Vancouver lawyer Gail Davidson filed a written complaint today (December 4) with Vancouver police and the RCMP against Prime Minister Stephen Harper's former campaign manager, Tom Flanagan.

Davidson alleged that on a November 30 CBC television broadcast, Flanagan "counselled and/or incited the assassination of Julian Assange contrary to the Criminal Code of Canada".

Assange is the founder of Wikileaks, which is releasing 250,000 U.S. diplomatic cables.

On the Power and Politics program hosted by Evan Solomon, Flanagan said: “Well, I think [Julian] Assange should be assassinated, actually. I think Obama should put out a contract and maybe use a drone or something.”

On CBC TV, Tom Flanagan called for the killing of Wikileaks' Julian Assange.

Solmon responded by saying "that's pretty harsh stuff."

Flanagan replied: “Well I’m feeling very manly today.” He added that he wouldn't feel unhappy if Assange "disappeared".

In an interview with the Guardian, Assange suggested that "Mr. Flanagan and the others seriously making these statements should be charged with incitement to commit murder."

Davidson requested that her complaint be investigated promptly by "competent and independent investigators". She wants a report and a copy of the complaint to be referred to an independent prosecutor for the approval of charges.

She also asked that she be kept informed by any officers or prosecutors involved in the case.

"Tom Flanagan has been a close advisor of Stephen Harper, as chronicled in his book, Harper’s Team: Behind the Scenes in the Conservative Rise to Power (2007, second edition 2009)," Davidson wrote in her complaint. "Flanagan managed Harper’s campaign to become leader of the Canadian Alliance party and then of the Conservative party. He managed the Conservative party campaign for the 2006 election and was the communications consultant for the Conservatives during the 2006 election campaign."

Flanagan has also served as Harper's chief of staff, and he is now a professor at the University of Calgary.

"Mr. Flanagan’s statement counselling and inciting the assassination of Julian Assange is directed generally to the public and specifically to President Obama," Davidson alleged in her complaint. "Mr. Flanagan was speaking as a man of authority who is called upon to advise the most powerful people in Canada. It is only reasonable to assume his incitement to assassinate Julian Assange may be acted on."

Davidson, a cofounder of Lawyers Against the War, filed seven criminal charges in Vancouver Provincial Court in 2004 against then-U.S. president George W. Bush. A justice of the peace accepted the charges, but they were later declared a "nullity" by Judge William Kitchen, who made this ruling after clearing his courtroom of the media and anyone else not directly connected to the case.

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