 Hello, and good evening, and welcome to this public meeting for the Recording in Progress for this public meeting for the Don't Extradite Assange campaign. Thanks all for being here wherever you are in the world. We're going to open with Kristen from WikiLeaks and John from the campaign, who will give us their reflections on what this news about the Supreme Court on Monday means and a bit of an explainer. And then we'll just open it up for discussion with you all your questions. There's a lot of questions. So perhaps Kristen you can start us off. Can you explain what is what is what are these latest developments? Well what happened on Monday was that the High Court decided to that they would agree on one question to be passed on to the Supreme Court in the Assange case. Formerly they objected to the appeal to the Supreme Court, but that's a formality. Of course they wouldn't say that their own decision was wrong and needed further scrutiny. But importantly they decided that one question might be of interest to the Supreme Court and it might be a case to put it there for a second opinion. Now it's a very important question. It is the question whether it was permissible for the Americans to present the so-called assurances in the appeal process, which were absent in the Magistrate Court. And these so-called assurances of course were the basis of the finding of the appeal court to overturn the Magistrate Court decision and allow the extradition. Now so it's a very important question for the Supreme Court to scrutinize. From a layman's perspective it seems absolutely absurd that a party who loses a case in the lower court is allowed to present such evidence or arguments in the appeal process, which is a totally new thing, which was never discussed in the lower court. But it looks absurd that they are allowed to do that. But even the High Court in its decision and the overturning of Judge Barrager's ruling were commenting that actually Barrager should have pointed out to the Americans that they should have amended their case in the lower court. How on earth can that be a sensible and a fair thing to demand of a judge to allow or even encourage one party to change the way that they present the case? Now let's go into these assurances for those who are not familiar with it. These are assurances that the Americans came up with after they lost the case that they would treat Julian Fairly in United States prisons once he was extradited to the United States. They said that he would get proper medical attention, that he would not be housed in a specific supermax prison in Florence, Colorado. That he would not be placed under so-called SAMS, which is an acronym for Special Administrative Measures, which means torture in layman's term. It means a total isolation, solitary confinement basically, and that he would be able to serve his time if and when sentenced in Australia. Now all of these arguments are inherently in themselves, no arguments at all to amend their case. There are a lot of prisons that are just as bad as supermax in Florence, Colorado. Those SAMS is just one sort of tool that the US prison system has to keep people in total isolation under solitary confinement. There are tens of thousands of prisoners in the United States under solitary confinement. Only a small fraction are under those SAMS, so they do have other means. In terms of this offer to serve a sentence in Australia, it does not of course take into effect that in pre-trial, which could be two or three years, Julian would be under solitary confinement in a prison in the US. And it is technically not possible to ask for a transfer to serve in another country until you have exhausted all your options legally in a country for appeals. So that would mean that Julian would have to sit in a prison in the United States for maybe 10, 15 years before he could ask for such a thing. And on top of all this, the Americans actually put into those assurances a clause where they retain the right to change their mind and withdraw this at any given point for whatever reason they deemed was appropriate. So it's not worth anything, these assurances. They are not worth anything that has been deemed by everybody who has looked into the details of the assurances, unless the international basically has said this is not worth the papers written on, these diplomatic assurances so called. So it's two things, one, inherently this is meaningless papers and secondly it's very critical they were allowed to present it into the proceedings. So, so naturally this is the very important thing to be discussed in the Supreme Court. So if you had any faith in the legal process, you would expect the Supreme Court to rule that of course this was not permissible. This is not worth anything. This is totally changes the case. But unfortunately, I would have to say that my belief in the UK justice system has become very limited given the experience and my experience in the UK courtrooms over the last years. So I would not be too hopeful of the outcome there, but it's a small victory that the High Court at least acknowledged this was something that possibly needed more scrutiny, but I have to be very cynical when it comes to any hopes in that this means that Julian will walk free. And let's not forget that it will take quite a bit of time for the Supreme Court to decide whether they actually will hear the case. That is not a given fact. And on Monday I heard of another case where actually a person had to wait four months for an answer to the question will the Supreme Court take up the case. So another four months with Julian sitting in Belmont's prison. So what could happen? It could happen then in three or four months the Supreme Court said, yes, we will hear this case. You can present this in a courtroom in three or four months, then they will take three and three to four months to deliver it. So this means another year, another year for Julian in prison. Which means basically for me to see this as an extension of the torturous process, which obviously is being handed towards Julian. This is punishment by process. So this is the situation legally as we are in now. But my reflection of the entire thing, this entire saga, is this what has been shown, I think in certain terms, is that this is not a legal question we're dealing