance of those who are truly in charge of it. State officials, including Hillary Clinton, have also been recorded talking openly about assassinating Assange.

Foreign Minister Marise Payne's double standards

In contrast to her loudly intervening on behalf of journalist Cheng Lei, and writer Yang Hengjun, who are both currently detained on criminal charges in China, Australian Foreign Minister Marise Payne, in concert with this and former Australian governments, has ruthlessly turned her back on journalist and publisher, Julian Assange. Julian Assange, arguably of greater stature than any other journalist in the world, remains in the dungeons of the corrupt UK government, which is in league with the United States and its war machine. Assange's 'crime' was to expose United States war crimes (and those of other states) to the world. It is indicative of America's despotism that its allies will do its bidding against their own citizens, helping the US to try to destroy Assange as a warning to any journalist who might try to write the truth about war and corruption when it involves powerful people. It is shocking that President Trump pardoned the perpetrators of what came to be called 'Collateral Murder', but backed the continued persecution of Assange. Behind his saccharinely benign grandpa mask, Biden takes a similar stance. [Candobetter Editor: Title change on 10 Feb 2021]

Federal Labour Opposition Leader Anthony Albanese ('Albo'), on Australia Day, tweeted in praise of local Australian heroes, with the glaring exception of Julian Assange, the most widely-recognised Australian anywhere, whose suffering is unfathomable, and whose services to the anti-war movement are immeasurable. Why wasn't Julian Assange included and why does the Australian Government allow the UK and the US to continue their illegal persecution, imprisonment, and torture, of this Australian citizen?

In response to the following Tweet by Anthony Albanese (@AlboMP) the Leader of the Labor Party Opposition in the Australian Federal Parliament:

   "These are the true heroes of Australia. They put themselves on the line every day of this pandemic – to keep us safe, to keep us healthy, and to keep Australia moving forward. On this Australia Day, on behalf of the nation, we say thank you."

… I posted:

   "Thanks to @julianAssange_ https://wikileaks.org and @SaveManning we now know the truth about Iraq, Afghanistan, Guantanamo Bay, US Political corruption, … Surely, Julian Assange is no less an Australian hero? Why won't our Parliament demand Julian's freedom?"

On Jan. 20, 2021, Joe Biden was sworn in as the 46th President of the United States. The Independent and Peaceful Australia Network urges Australians to reflect on our relationship with the US during this inauguration and think deeply about how we may forge an independent and peaceful foreign policy in the coming years.

While President Biden promises to differ from former-President Donald Trump, Australia faces issues that will persist regardless of who sits in the Oval Office.

On-going conflicts in the Middle East, the growing power of China, the ramifications of global warming and many more issues necessitate an intelligent foreign policy informed by the need for peace, science and our national interests.

Republished, with embedded 25 minute Video, from Assange extradition court ruling (11/1/21) | PressTV. This is the most recent edition of Richard Medhurst's (pictured) weekly Communiqué broadcast.

See also: Melbourne Vigil to Free Julian Assange at Flinders Street Station this Friday at 7:30pm (10/1.21)

A British Judge has ruled on whether Australian journalist Julian Assange will be extradited to the United States. The WikiLeaks founder is wanted on espionage and computer hacking charges and faces up to 175 years in prison.

As Richard Medhurst, who attended the extradition hearing, explains, the judge's decision to block extradition solely on health grounds still leaves press freedoms at risk and validates the politically charged indictment by the US.

The 210K PDF file, from which the double-sided A5 flyer "Uphold the Rule of Law", about Julian Assange can be printed, can be downloaded from here.

Update (Thursday 1/4/2021): Melbourne supporters of Julian Assange will be holding our weekly vigil tomorrow evening at Flinders Street Station from 6:30pm Good Friday, this Friday 2 April. For more information see @LorineBrice

Melbourne supporters will be holding their weekly vigil for Julian Assange this Friday at 6:30pm outside Flinders Street Station. It is vital for every Australian, who values free speech and opposes the unlawful detention and torture of Julian Assange by the U.K. government at the behest of its U.S. master, to demand that our government act now to free Julian Assange.For more information, see @LorineBrice, @Melbourne4Wiki.

Be there: 7:30pm, this Friday, at Flinders Street Railway Station. Listen to speeches and help us hand out leaflets.

Failure to act, could well result in Julian's death as Greek Australian activist Yanis Varifoukis explains in the embedded video.

This household had a moment of great joy last night, to hear that Judge Vanessa Baraitser, presiding at the Magistrate's court, has disallowed Julian Assange's extradition on medical grounds. She found there was a high risk of his suiciding if confined in a US prison. However, she apparently threw out the grounds of public interest (protection of journalists); political persecution, and oppression. She also seems to have upheld the honouring of the UK treaty obligations to the United States, as the only public interest matter. For some of us, her decision on medical grounds, that Assange would probably suicide in US prison conditions, is equivalent to preventing the extradition of a prisoner to Nazi Germany, on grounds that they would probably not survive the concentration camps. The US prison system actually allows major corporations to benefit from slave labour of prisoners; it conducts secret trials; and it holds prisoners indefinitely without trial - as in Guantanamo Bay prison. The war crimes and international surveillance of governments and private individuals that Julian Assange exposed show the United States as a totally rogue state. It is not even a party to the International Criminal Court. Julian Assange's defense team called the UK treaty obligations with this rogue state into question. We need an international media and state denunciation of state alliances with the United States, but that would, ironically, require journalists to run the danger of being pursued by this rogue state, just as Julian Assange has been. One hopes that a defense of Julian Assange against the US appeal would benefit from a higher court looking again at the points of law disallowed by Judge Baraitser.

