Tonight I received a letter that Fabio wrote and addressed to some English politicians. We reworked it together making it an open letter addressed to those who, in various ways, are involved in the dramatic situation of Julian Assange: to the judges who are carrying out an illegal trial, to the journalists who stay silent and others who “smear” it, to the men and women who have political or public relevance, who shamefully don’t talk about Assange and the atrocious crimes against him. I’m writing as an active citizen of the world, who has been living in the UK for over 15 years, until 2016.

I’m writing to express my shock and disapproval for the way Julian Assange has been brutally tortured and held in a maximum-security prison in London. The “Guantanamo” of the United Kingdom “: the detention camp of Belmarsh.

The United Kingdom is the nation of the Magna Charta Libertatum! The British system will be remembered for having tortured and shortened the life of a true hero of humanity. A man who symbolizes the freedom of the press and the right to be informed of criminal political decisions taken in rooms inaccessible to citizens, by people who want us to know a deceitful reality, filled with manipulations and omissions made by the mainstream media, corrupted and subservient to powerful lobbies.

Julian is a hero who distinguished himself from the masses to “show the king naked!”. A system that promotes universal justice wouldn’t keep a hero in a maximum-security prison, tortured for revealing acts of terrorism carried out by the armed forces of Western countries.

A crime is a crime everywhere, whoever commits it. The collateral murder video shows an American army helicopter attacking unarmed civilians in Iraq, which is a foreign territory to the U.S. This is called “terrorism”! Mainstream media often portray the countries of the Middle East as native places of terrorists but without Assange, we would not know the crimes against unarmed civilians of the self-proclaimed antiterrorism police. We saw Collateral Murder but we don’t know how many other attacks on civilians have been carried out and if they are still ongoing.

So, Britain with its judicial and executive system, covering and operating in support of crimes committed by the United States, is an accomplice to these crimes against humanity.

This is not the first time that the British judicial system has destroyed the lives of innocent people. It happened to the Guildfords and the Mcguires between 1975 and 1976. Innocent citizens illegally imprisoned; subject to all kinds of attacks and brutality for one or two decades! The police who unjustly investigated them, including the police chief and other officers involved, they all went unpunished.

It also happened to six Birmingham Irishmen in the same years. Even then the British judicial system degraded the lives of innocent human beings.

You who decide for the fate of others, how much is your life worth? Is there sufficient financial compensation to compensate 15 years in a cell? Were they younger when they entered the prison than when they got out?

What is the psychological impact on their lives for all the brutality that these innocent men unjustly imprisoned have suffered? For the British judicial system to define attacks on innocent human beings as “acts of terrorism”, how many more lives must be eliminated? How many lives must be degraded? Prejudice defined the outcome of these trials, not evidence like the Iraq footage.

Similarly, another hero, Nelson Mandela, was imprisoned for 27 years for taking a stand against the British, German and Dutch invasion, their domination and brutal crimes against indigenous and South Africa populations.

Be aware that the imprisonment of Assange will not be forgotten and it certainly does not matter how cruelly the British and American “justice” will punish him for his act of heroism towards humanity.

What you did and keep doing to this man will only be good to add another macabre, horrible chapter to the story of US and British imperialist crime. It will encourage the new generations and the ones who know the difference between right and wrong, to be like Julian Assange and Edward Snowden.

Those of us who do not want to play the game and do not want to be deceived by governments and institutions becoming more and more criminal will keep on claiming justice. The political and judicial system that acts arbitrarily and illegally, is obviously a shattered system! The Assange case highlights that mainstream media spreads ineffective and colluding information. The main task of the media should be to inform citizens about significant facts. If the media do not report about terrorist attacks as in the case of the US military helicopter killing civilians, the citizens cannot make conscious decisions and give informed consent, which is the basis of democracy and justice. The Assange case shows that uniforms and obedience do not make men worthy of being defined as such. Not heroes, but simply men and women are those who question the mainstream through concrete actions, defending truth, moral integrity, having the nerve not to stop in the face of threats against our lives.

Global injustice can be perpetrated through a corrupt legal system if we are not able to change the current track. With the Assange case, The United States and the United Kingdom are specifically violating the following human rights:

  • Art.3) The right to live free and safe
  • Art.5) The right not to undergo tortures or cruel, inhuman and mortifying treatments or punishments
  • Art.9) The right not to be subjected to arbitrary arrest, detention or exile
  • Art.10) The right, in a position of full equality, to a fair and public hearing before an independent and neutral court (in this case it is a British and US court!), in order to ascertain one’s rights and obligations and the soundness of any criminal charge brought against someone
  • Art.19) The right of opinion and expression including the right not to be harassed for one’s own opinion and the right of seeking, receiving and spreading information and ideas through every means and without regard to borders

The UK continues to punish him criminally only for having released the truth about facts that were
hidden from citizens to maintain an abusive, criminal and deceptive agenda and public propaganda.

I pray to the judges and to all who have the expertise to do so, to free Julian Assange, a true hero of humanity, and to allow him to be extradited to a safe country in order to live a dignified life, which he earnestly deserves. I ask you to stop the absurd crimes carried on by the US and British “judiciary” system against an innocent man, whose only fault is to have revealed crimes. Just for the sake of information. Just to defend democracy.

Hoping that you will end this horrible chapter of history.

Fabio Laganà and Cristina Mirra

Translation by Roberta Mereu,  from the voluntary Pressenza translation team. We are looking for volunteers!