Posted by John, December 15th, 2010 - under Julian Assange, Wikileaks.

Tags: Demonstrations, Free speech

More demonstrations were held in a number of cities today, demanding the release of Wikileaks founder Julian Assange. It is incredibly positive that in the space of half a week, two rounds of protests have been organised and that people have turned out in decent numbers for both.

Wikileaks has exposed the violence, double-dealing and hypocrisy of our rulers and the system they govern. Assange, still languishing in a British prison, has injured no one.

His only crime is to be the recipient and publisher of cables and files which detail war crimes and lies; expose what diplomats routinely say and do.

Around the country speakers from the Greens, the Media Entertainment and Arts Alliance (Assange’s union), lawyers, journalists, writers and activists addresses crowds ranging from 200 in Adelaide, 600 in Sydney and 1000 in Melbourne.

In Sydney a taste of the violence that the state is using against people the world over – Iraq, Afghanistan, the students in Britain and against both those who leak information and those like Assange who publish it – was on display as police viciously attacked the demonstration.

In the lead up to the rally, police had told organisers that they would not be allowed to march. After negotiations, they then indicated that a march would be permitted. Just hours before the demonstration, police then indicated that they would oppose the entire gathering – even if it were not to march.

Part of the problem, the cops maintained, was that too many police were indisposed; they had half the city on lockdown for Oprah Winfrey, so would be unable to shut down a couple of streets for a free speech march! As one demonstrator noted:

You couldn’t make this shit up! We came to protest against a system which defends the rich and powerful, while treating like criminals those who wish to exercise free speech. What do we encounter? Police defending the rich and powerful, while treating like criminals those who wish to exercise free speech…

But it got worse. The police did find enough staff. As the gathering of peaceful protesters voted to march regardless of police instructions, the cops attempted to surround and stop people moving on. The rally was able to out manoeuvre the cops for a time and marched from Town Hall to the intersection of George and Market Street, where they stopped.

Cops assault a demonstrator in Sydney Without warning, the cops attacked the demo. Witnesses say it wasn’t simply a series of scuffles – they went in hard, punching people in the head and driving people in to the ground face first. Up to 7 were arrested in a five minute blitz. Yet the march was not intimidated, it was defiant in the face of this gross abuse, with people holding their ground and chanting slogans such as: “Who’s streets? Our streets!”, and “This is not a police state; we have the right to demonstrate!”