A major people's Inquiry into the costs and consequences of the US Alliance and Australian involvement in US-led wars has been launched. Why is this inquiry so different? Because it is not run by government. It is run for the people by the people. The Independent and Peaceful Australia Network (IPAN) has trumped most voluntary organisations by taking democratic power into its own hands. This people's inquiry was conceived of and agreed to by IPAN members and is run and officiated by volunteers, in cooperation with web news-site Independent Australia. You are invited to make a personal or organisational submission because they really want to know what you think about Australia's foreign policy. Please consider donating.

"Investigation into how hysterectomy might modify other disease processes has been conducted using Rochester Epidemiology Project (REP) data. These studies have linked hysterectomy to long-term health consequences including pelvic floor dysfunction and fracture risk, as well as dementia, depression, and Parkinson’s disease." (Stewart, Elizabeth A., et al, "Reassessing Hysterectomy," Minn Mid. 2012 Mar; 95(3):36-39.) Yet, hysterectomy is one of the most common operations performed in Australia and New Zealand. Every year in Australia, around 30,000 women have a hysterectomy. In fact, it is the second commonest major surgical operation after Caesarean section for women under the age of 60. This is despite the fact that other surgical and other treatments exist for many of the conditions for which hysterectomy remains an apparently unthinking and profitable default for surgeons. As well as the implications of both partial and complete removal of the uterus, general anaesthetics carry increasing risks of dementia with age. The use of hormone replacement therapy post hysterectomy has been shown to be an important protective factor against dementia.

Called, "DiEM TV: Another Now with Yanis Varoufakis," this, one of several Varoufakis videos, focuses on how to break up Amazon dot com - but then passes on to how to break up the feudal world order. Varoufakis has unique experience of the global financial-political system, and so he does a good analysis of Amazon's engulfment of the real world and of feudal capitalism. Most interesting is his advice on how to break this behemoth down to size via Lilleputian-style exploitation of the financial system. Part of the video involves Varoufarkis reading from a novel he recently published about a global-democratic revolution after the 2008 financial collapse, Another Now: Dispatches from an Alternative Present. You may or may not hold Varoufakis's communistic value solutions, but his methodology could also play out with many different new kinds of polities. I enjoyed this mixture of Socratic style and Swiftian analogies. You may wonder at his aiming ammunition at Amazon dot com, when his books sell there, but he says his publishers choose to market them there. This does not detract from his analysis. You may also wonder about his understanding of alternative energy resource-limits, but that also should not prevent you from learning from this analysis. Video inside article.

Taylor Hudak's YouTube Channel is acTVism. There you will find the latest Julian Assange case updates.

	Taylor Hudak	Mrs. Christine Assange	Julian Assange

The continued detention and torture of Julian Assange by the U.K. government is, plain and simply, a violation of International Law, British Law, and the law of the United States. Had the U.K's own laws have been upheld, then the British Prime Minister Boris Johnstone, it's Justice ministers and many of their underlings including Judge Vanessa Baraitser, who is presiding over Julian Assange's sham trial, would long ago have been indicted for the laws they have broken and put behind bars.

The embedded 5:22 minute video is of Taylor Hudak's 27 November update in the latest developments In Julian Assange's case. The full transcript, adapted from the YouTube text, is included as an Appendix.

This is urgent. A rushed Senate inquiry will ignore the recommendations of an independent review and devolve our national nature laws to the states instead. We need you to speak up.

	Ross Asscroft, presenter of RT UK's Renegade Inc.	Journalist Richard Medhurst	Julian Assange

Previously published as First they came for Julian (2/11/20) | RT, Renegade Inc This article includes an embedded video..

Attacks on human rights and freedom of speech are at the center of the Julian Assange extradition case, so why has the press coverage been so minimal?

The case may split opinion, but punishing Assange and others for bringing to public attention serious violations by our governments is averting our attention away from the bigger picture.

In the embedded video, journalist Richard Medhurst joins host Ross Ashcroft to discuss.

Reform all aspects of how we treat our ageing population. More real, boots-on-the-ground funding for in home care. In home respite options. More support for carers, and recognition of the huge amount of unpaid work they are doing every single day. Complete overhaul of how income and assets are calculated, the scrapping of the "6 month hardship" rule. Streamlining the process for calculating daily fees and admission to long term placement. Specialised support and advocacy agency within the Department of Human Services, or an independent body, to assist carers to navigate the system. Go to Tara Kostezky's Campaign