with. This is not to do with the law at all or a normal legal process. The political aspect of this case has been sort of brought to the surface through the procedure, through the anomalies that are obvious in every state of this case. So that is the bitter reality of it and more and more people are seeing this as a reality and more and more people are coming on board supporting Julian because of this. There is no fairness. There is no justice in this process. Thank you. So thanks for explaining what the latest means, a bit from a legal point of view. John, do you want to give us a sense of what this means in terms of campaigning and politically? Obviously this is dragging out, but it is a bit of a win. How do you see this? I mean, this is an amazing audience as always from so many different countries, time for Sydney, LA, Finland, Chile, Mexico, you name it, New York. So what does it mean in terms of everyone who's campaigning around the world? What does this mean, do you think? Well, I think there's one very important sort of campaigning aspect of this decision that we should pay attention to and that's this. We've always said right from the very beginning that this was a political trial, that it wasn't a normal legal case, it wasn't a normal criminal case in any sense whatsoever. And this whole business of diplomatic assurances underlines that it isn't normal for a sovereign state to interfere or to intervene in the judicial proceedings in another sovereign state with a diplomatic note, which explains after the ruling has been given that we didn't mean that. And this is to reassure you that we're going to behave completely differently than we said we were going to behave during the actual trial. What that is in straightforward language is the United States relying on its so-called special relationship with the UK and with the UK political system to insist that its word after the fact must be taken into account. And the judgment reversed. That's what that means. It says, you know, you guys, you know, this court in England, you can't possibly say that the United States isn't acting in good faith, that it's not a reputable government that you must take seriously and therefore you've got to believe these assurances. That's the pitch. That's the politics of what's going on. Now the fact that there is politics going on demonstrates that we're not in a normal legal proceedings. We're in a political offensive against the free press and to make an example out of Julian Assange so that a free press can't operate any longer. And this method of dealing with it, both the accusations themselves, of course, the whole framing of the trial, but this intervention in that process makes it absolutely clear that if, for instance, this part of the judgment is finally upheld, it will be upheld because the United States politically, the United States government politically intervene in this process to reverse a judgment which had gone against them. And, you know, not surprisingly, perhaps senior members of the British judiciary didn't turn around and say, oh, come on guys, you know, you're having a laugh here. We don't trust your assurances. We don't agree that you even delivered them in a timely and legitimate fashion. So that's question. I mean, so it's good that that question is going to the Supreme Court and that's a good thing to be campaigning on to say this proves it was political. They're intervening to move the goalpost after the judgment because they didn't like the judgment. The Supreme Court should chuck it out. And that's, you know, that's a strong argument for campaigners, for campaigners to take up. Okay, thank you. So, feel free to pop questions in because we're going to have a bit of a, you know, a meeting discussion format. We know some folks had been asking previously about the issue of bail. Can somebody speak to that please about what are the, what is the bail, you know, situation, the odds of tuning getting bail. We have a bail application has been set forth and has been denied previously. So this is in the hand of the lawyer what they and Julian think is tactically right to do in this scenario. I am certain that this is being considered now again, given the new sort of timeline that we are facing in terms of seeing this going possibly to the Supreme Court and I hopefully likely it will. You know, this is, this is something that I would not like to go into in details, because the decision on that matter is Julian's decision in with his lawyers. But I can assure people that because I've heard many being surprised this has not been done already. It, I understand very well the reason why it wasn't feasible to do it until we had this decision. But I, we should hear something about that, that scenario. It's a slim possibility that, that he would be freed. I don't believe that, given the past history that that he will be allowed out on bail. But it is, it has crossed all the, the red lines that have been set out by human rights organizations. So it is certainly a scenario that has is being followed and looked into in very in details I can assure people that when you cross the threshold of staying in locked in as an innocent person under any circumstances for more than 1000 days. As in the case of Julian, he is a remand prisoner. It's very important to, to keep that in mind. You are crossing a line which is condemned in other countries and seriously condemned. And the European Court of Human Rights have taken up similar cases on the basis that this is absolutely unacceptable to keep somebody on inside waiting at this issue in the courts for so long. For 1000 days, it's, it's, it's, it's a, it's a tortures situation as everybody could understand. I want to add a little bit to the assurances which came to my mind today, actually, I was reflecting back about all the, all the abnormalities and the handling of Julian's case from the beginning and it's been now more than a decade. I don't know how far back people remember this, but Sweden was asking, wanting him extradited to Sweden for questioning, where he was never charged and the case was eventually dropped. Julian's lawyer were asking the Swedish executive whether they could give diplomatic assurances that he would not be extradited onward to America. The Swedes said that that is totally impossible. States