Live video for mobile from Ustream 11:45 PM EST That is all for now. FDL’s live blog on Assange’s asylum request decision will resume just as Ecuador announces a decision. I’ll refrain from speculating. There won’t be any glib comments as I sign off for the night. I’ll just share this exchange that I had [...]

(update below) The Ecuador foreign minister made a “severe allegation” today during a press conference against the United Kingdom and claimed they had received a “threat” to storm the Ecuador embassy in the UK to force the country to hand over WikiLeaks founder and editor-in-chief Julian Assange, who has applied for political asylum in Ecuador. [...]

Ecuador President Rafael Correa has stated the rumor that WikiLeaks founder and editor-in-chief Julian Assange has been granted asylum is false. Using his Twitter account, he declared, “There is still no decision. I hope Foreign Ministry report.” The “rumor” is the result of officials in Quito, one of whom The Guardian quoted as saying, “Ecuador will grant [...]

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has been in the Ecuadorian embassy in London awaiting a decision from Ecuador on his asylum request for over a month now. Recent headlines suggest Ecuador is going through all the motions a country would need to go through before it granted asylum to someone who had made such a request. [...]

(update below) Julian Assange, editor-in-chief of WikiLeaks, entered the Ecuadorian embassy in the United Kingdom last night and requested political asylum. Ecuador’s foreign minister says the country is now reviewing the request. The decision to seek asylum comes just days after the UK Supreme Court decided to not reopen his appeal against extradition to Sweden [...]

(update below) Killing by remote control, the escalated use of drone warfare in countries, depends on people believing drones do not kill a large number of innocent civilians. It depends on people believing the program is indeed “precise” and rarely kills anybody other than members of al Qaeda and its affiliates or the Taliban. So, there [...]

(update below) The Supreme Court in the United Kingdom issued a much anticipated decision today, ruling Sweden’s request for WikiLeaks founder and editor-in-chief Julian Assange’s extradition was “lawfully made.” By a majority of 5-to-2, the court found the Swedish public prosecutor in the case was in fact a “judicial authority” and held that the European [...]

(photo: Screen shot from BBC News broadcast of Babar Ahmad’s interview) The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) has ruled that five individuals facing terrorism charges, including the radical cleric Abu Hamza, can be extradited to the United States. The ruling by the court in Strasbourg, France, was part of a determination that the human [...]

Numerous complaints about United Kingdom press coverage of WikiLeaks editor-in-chief Julian Assange’s struggle against being extradited to Sweden have been made by Assange. Those complaints were submitted to the Leveson Inquiry, empaneled to examine culture, practices and ethics of the press in the aftermath of the News of the World phone hacking scandal. The complaints [...]

The British press is reporting that ten major human rights and anti-torture organizations have announced they will not be cooperating or participating in the United Kingdom Torture Inquiry, headed by Sir Peter Gibson. The organizations, who sent a letter on August 3 to Sara Carnegie, Solicitor to the Detainee Inquiry, cited a lack of transparency and credibility in the proposed investigation, noting, “Plainly an Inquiry conducted in the way that you describe and in accordance with the Protocol would not comply with Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights.”

A new phase in the struggle for accountability for torture and war crimes is sure to begin.