Topics: Julian Assange;
07:35AM ACST
27 June 2024
Tom Oriti: Senator Simon Birmingham is the Shadow Foreign Affairs Minister who joins us now from our Canberra studio. Senator, good morning. Thanks for your time.
Tom Oriti: Good morning, Tom. Good to be with you.
Tom Oriti: How do you feel as Julian Assange returning home to Australia? A good outcome in your view?
Simon Birmingham: I welcome the end of this very long running saga. Julian Assange was always entitled to Australian consular assistance, even though for a number of years he refused to have that type of assistance. He, of course, has dragged this out a very long time. Some of it of use of legal proceedings that are entirely within his right to use, such as the many, many appeals he undertook in the UK to avoid facing a court in the US. Others, of course, that was a complete dodging of justice, which were the seven years he spent in the Ecuadorian embassy. But ultimately this has been a long running saga. The fact that it’s at an end is welcome. What he does not deserve, though, is the warm embrace or homecoming welcome of Prime Minister Albanese like some type of hero. When in fact what he did yesterday, shortly before being welcomed back to Australia by the Prime Minister, was finally plead guilty to charges under the Espionage Act in a United States court. And it shows little regard for our closest ally to be welcoming home somebody who has just pleaded guilty to such charges.
Tom Oriti: There’s a few things I want to unpack there, but let’s look at that contact with Anthony Albanese first. I mean, with respect, what was wrong with the Prime Minister calling him? He has done his time and there is a significant belief in the community that this had dragged on too long. The US Department of Justice has itself acknowledged he didn’t actually endanger any lives. I mean, wouldn’t it have been a little strange with respect to the Prime Minister if he didn’t get in touch?
Simon Birmingham: No, I think it would have been perfectly normal. People come home to Australia every day, including those who may have encountered criminal proceedings or otherwise overseas, and they don’t get a welcome home call from the Prime Minister of the country.
Tom Oriti: It’s a very different case, though.
Simon Birmingham: It may be a different case, but it’s also a very different case to some of those who have genuinely faced arbitrary detention and were truly political prisoners. Julian Assange is not Cheng Lei, he’s not Sean Turnell, he’s not Kylie Moore-gilbert. He was not held in a Chinese jail or an Iranian jail or a jail in Myanmar against his will, without access to a court, legal representatives or a system of justice. He spent time in a UK prison. He was detained because he had breached bail orders by spending seven years hiding in an Ecuadorian embassy, because he was unwilling to face justice in Sweden. You know, Sweden’s not exactly a despotic regime. They were charges in relation to alleged sexual assaults. Ultimately, he then spent years resisting facing US courts. Again, a very open, transparent legal system. And ultimately, he pleaded guilty to those charges. So no, he is not worthy nor deserving of a welcome home from the Australian Prime Minister. We can all be grateful the saga is over. But that doesn’t mean he deserves to be welcomed like a hero, when in fact what he did was ultimately a criminal act.
Tom Oriti: And there’s a lot of talk, as you say, around talk of heroism and that sort of thing. But you mentioned there, and you’ve gone into the details. You feel as though he dragged the process through. He was dodging a lot of it through the embassy for so long. There are obviously conflicting ideas about this, including from within the Coalition itself. Barnaby Joyce comes to mind. But I don’t know based on what you’re saying. Simon Birmingham, should he have been extradited to the US then? I mean, we spoke to his former lawyer, Geoffrey Robertson, yesterday and I’m paraphrasing, but he said, you know, in his words, the Morrison government didn’t lift a finger on this.
Simon Birmingham: Well, the question of extradition was always a matter for the UK courts to determine. And Julian Assange was always within his rights to both resist that through the legal processes and to appeal it at the many different junctures when the court found he could or should be extradited. You know, ultimately, although in very peculiar circumstances, he did face a US court, did plead guilty to a charge under the United States Espionage Act. And that stands as a fact and, of course, is reflective of the fact that what he did all those years ago was not careful journalism like you or other people in the ABC, or indeed any other responsible media outlet would do. Instead, he simply published around half a million documents and without having read them, curated them, checked to see if there was anything that could be damaging or risking the lives of others in there. He simply dumped them on the internet. That is not journalism and shouldn’t be feted as such.