do not make assurances like that. You, you can't even ask that we can't intervene in processes in that matter. And it's off the table totally. When I was asking this, I was talking directly, well through the media to the politicians in Sweden, we're not asking you to intervene in a judicial process. We're asking for a political statement in Sweden saying that of course we would never extradite an individual, a publisher to a country to face trial for the simple work of doing journalism. Please say that, that's assurances, those are assurances, but no, wouldn't, wouldn't, wouldn't even consider it. So now 10 years on, the High Court in London is taking a piece of paper with meaningless assurances and reversing the decision on the basis of that. I mean, how absurd this entire saga is. It isn't about the law at all. And as John was saying earlier, so many endless twists and turns in the process. You know, it's hard to keep up and remember, as you say, you know, no assurances when they're needed from Sweden, but now, yeah. Okay, there's a question that's come up from a few people. I see Magnus, Michael Seymour, someone else also raised this. And I think the gist of it is the appeal is sort of on this narrow scope of assurances in the Supreme, hopefully in the Supreme Court, but what are the options of appealing on them on the real substance of the cases? Will there be an opportunity for that? Let's just say hi to Deeper Driver. I'm sure many of you know Deeper is is an official legal observer for the case. So Deeper, we're just asking this question about, you know, hopefully they'll be on appeal in the Supreme Court on this issues of the introduction of assurances. But what about the more substantive points in the case? You know, political persecution and extradition and freedom of press, all those issues. Will there be an opportunity for Julian to appeal on those points a few people are asking? And I think somebody has pointed to a response maybe Stella has made on this, but it would be great to hear if you will have thoughts on that. Well, I mean, the simple answer is this, if the Supreme Court upholds the decision of the appeal court and decides that Julian should be extradited, the case goes formally to the Minister of Interior to sign that off. But at that point, maybe in a year time, Julian's lawyer can actually appeal that decision on their terms. Remember that the appeal process earlier were on the narrow points that the Americas lost on the questions of Julian's health and suicide risk and the prison conditions in the United States. So in the appeal process, there was never any discussion about the actual merits of the case, the violations against Julian's rights in the process, the spying on his lawyers. The fact that one of the key witnesses in the American case has withdrawn the testimony and so blown a hole in the important points in the indictment against Julian, et cetera, et cetera. There are so many issues that you could then discuss. And as somebody pointed out, maybe this was a tactical way in the lower court to basically side with the American on all arguments, but not extradite on the basis of health consideration and prison conditions, thereby avoiding the big questions being debated in an appeal court, or at least delaying that. So there is a possibility of another round in an appeal process, maybe a year down the road. So we might be talking about another year. So it is a possibility the fight is not over, but it's a fight, I must say, which is being fought while Julian is sitting in this horrible condition in Belmas, punishment by process. Yeah. I was going to say, I hope you can hear me, I'm sorry. So I think one of the things that people have to recognize is that throughout this case, it is, it has always been that unlike it in any other reasonable court process where you would have to prove beyond reasonable doubt that somebody is guilty, or prove on the balance of probabilities that somebody is guilty. There is no extradition law. And in particular in relation in given the US UK extradition treaty. There is a presumption that Julian will be extradited. And so at the initial stage, it was his lawyers trying to make the case that there are some reasons why he should not be extradited which is to the various bars to extradition. So he was extradited and framed the conversation initially in the form of those bars. What gets discussed is the subjects around those bars it doesn't come back to the basic issues, which are of democracy journalism free press free speech, although the lawyers have done a fantastic job trying to bring those factors in through other ways. I think the next thing to understand is that this is this case is not one where justice will prevail through the court process. So here we have a magistrate who who's a presiding magistrate who has serious conflicts of interest, Lady MR but not her husband has relationships with the intelligence services. Her son runs a company that shuts down places like WikiLeaks. She herself has accepted hospitality from the FCO and others. And so there are serious concerns about judicial impartiality. Not even at the stage of MR but not but even at the stage of Judge Snow and Taylor where they say things like, oh, he's a narcissist after he has said his name and said he's not guilty. So the judicial processes seems to me to be extremely biased against this individual. It's a little bit like Guantanamo. They pretend that something is outside the scope of the law, as in Guantanamo and here with the extradition law they do it through a slightly better facade they pretend that because of the treaty, it's outside the law, even though the treaty has an exception for political prisoners. They pretend that what he's done is, oh, it's not just espionage, i.e. publishing, but it is also this conspiracy to commit computer intrusion and anybody who's looked at the details of that charge can see very clearly that that conspiracy a. wasn't successful, b. was not related. You cannot prove that he was the person at the other end, c. that are, you know, I won't go into the detail because before everybody but the very at a very high level. They are trying to pretend that something is a legitimate process where it is. And then they are going to try and use that illegitimacy through the structures. So, the