From The Australian. Here's what's on the Front. I'm Claire Harvey. It's Wednesday, January eighth. There's an epidemic of childhood anxiety, or maybe there's not. Experts say worried parents and well meaning educators may be making anxiety worse by indulging kids instead of helping them through the normal challenges of life. That's an exclusive live right now at the Australian dot com dot a slash health. Julian Assange has been very quiet since returning to Australia in mid twenty twenty four.
He was freed after pleading guilty to a United States charge of espionage. He's a hacker, a self styled freedom fighter, and someone who's always denied committing crimes. But do you remember why he was on the run in the first place. Today we go back to the start with the women who accused Assange of rape. This episode was first broadcast in June twenty twenty four, and don't forget we'll be back with all new episodes of The Front on January eleven.
Before we begin, this episode contains allegations of sexual assault. Back in twenty ten, Julian Assange was a figure of international intrigue, the swashbuckling hacker turned publisher whose website Wikileagues was dumping thousands of documents into the public domain, highly damaging secret military files that exposed the inner workings of America's war in Afghanistan. And then Assange was accused of
rape while he was working in Sweden. Two young Swedish women who had met him in Wikileak circles accused Assange of having sex with them without using a condom without their consent. One was Anna Ardin. She had hosted Assange in her home and the pair had sex in which she said Assange deliberately ripped a condom she'd asked him to wear and was violent towards her during sex. Assange denied both those allegations. You're Flawdiana. Julian Massange men to scoff,
but I'm not a shorning all. In this interview with Swedish paper Zvenska, Doug Bladette, Ardin, who's written a book about her allegations, said this, We've used a voice actor to bring you the translation of her words.
I'm happy to forgive Julian Assange, but I can't create this reconciliation myself. I did my best to get this thing tried in court, but he stayed away. It affected my life immensely in the beginning. I had to quit my job, I had to move out of my apartment. I was even hidden abroad for a period. I also got a lot of support and it's helped me move on and I think I've become a stronger person in this process.
Another woman, known only as Miss W, had consensual sex with Assange using a condom, but said she had awoken the following morning to find him having sex with her again, this time without the condom she'd asked him to use. This action removing a condom is now known as stealthing, and over the past decade has been formally criminalized throughout Australia and much of the western world. In Queensland, this
offense carries a maximum sentence of life in prison. Assange has always denied wrongdoing and said his contact with the women was consensual. He was questioned by local police, but he left Sweden for the UK before he could be charged. Swedish authorities formally arrested him in absentia in September twenty ten. Swedish courts issued a European arrest warrant, and the international policing agency INTERPOL issued a Red Notice, a note to
police around the world indicating a person is wanted for extradition. Assange, by now in London, was arrested by London's Metropolitan Police and remanded in custody, whereupon numerous supporters, including Jemima Kahn, helped him post hundreds of thousands of dollars in bail. British courts issued an extradition warrant, rejecting Assannger's arguments the Swedish prosecution was politically motivated. Assange appealed to Britain's High Court.
His lawyers argued the women had consented to sex, and that his conduct might have been unpleasant, but if committed in London, would not have been a crime. His lawyer ben Emerson case Assange may have seemed disreputable, discourteous, disturbing or even pushing towards the boundaries of what they were comfortable with, but it was not a criminal. He's a voice actor with Ben Emerson Casey's words as spoken in court.
He's speaking about the second woman who says she awoke to find Assange having sex with her without a condom.
She may not have enjoyed the experience, but she clearly consented to it.
The High Court rejected Assange's arguments, ruling Swedish authorities could order his return to Sweden. Assange was defiant.
I have not been charged with any crime in any country. No doubt. There will be many attempts made to try and spin these proceedings as they occur today, but they are merely technical.
While all this was going on, Wiki leaks continued. In twenty eleven, the Walkley Foundation in Australia gave WikiLeaks and Dessange an award for an Outstanding Contribution to Journalism after they published a video showing American forces killing civilians and to Reuter's journalists in Baghdad That sparked a fierce debate. Was this accused rapist and self proclaimed crusader actually the journalist at all? James Madden is the Australian's media editor.
I think it's cut and dried. Actually, Claire, I do not believe what WikiLeaks does can be considered journalism, for the simple fact that journalists have an obligation to the readers and the public to present information in its relevant context.
That is a responsibility that falls upon the shoulders of journalists and media companies and news outlets, and Wikileak's mo has today obtaining documents and publishing them trives of documents at a time, without sifting through these documents to present the information within in journalism form.
Wikiliks prided itself on presenting entire cases of material without editing or redaction. That meant the most sensitive diplomatic communications were suddenly out in the open, including the names of human rights leaders, dissidents, spies, informants, and others who were
secretly dealing with the US in places like Iraq. In twenty ten, human rights organizations including Amnesty International begged WikiLeaks to redact the names of Afghans who were working with the Americans after the Taliban said it was going through the documents on wikiliks to identify and eliminate collaborators.
