Artists, intellectuals, Nobel Peace Prize and Pulitzer Prize winners, jurists and prosecutors. All joined to speak out for Julian Assange in an international campaign entitled “La mia voce per Assange” (My voice for Assange). From legendary film director Ken Loach to Nobel Peace Prize winners Adolfo Pérez Esquivel and Mairead Maguire, from the Guardian’s Pulitzer Prize winner Ewen MacAskill to the extraordinary Italian actress Laura Morante, popular Italian singer Fiorella Mannoia, renowned Italian prosecutor Armando Spataro, the president of the Italian Union of Journalists (FNSI) Beppe Giulietti, the head of media relations for the Daphne Caruana Galizia Foundation and Daphne’s sister, Corinne Vella, acclaimed U.S. actor John Malkovich, satirist Randy Credico, and renowned human rights lawyer Steven Donziger.
After surviving the Argentinian dictatorship only thanks to those who mobilized behind him, Adolfo Pèrez Esquivel, winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, called on individuals, intellectuals and celebrities to mobilize to save Julian Assange. A committee was established in response to Esquivel’s appeal which includes professor Grazia Tuzi, Armando Spataro, Laura Morante, Vincenzo Vita, Paolo Benvenuti, Daniele Costantini, Flavia Donati, Giuseppe Gaudino. The committee has recorded dozens of videos featuring artists, intellectuals and celebrities speaking out for Julian Assange.
Our newspaper, Il Fatto Quotidiano, publishes some of them here, along with two interviews, one with Italian prosecutor Armando Spataro, who famously nailed the CIA agents responsible for the extraordinary rendition of Milan cleric Abu Omar, and another with Italian actress Laura Morante.
Pulitzer prize winner MacAskill in one of the videos states that he is “ashamed as a British citizen that the UK is complicit in this”, referring to the cooperation the United Kingdom has ensured the United States in its legal prosecution of Julian Assange. And Corinne Vella concludes: “If his [Assange’s] persecution continues, investigative
journalism and press freedom will be compromised. In the end, we will all lose”.
Italian actress Laura Morante: why I care about Assange and WikiLeaks
You grew up in an intellectual and artistic environment, what led you to take an interest in Julian Assange and WikiLeaks?
Ever since I read the news reports about him a few years ago, his detention and his case, I’ve been asking myself: why don’t newspapers report on his case on their front pages, considering how outrageous it is? We live, right now, in a country where you can no longer distinguish information from propaganda. Whenever I read a newspaper, I try to read between the lines, because I no longer understand what is really going on in the world. I continuously have the impression that I’m being manipulated. I think it’s absolutely invaluable that an organization like WikiLeaks exists, which has made enormous efforts, and run immense risks, to inform the public about what has really been going on in the world, about what might be the real, hidden reasons behind certain facts, certain wars. We think we are free, but unless we are informed, freedom is pure illusion. There is no freedom if there is no free information, because if I don’t know what is going on, I vote without knowing who I’m really voting for, I’m under the illusion that I’m choosing, but actually my choice is based on false truths. And so to me saving Julian Assange and WikiLeaks means not only standing by a human being who has been going through a horrifying ordeal for years, but it also means standing up for our freedom.
Hillary Clinton was celebrated on the Venice Film Festival red carpet, yet she voted in favour of the Iraq War. Assange, who revealed war crimes in Iraq, is rotting in the UK’s harshest prison. What responsibility do the cultural élites have in all this?
A huge responsibility. And I can’t say how saddened I have been by the fact that a lot of people in my field – entertainment – have responded to me that the Assange case is controversial. Unfortunately, it must be said that this is in large part due to that documentary [Risk, 2016] by the filmmaker who won [the Leone D’Oro 2022] in Venice.
You’re referring to Laura Poitras, but we should remember that at the Toronto Film Festival she did say that Assange’s extradition would be a serious threat to press freedom.
Yes, I read that she said that, but it’s a little late now. The damage is done. I can’t forgive her that easily. Unfortunately, we are easily influenced. We need to try very hard to keep our critical spirit alive and kicking. For years now I haven’t read a news story in a newspaper without wondering why that news story is there. I always go looking for verification, insofar as I can. I think that’s the only way you can read the news nowadays, because we are a country awash in propaganda. The situation has become truly outrageous! You can’t even get different points of view anymore – never mind critical points of view, but at least more than one point of view. Maybe that’s also why I care so strongly about the Assange and WikiLeaks case. I feel reassured so long as they can keep working without risking 175 years in prison.
Italian prosecutor Armando Spataro: I agree with Ken Loach that the Assange case is a monstrous injustice
What prompted you to join the appeal launched by Nobel Peace Prize laureate Adolfo Pérez Esquivel, to save Julian Assange?
Let me first say– and I can assure you on this point – that I would have joined this appeal even if I had never investigated a case like that of [the kidnapping by the CIA and Italian intelligence] Abu Omar. Like so many leading academics, including Vladimiro Zagrebelsky, have said, in a democracy, the right and duty to inform the public is not a marginal one. Indeed, the right and duty to inform the public is even in the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution and Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Assange has made it possible for the world to know about the tragic acts that were committed in Afghanistan and in Iraq, and the world has a right to know those things. There is no democracy in which state secrecy can be abused to provide impunity not only for the perpetrators of a kidnapping – like the one I dealt with – but also for the perpetrators of crimes against humanity. We need to mobilize, and frankly I must tell you that I find the silence that many major newspapers and media have allowed to fall on this matter incomprehensible. And this is not the first time.
As a man who has been fighting for justice all his life, how do you see the British judges’ decision to extradite a journalist for revealing war crimes, exactly as if he were a drug dealer or a mobster, while at the same time leaving criminals who committed atrocities in Iraq, Afghanistan and Guantanamo go unpunished?
On the last part of your question there is a legal argument to be made: the crimes were not committed in Great Britain. One would need to study whether the British system allows for the punishment of crimes committed abroad. In other countries that is possible. But I think the first part of your question is more important, because it seems to me that a part of British institutions – despite the UK being a place where they have always told us democracy was born – neglect the importance of the duty
to inform the public. Vladimiro Zagrebelsky said that journalists, especially investigative journalists, are called the watchdogs of power, yet in this case it seems they are being told: yes, you are watchdogs, but don’t bark! I find it completely objectionable, unacceptable in every respect, that the [British authorities] would even consider
extraditing Assange, now detained for years, for exercising his duty to inform. That is why I have joined the appeal of Nobel laureate Adolfo Pérez Esquivel and other intellectuals who have joined it. I am honoured to do so, for my deep beliefs about how democracy, all democracies, work.
The renowned film director Ken Loach has called the Assange case “a monstrous injustice.” Do you agree?
Yes. And the more time passes, the more monstrous it becomes, because this man has experienced years of suffering by now. And frankly I can’t imagine how this can’t be called a monstrous injustice.