only way Julian's case will be heard is a through us communicating to lots of people, what's really going on through webinars like this, through people writing to their MPs through communications like John does John Reister's through through public events, through talking to your neighbors and friends and your community groups and your trade unions. And if you're expecting justice in the British courts, it will have to be fought for really hard outside the court, as well as inside the court. Inside the court, we have an A steam. What we need is lots of pressure outside the court, which is political and serious pressure. Thank you. Also thanks to the folks and veterans for peace in the US who are saying they'd like to do a renewed campaign on dropping the charges in the US and you know want to push that so that sounds wonderful. Just point any Americans to that. Thank you for the code pink person. A couple of people are obviously asking on Julian's health. Doctors for Assange were concerned about the diagnosis of a mini stroke. So what what what is the latest on that and then also folks are asking, you know, given his health issues are their grounds for any transfer to a slightly less, you know, brutal prison. Julian, of course, his health is waning and nobody should be surprised, giving the circumstances of sitting in Belmers prison. The, the minister was a huge warning. It does not have a lasting impact when you intervene with with medication. But to suffer that is often an indication that a full stroke could happen. And that is, of course, the situation that we are really worried about. We are worried about his health and his health is is is not good, but he is a very determined and strong person. He is still holding it in there, but we are worried transfer to another institution that has not been seen as a possibility. And actually the prison authorities have been maintaining that Belmars is a better place than others in the UK. So I don't, I don't know if there's any possibility there. But I mean, this cannot go on forever. I would be seriously personally worried if if he would have to sit there in for a much longer. That is just my personal opinion. But his life is in danger. That is just a certain thing we can for obvious reasons. I think there are a few things. Firstly, Julian should not be in any prison, low security, high security or otherwise. Secondly, I think we have at least for the people who are not in the UK that most of the British prisons are extremely Victorian badly, badly with bad upkeep. So for example, last year, for several months Julian was left in the cold because there was no heating in the prison. And he was not allowed his warm clothing from the basement because there was some excuse made about needing to sign some paperwork and because it was COVID there was the paperwork wasn't there is what I was told. But if you look at Craig Murray's imprisonment in Stockton prison in Edinburgh, and you look at other good people who have been in various prisons around the UK. It's all much of a muchness. What we need to focus on is getting Julian out for good. And at the end of the day we have to realize that although Julian may be extremely resilient and extremely strong. And he's also a human being and he has nobody knows the long term effects of torture on the body. We know that Julian's body is already taken a beating the mini stroke is an indication of that. But he's had other problems while in the embassy. He had this tooth, which needed a root canal and was not given treatment for seven years can imagine living like that. Similarly, you know he had a shoulder injury which means that he's still having an arm impairment, because that was never dealt with, and the British wouldn't allow him to leave. So if you expect this state to move him to a slightly nicer comfy prison, when they're not willing to grant him Bill and not willing to grant him basic rights in Belmarsh, then I think that's a little bit of an optimistic expectation. Right now, the focus has to be on getting him out under any conditions. I think we lost the deepest frozen so I'm going to do it is definitely carry on a galaxy or others, but Julian is still here and we have to do what it takes to get him out now while he's still alive and well, relatively well. Thanks deeper. Back to the sort of political angle on the case Stephanie asks, what is the veracity of politicians who say we won't talk about this case as it's as it's before the court. I thought this was a rule they had to follow but there are plenty of politicians who are talking about it. That's something who would like to take that. Well, it is. Well, there are some restrictions on what you can say about court cases but the politicians use it as an excuse. And neither would it be very enlightening to have your average MP carry on about the details of the legal case, despite the fact that quite a few of them are lawyers. What we're asking for is comment on the political issues. What we're asking them to do is to is to raise the issue of whether or not a journalist should be treated like a spy. And this started out as being a case about Julian Assange, the use of the United States Espionage Act against Julian Assange. The very, the very thing that Mike Pompeo when he was head of the CIA said about WikiLeaks that it's a hostile non state intelligence agency. That is now being written in to the new draft of the Official Secrets Act in Britain. In other words, what started out as an issue of Julian Assange is now going to become an issue for every single journalist in a new Official Secrets Act, which seeks to treat them all as if when they do things that the government doesn't like they are actually the agents of a foreign power. So we always said that this would bleed in to the political culture and it is doing so visibly and palpably. And therefore the politicians really need to understand that this is not some arcane legal argument. It's not something where they're required to comment on a judicial process, which is ongoing. They're required to say something about the erosion of press freedom, about the erosion of freedom of speech. And quite frankly, if you're a politician that can't find it in yourself to say something about this issue, perhaps another job in Sainsbury's should be