Tom Oriti: He will seek a pardon from the US government, it seems, and only saying that based on the remarks we heard last night after he touched down in Canberra. I mean, if you were in government, are you saying you wouldn’t support that, seeking a pardon?
Simon Birmingham: Well, I think as Penny Wong has been clear this morning. That’s now a matter for his legal team and their engagement with the US. This was and should have been treated solely as a consular matter by Australia. I have no quibbles with the hard-working staff in the Department of Foreign Affairs who sought to give him consular assistance over the years and indeed made representations into the UK and US legal systems. That is absolutely part of the advocacy that should happen. And were I to have been foreign minister during that time, I would have wanted to make sure that we were protecting his legal rights and indeed seeking to bring a long running saga to an end if there were a way to do so. But my criticism is levelled at Prime Minister Albanese to give him the type of equivalence of treatment of those who were political detainees, those who were in arbitrary detention is just putting him on the wrong plane. Ultimately, this is a controversial figure. He has pleaded guilty to charges in a US court, and he doesn’t deserve the warm embrace of the Australian Prime Minister on his return.
Tom Oriti: I put that to his brother. About half an hour ago. Gabrielle Shipton had a bit of a laugh and said, hang on a minute and this is a quote from Gabrielle Shipton. Hang on. He’s convicted of journalism, in his view, and I appreciate your praise for the work we do at the ABC. A moment ago, Senator. But the reason why I say that is, are you worried about the implications of this guilty verdict in that it could have an impact on the Fourth Estate and broader freedoms of the press?
Simon Birmingham: No. Look, Tom, ultimately, lawyers will argue, of course, over these matters, but I think we have to be very clear and to mount the case that it was a journalistic action, that it was publication by a media outlet would be to suggest that some of the ethics and standards of journalism were met. I don’t think it’s ethical or meeting the standards that you and your colleagues apply to the journalistic profession to publish and be damned, without even knowing the content of information. That’s not journalism, and that is just simply mass reproducing of documents and without even knowing the content of them. And it gives journalists a bad name to argue that somehow what Julian Assange did was at all akin to the type of journalism that we need in the modern age, in an age where indeed, with the type of misinformation and disinformation coming from many different parts of the world, it is more important than ever to stand up for appropriately credible, curated journalism rather than to defend the type of tactics on the internet that ultimately can just potentially feed yet more information or disinformation.
Tom Oriti: Before I let you go just on the Prime Minister, Anthony Albanese has said advocating for Julian Assange, it’s all about helping Australians. And I say that because here at home, another high-profile whistleblower case seemed to play out with a very different commentary. David McBride, former Australian Army lawyer sentenced to five years, eight months for revealing information about alleged Australian war crimes in Afghanistan. It seems like some could make a parallel to that. I mean, what do you make of the Australian Government’s handling of that case compared to that of Julian Assange?
Simon Birmingham: Well, again, each case needs to be treated on its legal merits. I think that case is is one where it’s appropriate for the Attorney-General to address questions about any interaction he has had in those matters. I’m not going to judge that per se. But I think, again, the contrast, if you like, in terms of the Prime Minister not just defending normal advocacy and consular representation but seeking to somehow own the Assange return as some great political outcome, and do so by ringing him personally and engaging with him personally just misses the mark. Prime Minister Albanese should have been more respectful of the feelings in the United States that this man did commit a crime and did endanger the lives of Americans. I don’t think his phone call will have been welcomed by many people there, and indeed, he should have been conscious of potentially the types of parallels that you draw in relation to other cases.
Tom Oriti: Senator, thanks so much for joining us. Appreciate your time.
Simon Birmingham: Thanks, Tom. My pleasure.
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