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Yanis Varoufakis Julian Assange

Last night Julian Assange called me. Here is what we talked about | Yanis Varoufakis

24. März 2020

Last night Julian Assange called me. Here is what we talked about | By Yanis Varoufakis


(Aufgrund begrenzter finanzieller und technischer Ressourcen ist dieses Video derzeit nur in englischer Sprache verfügbar.)


This article was originally published on DiEM25.org on the 24th of March 2020. 


Last night, immediately after our first DiEM25 TV event, my phone rang. It was Julian. From prison. It was not that first time that he honoured me deeply by using the few phone calls prison allows him to make to call me. Like every other such occasion, when I unexpectedly recognise his voice a torrent of emotions comes flooding in. Guilt, primarily, at the thought that, the moment the line is disconnected, he will remain there – in the exceedingly dark place to which he has been confined because of a decision he made long ago to help the rest of us grasp what the powers-that-be have been doing on our behalf without our knowledge or consent.

Julian wanted to talk about the effects of Covid-19 on the world we live in and, of course, on his case. He remarked that Jeremy Corbyn’s election manifesto, that the establishment had lambasted for being too radical, now seems unreasonable moderate. We laughed at the audacity of those who were telling the people of Britain that it was irresponsible to spend a few tens billions on providing proper funding to the NHS and social care for all, on turning broadband into a public utility, and on taking the railways into public ownership to make them work properly – the very same people who, now that big business and capitalism more generally, are in serious trouble seem to have discovered the money tree, announcing trillions to be pumped into the economy. Julian did not know (how could he, when the prison authorities deny him access to newspapers, the internet, even to BBC Radio 4?) that Boris Johnson had, earlier yesterday, announced the temporary nationalisation of the railways – seeing that privateers can never provide a decent service in the midst of a national emergency.

After a few minutes during which we allowed ourselves to bask in the neoliberals’ Waterloo, in the hands of some RNA that the system could simply not cope with without abandoning all its certainties, we discussed what this means for the future. Julian said, quite correctly, that this new phase of the crisis is, at the very least, making it clear to us that anything goes – that everything is now possible. To which I added that anything ranges from the best to the worst possible developments. Whether the epidemic helps deliver the good or the most evil society will depend, of course, on us – on whether progressives manage to band together. For if we do not, just like in 2008 we did not, the bankers, the spivs, the oligarchs and the neofascists will prove, again, that they are the ones who know how not to let a good crisis go to waste.

Will we succeed? Julian had a hopeful comment on this: At the very least, transnational organisations like Wikileaks and DiEM25 had honed the digital tools for online debates and campaigns well before Covid-19 came on the scene. In some measure, we are better prepared than others.

Then we talked about his case. His prison conditions are deteriorating. Now that visits have stopped, his isolation is getting worse. His lawyers are about to petition the court for bail. If any prisoner’s health at Belmarsh High Security prison is in jeopardy from Covid-19 infection, it is Julian’s. Will the court grant him bail? Unlikely. Will the new crisis change the odds of his extradition? We agreed that the answer to the last question is: probably, but only a little – now that the national security complex in the US and in the UK have things to worry about that did not feature a few weeks ago.

Our conversation lasted ten minutes and one second. Then the prison warden cut the line. The one man who knows the perils and pains of isolation better than all of us, had emerged from it to give me, us, a ten-minute lesson in how not to lose it while in confinement.

Make no mistake dear reader: Julian is struggling to keep his faculties, not to lose his mind. For hours every day in solitary he fights the darkness and the despair. When he sounds lucid, funny even, on the phone it is so because he has worked for 20 hours in anticipation of the moment when he will have to communicate his side of the story, his thoughts, to the outside world. No one should have to live that way.

And so it is that, now that we are all in some state of isolation, Julian’s plight – as well as insights – must give us pause, and cause, to discover in ourselves the power, and the solidarity, necessary to ensure that this crisis is not wasted – that the inane and corrupt powers-that-be do not end up, once again, the beneficiaries.


Note: All opinions expressed are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect the editorial position of acTVsm Munich.


VIDEO SUGGESTION 1: Wikileaks Chief Editor, Yanis Varoufakis & Richard Gizbert speak out for Assange & Press Freedom


VIDEO SUGGESTION 2: Julian Assange Global Protest with Roger Waters, Vivienne Westwood, Varoufakis, Brian Eno & more!


ABOUT YANIS VAROUFAKIS & DiEM25

Yanis Varoufakis & DiEM25Yanis Varoufakis is a professor of Economic Theory at the University of Athens, former finance minister of Greece and founder of the Democracy in Europe Movement 2025 (DiEM25). Varoufakis is also the author of several books on the European debt crisis, the financial imbalance in the world and game theory.
DiEM25 is a pan-European, cross-border movement of democrats that is focused on addressing the economic and social problems faced by Europe today. It provides an alternative to austerity policies that it  argues are dividing the continent and fueling the rise of “international nationalists“.

Citation of Thumbnail: Julian Assange


 


12 Antworten auf „Last night Julian Assange called me. Here is what we talked about | Yanis Varoufakis“

I hope Assange knows that Chelsea Manning is free for the time being.
I hope his lawyers can arrange bail for him very soon.
The situation he is in is beyond cruel and I worry for his father.
If there’s a God, please help Julian stay strong somehow.

Thank you for sharing with us, even though it does not make all the sadness I feel for Julian so isolated for so long, but it is somewhat comforting. With the corrupt and genocide government we have now in Brazil, it makes it hard to believe in humanity. But we must struggle and hope that the good wins and rebuilds this world in a more just manner.

Thank you so much for sharing Jullian’s Message. His an Amaisin Person and so Strong that the Strenth he has Shown through all of this. I Really hope that Julian Assange comes through this and set Free. Is what he needs as well as Deserved his poor family have been put through this also. We’re is the Empathy for him in a place like that!! And he’s barely hanging on under the Stress and Strain of it all with Nothing!! I’m Sure that God is Giving him the Strenth through this and we hope that Julian Assange is Set Free. We can only Pray for him Now. In Love and Light will always Conquer.

God Bless You and Keep You Well Julian. It is a travesty that you have been jailed for journalism, for revealing the truth, when so many politicians are not jailed for their lies and crimes.

Thank you Yanis.
Thank you Julian.
Julian please hold strong , You are in a place beyond anyones comprehension. We are in the dark without your input, People need you , Next generation needs you , I need You

Thanks for sharing it

Unfortunately, this war is over. What we have now is what we always had. They planned, they organised and they executed while most of us are drinking, partying and so on.
People don’t want honest system, people want money. In general we are morally corrupted.
Like Assange, many heroes before him, will die and will be forgotten. May be some will remember him in few years time when a teenager wears a t-shirt with his name or picture on it.
Sorry guys, they have the guns and we don’t even have the numbers anymore.
That is what I think tough I still believe in doing good for humanity.

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