beckoning. Somebody who's pointing out here, Christine, I think, is that these American politicians have not been shying away from commenting on Julian Assange in a negative way, but they keep rather silent on the broader issue. But things are changing. And we are of course seeing group of parliamentarians, cross political groups, party political groups in many countries now coming together, understanding the importance of the issue, and campaigning with us against the case against Julian, and the demand is drop this case. This is growing in many countries, and we see more and more people willing to speak out. Even, I mean, the former prime minister and foreign minister of Norway, Torne Järgland, who was a member of the Nobel Prize Committee, spoke out. So, statesmen are starting to speak out. We are getting more and more input from those circles. What is needed now is for political leaders in other countries to show that they do oppose this treatment. They don't have to do it for Julian Perse, but for on the basis of the principle, which should be obvious to everybody and dozens of human rights organizations, free speech organizations are now seeing that and speaking out very forcefully against the case and urging the Biden administration to drop the case. Public support is big and people do care about this. In the United States, even though more people want to measure that according to a new, you got poll in the US, then having the case dropped, there is a substantial portion of people in the US who are against this and are urging their president or the administration to drop the case. Surprisingly big portion actually giving the fact that the media in the US, the mainstream media has been extremely negative in its entire approach. And actually the UK and the US media do stand out in their sort of negative reporting on Julian, but it is changing. This is changing day by day and the more information that people are getting, the more informed they are, the more they care about the essence of the case. Strangely actually, which is came out in this you go Paul is the fact that support for Julian's extradition is stronger among Democrats than Republicans, which was, I find surprising, giving the fact that we are talking about an indictment which revealed war crimes and dirty secrets of Republican administration, which was hailed by the liberal establishment at the time. But now, Democrats are more leaning towards wanting a measure that it than Republicans. So it shows, I think, the effect of the failings of the media environment in that country. But things are changing. And people are basically giving the mainstream media signal. They are going elsewhere for the reporting. And in the end, they will get it. They cannot continue on the path that they have been on with their very skewed reporting throughout the years. Thank you, Deepa. You wanted to jump in. Yeah, one of the things I wanted to say is, if you look at Australia, the Deputy Prime Minister Barnaby Joyce has already come out in support of Julian. If you look at Greece, political prisoners who suffered during the Greek, etc. They've come out in support of Julian. Similarly, in Italy, in France, in Germany, we've had a coalition of politicians coming out to support Julian. And here in Britain, we have had, you know, Jeremy Corbyn speaking from the floor at SOAS and elsewhere saying, you know, the person who is the people's minister essentially saying that Julian should be free. So there is political will. You talked about why aren't they talking in Parliament. And I think the answer is that we need to put more pressure that we care about them bringing this up in Parliament and we need to find ways to introduce maybe the subjects if these people are uncomfortable with Julian. So things like press freedom, things like democracy into the debates at Parliament. I think there is a broader question to be asked about, you know, why are we, we are all, of course, we are talking about Don't Exit I DeSange, that at the end of the day, we need to talk about what we can stick and a nice way of talking to people is explaining to them what Julian did that matters. And if you're on Twitter, use the hashtag why are science matters and put in information about loads of things. Most people feel very nervous to talk about the case because it's gone on for 13 years, and I'm like Kristen, they don't know the detail. There's a one page brief that I'm hoping Don't Exit I DeSange will put in the chat that people can use to breathe people who who are too ashamed to say I don't know enough about the case or have been paying attention but didn't want courageous enough to speak up and our courage is contagious as Julian has said so we need to get other people to speak and we do that by speaking up ourselves. On that subject, by the way, I mean, some of you will have seen but but it should be more widely publicized. Julian has just won a major anti corruption organization award in in in France and that stuff is is is worth publicizing far and wide because it puts him back in the category of campaigning journalist, which is what he is not a spy, not a prisoner, but a campaigning journalist and that's, you know, just one example recently there are, there are, there are many that the truth of the matter is actually at the moment that the majority of the print media in the United Kingdom are supportive of Julian Assange. That is now a fact. It's the Guardian editorial line. We can all go into the history of what the Guardian did wrong. But as of now it is the Guardian's editorial line to stop the exhibition of Julian Assange. It's the telegraphs editorial line. It is the position of the Sunday Mail and the Mail. This is now being mirrored in the express in the in the in the mirror. So those are very considerable mainstream print papers that now have a neutral or sympathetic and supportive position towards Julian Assange and and and campaigners need to take this on board because it's our success. That didn't happen because they had some kind of a damascene conversion on the way down Fleet Street or something that happened because people outside the mainstream media kept putting the argument and in the end it so coalesced with the facts as were presented that it's become more and more convincing. I know Stella Morris was on the BBC