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Global Relations and Legal Policy, Volume 1 (2020)
In the international scenario, Julian Assange sought political asylum at the Ecuadorean embassy in London days after his appeal against extradition to Sweden was rejected. The WikiLeaks founder had been accused of rape and sexual assault of two women in Sweden. However, he is majorly wanted for charges of espionage in the U.S. and his extradition to Sweden would have accelerated the same. There are 18 charges levied against Assange in the United States including the Espionage Act, for conspiracy to gain access into U.S. Military secrets during January 2010 to May 2010 (Sonavane, 2020). Ecuador had clarified that his protection in the Ecuadorian embassy should in no way be deemed as means to interfere or thwart the judicial process. Despite this statement, Ecuador granted him asylum stating he would face human rights violation if he was sent to Sweden (BBC-NEWS, 2012). Ecuador came under the radar of several critics who argued on the irony of Assange seeking asylum in a country especially known for its poor record of free speech. As far as the espionage charges are concerned, it has been argued that Assange’s act was politically motivated. The reason behind it is said to be that he wanted to highlight the human rights violations by the U.S. Military (Perraudin, 2020) in Afghanistan and Iraq. Later, Assange was arrested in London after he was evicted from the Ecuadorian embassy. As of now his lawyers continue to seek asylum in France (Rosman, 2020) stating it to be the “homeland of human rights” and that his extradition would pose a serious threat to the freedom of press and free speech. Another most celebrated case of espionage is that of Edward Snowden. He has been accused of leaking details of secret and extensive U.S. government global surveillance programs in 2013. U.S. since then has declared this whistle-blower as the enemy of state and slapped charges of espionage on him. His actions in 2013 lead to a number of debates that questioned the working of surveillance agencies of the government. Prior to this leak, the general public had been living in the dark since they had no idea about the extent and working of the agencies like National Security Agency (NSA) and its British counter-part Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ). This whole debacle led to the wider use of encryption technology worldwide. So far Snowden has been living in exile in Russia and is eyeing political asylum in France (Cerulus, 2019) and Germany (Die-Welt, 2019). Even the refugees who sheltered Snowden in Hong Kong had been seeking asylum in Canada (BBCNEWS, 2017). 5
Interpretative Comparison of the Past with the Present
The 1891 case of Castioni saw the birth of the theory of political incidence test. However, if the same principle were to be applied to let’s say the ISIS attacks, then these “alleged extremist terrorists/organizations” are nothing but political activists/ heroes. Their clear dissatisfaction with the governments in Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria would sound reasonable and can be easily construed as having a “political character”. The Castioni case provides for a two-fold requirement. One of the requirements is that of a political revolt or disturbance and the second is that the committed act should be incidental to such revolt or disturbance. The murders, tortures and other acts of human rights violations in the ISIS scenario seem to be well justified according to this test. If the ISIS perpetrators were to be ever brought to trial, then the exception of the political offense is a protective tool in the hands of such people. The perpetrators of the Mumbai terrorist attacks shall also be well protected as per this theory. The acts of the alleged terrorists had been in furtherance of their anti-India agenda. This agenda in itself gives their act, the protective layer of it being classified as a political offense. As far as the acts of Julian Assange and Edward Snowden are concerned, their acts of leaking classified and confidential government information do not per se