That information, or that fact Claire doesn't always garner a lot of publicity when defenders of Assange are talking about the merits of his an Wikilik's journalism. But the truth is, professional journalists take extraordinary steps to defend the privacy and by extension the safety of people about whom they're writing, and a lot of consideration goes into presenting information in a responsible way.
Then Assange went into hiding, and unlike most people accused of being sex offenders, he was suddenly hailed as a hero. Assange claimed he was afraid that the Swedish judicial process could end in him being extradited to the United States
over all those classified US documents. In twenty twelve, he sought asylum in the London embassy of Ecuador, a South American republic, and that's where he stayed for seven years in the embassy, refusing to emerge in case he was arrested and sent back to Sweden to face the rape charges. In twenty nineteen, after much legal back and forth, Sweden dropped the charges, saying too much time had expired. Although the women have never recanted their claims, Assange was triumphant.
Seven years without charge. Why my children grew up without them? That is not something that I can.
Forgive yeah children. It later emerged Assange had formed a romance with a Swedish Spanish woman, Stella Morris, and fathered two kids while inside the embassy.
He's not a criminal, He's not a dangerous person. He's a gentle intellectual center and a journalist, and those people are not the people who belong in prison.
In April twenty nineteen, the Ecuadorians revoked his asylum. They said a sanch had been a terrible HouseGuest, abusing staff, hacking into their computer systems, meddling in Ecuador's relationships with other countries, and even leaving the feces of his cat and himself on the floors and walls of the embassy. The Metropolitan Police stormed the embassy and dragged Assange out,
a bizarre scene on the quiet streets of London. As Assian shouted the UK must resist pressure to extradite him, Scotland Yard arrested him for failing to appear in court over the rape allegation. Until now, the US had not moved on Assange at all, but in twenty nineteen, once he was out of the embassy, the Americans finally revealed they did want him. He'd been indicted by a US
grand jury for conspiration to commit computer intrusion. Coming up, how Julian Assange recast himself as not an accused rapist, but a freedom fighter. We'll be back after this break. Belmarsh is the maximum security prison where Julian Assange has been for the past nineteen hundred and one days, just over five years. His family and advocates have complained to Assange's mental and physical health were under desperate strain, so
why was he in jail? Initially, he was sentenced to fifty weeks for breaching bail over the Swedish rape allegations. British prosecutors said he'd illegally entered the embassy to avoid extradition to Sweden. Assange released a statement of apologizing for his conduct. We've used a voice actor.
I apologize unreservedly to those who consider that I have disrespected them by the way I have pursued my case.
This is not what I wanted or intended. In early twenty nineteen, after about a month behind bars, Assange was charged with an additional seventeen counts under the United States Espionage Act relating to hundreds of thousands of leaked classified US documents covering the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. And in twenty twenty.
Julian Assange has been a denied bail by a judge at a London court. The wiki league's founder was hoping to leave prison two days after the same judge rejected a request for extradition to the United States.
The judge that Assange couldn't be trusted to show up in court if he was given bail, and ordered him to remain in Belmarsh while the extradition proceedings played out. Then, in December twenty twenty one, another twist.
Julian Assange is a step closer to being extradited to America after the US government one it's been to overturn a UK court decision.
Assange appealed to the UK Supreme Court and failed. In April twenty twenty two, the US got its wish. A British court has issued an order to extradite Wiki Leagues founder Julian Assange to the United States. If convicted on all charges, Assange faced up to one hundred and seventy five years in an American prison. Just a month ago, another British court granted Assange one last chance to appeal the extradition order, and then on Sunday a deal was announced.
Assange agreed to plead guilty to one charge of espionage conspiring to unlawfully obtain and disseminate classified national defense information. He was released from Bellmarsh and bordered a plane to Saipan in the Northern Mariana Islands, a US Pacific territory, where a judge will handle the formalities. That was also part of the negotiation to avoid Assange setting foot on
the US mainland. The Americans have agreed to drop eighteen espionage charges against Assange and he'll be sentenced to sixty two months in prison, but his time already served in Bellmarsh will be counted. It's expected that after sentencing, he'll leave the Marianas for Australia, his homeland. The Albanese government, which is campaigned for his release, will welcome Assange in
the US. The Biden administration, which continued Donald Trump's pursuit of Massange, will be relieved to see the last of him, and the big question what now for the hacker turned activist who says he's only ever sought to expose the truth. Thanks for joining us for this fresh edit of one of our favorite episodes from the past year. We'll be back with all new episodes on January eleven. In the meantime, check out all the world's best journalism anytime at the Australian dot com dot au