being interviewed by Sarah Montague. Now those of you who still compare to listen to the day program will know that this is flagship core BBC journalism. Sarah Montague is actually a member of the aristocracy, a lady in her own right. She's deeply attached to the British establishment. It was a neutral interview. Now that's as good as you get from the core of the BBC. So we're winning this argument. And we're winning this argument because we're concentrating on the most important things about it about not extra dieting and about what's wrong with the case about why journalism is important. And this case is so long and so complex. There are so many issues that we've discussed tonight attached to it that the art here for campaigners is not complexity. Complexity comes with the territory. The art here in campaigning is simplicity is boiling this down to clear simple ideas which millions of people who are still undecided when they hear them will be convinced. John is absolutely right. This is not a complex case in its essence and it shouldn't be. It is simply about journalism and about the vendetta to against a journalist for exposing the truth. The complexity is the tool of the opposition. That is the opposition that is trying to muddy the water. And I often feel that that I am doing injustice to Julian when I'm actually going to the legal details of the matter because at the end of the day, that doesn't really matter. It is not about the book of the law. It's a political case as Deepa said, as John said, this is about politics and it will, in my mind at the end of the day, only be resolved through political measure and through the pressure of the general public who should be outraged and are outraged at what is going on. Beautifully said. Actually, the other day I was speaking to some Brazilians who were sort of brainstorming about how to help and they'd been involved in the campaign to free Lula, the former president of Brazil, and they were saying the same thing. They were saying, look, we're not going to win this campaign by trying to get everyone educated on every twist and turn in the legal case. It's just too complicated. There's no way to follow it all. You know, this is over a decade. It's as you've all said, it's going to be one on politics on campaigning and on simplicity. So I think you've all said that really well. I just love to give a shout out to was it Karen and Sydney and your group that's standing outside the town hall. And I think again, you know, as John was saying, we've got more support than ever, more mainstream support than ever. I'm going to look forward to listening to Stella on the BBC. A few people are mentioning UN special repertoire on torture Nils. I always mess up his name Nils Melzner. And he has a book coming out. Is it in February? Does anyone want to speak to that? I was just going to say, yes, it is coming out and we're working with the publishers for so about doing public events around that in this in this country. So yeah, I've got an advanced copy of the book. It looks absolutely fantastic. Important moment in the important campaigning tool. Wonderful. And you, John, I think have spoken so well about how Nils has done a really beautiful job in encouraging people to kind of, you know, just welcoming people to evolve their position. You know, he evolved his position. I think was it Rebecca at reporters without borders evolved her position and just sort of welcoming people on the journey, you know, being a really inclusive movement. And he wrote a beautiful piece about how he went on that journey himself. And I think there's a lot to be learned there. Sorry, Deepa, were you going to say something? I was just going to say that Nils's book is now, but if you order via Verso you will get a copy at home now because I've got my copy. And it's really worth reading the book because Nils is honest about various things which people feel really uncomfortable asking questions about certain things but Nils has been extremely honest including about his visit to Belmarsh and what Julian looked like while he was in prison, and about the bigger picture issues. So he's very he has a lot of empathy with Julian but also an understanding of how the broader democratic processes work and how things work in within the system. And I think there's also a lot of knowledge within that book, which I think people will enjoy reading but I would encourage people, if you feel able as a Christmas present or as a birthday present to, and to give those copies of those books to friends and family but also to target them at politicians and journalists who might not have picked up the book otherwise, but might be drawn in by Nils Nils is writing to try and understand what's going on. There are people who understand because Nils wrote the book as an account because he says in the book that normally a UN special rapporteur will not write a book about a case. And it's not just about this case that he's concerned about he's concerned about the big picture issues when he's writing this book, he's concerned about the fact that Britain and America and Sweden are not engaging in good faith with the US. So if you have friends who work for the UN or for the EU, pass on the book to them and get them to have a look, maybe they will change their mind and the more people we have within the system, who are little subversives who understand what's going on little agents for change, the better for Julian, and the sooner we get him out. Let's ask a question by a friend abroad about the UK Supreme Court and this might be more of a lawyer question and maybe it's more of a stellar question, but they were asking, you know, should activists be trying to get the attention of the Supreme Court in a way, you know, how does the Supreme Court sort of lean, you know, politically. So what are your thoughts there on, you know, when folks are campaigning in terms of their targets. Should they just continue as normal or should they be focusing in any way on the British Supreme Court. Can I just jump in with a quick comment before I mean I'm sure John will give the official campaign line and what John wants people to do, but I think where I've seen other cases. We have to recognize that although judges seem completely removed from us in many ways and come from a different often from a different social class and other things. They do read the papers and they do see the news, and they do. If you have protests and visible signs in places, they do come across them, much as they, they think they're being independent and impartial. So I don't think this is a, this is a mechanism of, you know, putting pressure on the judges or anything else but at least bringing to their attention that people are interested in that we're looking and at every rate of this court process that is one of the reasons that people like me have queued in the early hours to get into court so that judges know that everybody is looking at them and that forces over time. There is some amount of change in the way they engage with it because when they can get away with things people tend to lose, you know, put down their guard and do things as the way that is more that is the path of least resistance. And if we make enough resistance for them to think about it that might be useful but sorry to jump in there John. Thank you. It is better to sort of explain the composition of the Supreme Court. I'm not English, I'm not British, but I am told that the Supreme Court is rather conservative as it is with the members who are on the Supreme Court now. So, whether that will have an effect on the outcome remains to be seen, but maybe Johnny will have more details on the individual sitting in the Supreme Court now. Yeah, well I mean just if people don't know the Supreme Court, it's only really been called that comparatively recently. It is in fact the sort of department of the House of Lords. The Law Lords sit in the House of Lords, they're part of it. And of course Britain now has the largest unelected upper chamber in the world apart from the Chinese state. So they're surrounded by and part of embedded in one might say, one of the most conservative parts of the political system. And the way to change, I mean I don't believe kind of personally lobbying whoever turns out to be the judge in the Supreme Court will be particularly effective in fact it might well be kind of productive. But they do have very, very sensitive political antennae. You know when you get to this level, they are essentially politicians. They are legally informed, legally trained politicians, and they are acting in ways which protect the interest of the British establishment. And I think that's how it works. You know, one of the older and one of the better textbooks on the British judiciary, the politics of judiciary by fantastic guy called J.A.G. Griffiths said that the law is politics by other means. And at this level that's absolutely true. So the way to affect them is to affect the political environment in which they're operating. I should never believe that people at this level don't understand what's going on at street level politically. They understand it very, very well. They have it reported to them in considerable detail and with considerable and with considerable analysis. So when we, you know, I was part of organizing the demonstrations against the Iraq war for the stop the war coalition. Of course you all saw the, the press figures the massive underestimates for the numbers that turned out on those demonstrations, but we know for a fact because what the government minister at the time said that the cabinet was receiving independent reports of entirely accurately what the size of those demonstrations was what the mood on them was, and that was affecting their judgment so they get an accurate picture and the press doesn't reproduce it. The politicians get an accurate picture of what protesters and campaigners are doing. So the way to affect the judges is to affect the political environment, essentially to make it more politically painful to go ahead with the extradition than it is to drop it. And if the government and we are now blessed with a spectacularly weak government, you know, Boris is counting the days that he can hang on, and if he goes pretty but tell will go. So it's a vulnerable government. So the more protests we have, and the more focused and effective it is, the more we'll change the political environment in which the judges will make their decisions. Beautifully said, and I think that's a beautiful note to start wrapping things up on. Can I ask for just like some maybe some final, you know, closing comments from, from each of you. And there was a couple of questions I didn't want to ignore around is Julian receiving mail is, is, do we know if he's, you know, reaching any of the letters sent to him or reaching him or not, I don't know if you might know about that. But beyond that, if you'd be kind enough to make some closing comments and a huge thank you for everyone in this meeting. We can see you all organizing and sharing contacts and I know it's all sorts of times all over the world so thank you you are doing amazing work. Yes, if I can answer this yes he's receiving mail. Yes. Closing thoughts. I mean the fight continues and I'm really grateful for the big and growing support we've had. It has had an impact on the will have an impact and it will have an impact on the future of Julian and the future of journalism. So we cannot even we have to try to escalate our work in the coming weeks, because it will come into a pivotal point here. And of course, at the end of the day, this is, this is a question of putting through any means possible, a pressure on the Biden administration to drop the case entirely that of course is the only solution. It's to 40 act addition is one element it will save Julian's life. Yes, we need to take it further and the simplest way is to pressure the American administration to drop the case and to point out it's just unacceptable for his legacy and for the future journalism to have this going on and the scandal that the Biden administration and Biden himself is not intervening directly, and doing the same thing as his predecessor over Obama decided that was not to go ahead with the indictment. The Biden administration is taking over this heritage from the Trump administration. Why on earth are they doing this? Why on earth are they keeping this legacy of Trump and Mike Pompeo going? We know the animosity from from that camp. And I am certain it will get through in the end that they will see that this is not a political legacy that they want to have on their hands. And, you know, there are frequent elections in the US. This is something that matters. They should know that there are consequences on the international level. We need politicians in other countries to speak out forcefully. And we need people all over the world to point out that this has to end. This has to end. Thank you. Deepa, would you like to make any last remarks and then we'll go to John. Thanks. Firstly, I think we have to remember that, you know, 789 Muslim men were tortured, raped, beaten, you know, horrendously treated at Guantanamo. Wikileaks revealed that millions of people have been displaced and killed in the Iraq and Afghan wars. And they have, if we care about, if you're a Democrat and you care about Black Lives Matter, care about the Black lives in the Middle East that have been destroyed by the US foreign policy, care about us knowing the truth about what happened there. If you're somebody who cares about the environment, care about what Wikileaks does and talk to your friends and colleagues about what Wikileaks does and what it revealed about the Trafigura dumps or about, you know, other environmental protections which were being eroded through the Soviet releases and then otherwise talked to people about things that mattered to them, corruption in Kenya where Daniel Arup Mui and others were engaging in corrupt activities, whether it is the Tunisian the revolution in terms of sparking the Arab Spring. Think about all these things and talk to people because those issues might be things that people can relate to even if they can't relate to Julian and do make an effort to speak to even politicians who are useless because at some point they will come to you for your vote. And it is important that when they come to you for your vote, you tell them that a science matters. And even before they come to you to vote, when you're on Twitter, when you're on social media, when they write about when Blinken writes about press freedom, tag him and say what are you talking about press freedom while ratio his tweets and get them to start feeling afraid that if they continue to target Julian, we will continue to target them because that's what Wikileaks was about us surveilling the state, not the state surveilling us, and we have to keep to that and we have to fight. Because only if we fight, we will win. If we give up, we have already lost. So we have to fight now. Thank you. Please. Yes. So, so briefly, just to just to recap what we've been saying in the in the in the discussion. I absolutely agree with with with with deeper we have to, we have to target and try to influence all politicians. And she's right to say target the useless ones because if we just kept it to the good ones it'd be a small job. So do do get on to that. In terms of the case. Here's where we are. There were a number of questions and some people have said in the chat and quite rightly I think some of the most important political questions in this case, which we lost on in the magistrates court decision and had this judgment the recent one to appeal to the Supreme Court gone the other way. That is, had they said no you can't appeal to the Supreme Court, then there would have been a another new appeal launched on all those questions the freedom of press the political expression, the political exemption clause of the extradition treaty, all of those would have been then the subject of a fresh appeal. But because the court decided that we could pursue the argument about the assurances and the United States ability or not to be able to introduce those at a late stage in the whole proceedings after indeed the trial had finished. Then we will pursue those and are going to take that opportunity to pursue them to the Supreme Court if the Supreme Court agrees to hear them, which I think is is likely. Just to clarify that point. This is a student a two stage process the court decision that's just happened was an agreement by the existing High Court judges who ruled against Julian that there was a point of law that could still be further contested, and that we had the right to appeal to the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court now has to say, yes, we agree with that, and we will hear it. So that's what we're waiting for next, probably won't hear it for another 10 weeks. But whatever happens in the courts, whether it's decided finally in the Supreme Court, whether we have to go back to another appeal, whatever happens if there is a bail application or not, whatever happens in the courts happens in a political context, which is not set by the courts, not decided by the lawyers, but is decided by the political process outside the courts, amongst the general public in the press on the social media. And that's where we come in. We, and only we, this isn't something that the lawyers can do. They have their job, they do it well, but they can't do this. They can't affect the general political mood. That's what campaigners do. So, and I say this at every meeting we have with the campaign, it doesn't matter how little you do. There is no such thing as too little. If you're just liking or sharing a Facebook post, that's fine. If you're signing a petition, that's fine. If you're starting a petition, that's better. If you're organizing a meeting, great. If you're advertising a meeting, fantastic. If you're coming on a protest or a picket or down outside the court, that's brilliant too, because all together, those elements make up an effective campaign, all campaigning, all mass campaigning, all the really great campaigns, whether you're talking about CND, or you're talking about the civil rights movement, or you're talking about stop the war, all of those movements are mosaics of small acts taken by individuals, either individually or collectively. That's what we're trying to build in the DEA. That's what all the campaigners around us and you're trying to do, get stuck in, do a little bit more, help a little bit more, publicize a little bit more, and we'll get there. Thanks very much. Thank you so much. This has been a great meeting. And thank you to everyone in this meeting who is doing, who are doing all the things that John has been talking about. So have a good evening, good weekend, and I'm sure we'll be meeting again before too long. Thanks so much. Bye.