‘BRICS surpassing US and Europe in global economic power’ – Julian Assange’s father
John Shipton, father of Wikileaks founder Julian Assange on his arrival to attend the ‘BRICS Summit’ – one of the most striking events of the year which took place in the city of Kazan in the Russian Federation from October 22 to 24 said, “BRICS surpassing US and Europe in global economic power”.
He told media, “BRICS is the rest of the world, manifestly abandoning the United States”, as he highlighted the bloc’s growing global influence.
He pointed out that BRICS represents 45 percent of the world’s population and 34 percent of global GDP, while the G7 lags behind.
Shipton emphasized the importance of industrial growth within BRICS nations, which he views as the foundation of a strong economy.
In contrast, he criticized the West for neglecting industrial development, leading Europe into an “unnatural, unavoidable decline,” though he noted a glimmer of hope for the US due to emerging re-industrialization efforts.
Shipton, founder of Australia’s now-defunct Wikileaks Party, arrived in Moscow on October 19, 2924 at the invitation of the BRICS Journalists Association and its co-chair Mira Terada, a champion defender of human rights.
Commenting on ongoing repression and press and suffocation of freedom of expression in the United States and the West, John Shipton said, “US government subjects American people to unimaginable ‘density of propaganda.
Very few people realize the “density of propaganda” in the United States.He told Sputnik, “The density of propaganda and the willingness of the government and its institutions to delude the people and mislead the people is completely ruthless”.
According to Shipton, the US government actively resists efforts by American people to express their own opinions via social media, with Washington insisting on a “unity of policy”.
As the option of ensuring the populace’s obedience by deploying the military on them is unavailable to a democratic government, Washington employs media to convince people to follow its policies, Shipton says.“This is a really important understanding to understand how a government or in a contemporary state institutes its policies,” he suggests.
Shipton also remarks that “the US government as an empire” understands that “the state is the highest form of human organization” and thus “makes every effort to demoralize institutions of state in those countries that it wants to vassalize.”
“So you can see in the EU is now a contention between the declarations of the EU and those states within the EU”, he remarks.
While people such as Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban or Slovakian Prime Minister Robert Fico strive to maintain the “quality” of their respective states, Brussels attempts to keep them in line by threatening to withhold their own money.
John Shipton, father of Wikileaks founder Julian Assange with BRICS Journalists Association co-chair Mira Terada“The centralized distribution of money for the European Bank, the European Community Bank, ECB, it is all of the state’s money goes into the ECB and then it’s redistributed to those states”, Shipton points out.
“This gives the ECB and the EU enormous power and removes a fundamental power from those states so involved the ability to raise your own money.
If you can’t raise your own money, you cannot improve the quality of your people by directing funds to those areas that will improve those qualities”.
During an interview with Sputnik, Shipton stressed that Russian President Vladimir Putin became “the first head of state to defend Julian’s interests as a publisher and a citizen” in 2012, just as Assange “was receiving every smearing lie and calumny that the institutions of state and those hangers on in the United States, the United Kingdom and Australia could deliver upon his head”.
“Putin defended his interests as a publisher and journalist. For that, I extend my affection to your president. And my thanks”, he said.Shipton says he was “elated” to finally be able to hug his son when the latter was finally released after a lengthy incarceration in a British prison.
Julian Assange is in good health now and is “repairing himself”, with his children “teaching him how to be a parent, as all children do”, Shipton said.
He noted, however, that United Nations rapporteur on torture and unusual punishment, Professor Nils Melzer and two other doctors specializing in psychological torture who together attended Assange while the latter was incarcerated in Belmarsh prison, concluded that Julian “was showing all the effects of prolonged psychological torture”.
Regarding the way Assange’s release was secured, Shipton suggested that it was the “understanding of how power flows between states and between the institutions of states” that helped free Julian.
He also agreed with the assessment of former US independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy who criticized the plea deal Assange had to take, with Kennedy branding it a “big blow to freedom of the press”.
As per the deal Assange pleaded guilty to one charge of conspiracy to obtain and disclose national defense information, and was sentenced to time already served.
“It now has become a worldwide concern of the capacity of ordinary people within the West to access the frank and revealing articles”, Shipton observed.
“We, particularly in Australia, have certain legislation which specifically aims to restrict our access to information and information that will become knowledge within the society specifically aims to restrict”.
The facts revealed through the efforts of Assange and US whistleblower Chelsea Manning gave people “an understanding of how the United States empire institutes itself into the states that it wishes to have as vassals or goes about destroying those states”, Shipton said.
“One of the current understandings is the phrase ‘color revolutions’. This is brought about by NGOs and news agencies, news publishers and journalists being suborned to undermine the cohesion of a state”, he explained.
“So we can see clearly what can be done to a state by controlling the information that people get through a series of color revolutions, which happens next door to Russia in Ukraine and almost happened in Belarus, almost happened in Kazakhstan, almost happened in Georgia and so on”.
Very few people realize the “density of propaganda” in the United States, Shipton added.Shipton also remarked that “the US government as an empire” understands that “the state is the highest form of human organization” and thus “makes every effort to demoralize institutions of state in those countries that it wants to vassalize”.“So you can see in the EU is now a contention between the declarations of the EU and those states within the EU”, he said.
Reality of freedom of speech in the West
While a certain form of freedom of speech does exist in the West, it is a “very limited form”, said international human rights activist and BRICS Journalists Association co-chair Mira Terada.
According to her, “alternative media and journalists and opinion leaders” who dare to challenge the narrative pushed by the West are being persecuted by countries such as the United States.
“It is a terrible trend and it does affect journalism. It does affect the way how information spreads around the world and what kind of information spreads around the world”, Terada lamented.
“But there are still people who stand up for the truth and their idea to put their life for it”.
Commenting on the reason behind Biden administration’s fear, Terada Mira said, the Biden administration fears the truth that media outlets such as Sputnik bring out.
“They are afraid of the influence that this media has around the world. They are afraid that Western propaganda is not working well enough.
They are afraid that they are going to lose those minds and hearts that they filled up with their lies, to Sputnik and to RT.
They’re afraid that they will lose complete control over the people that they need to control in order to get the results that they are looking for”, she said.
Thus, the Biden administration seeks to “suppress the truth” along with any opinions and narratives dissenting from theirs, “because they believe that the only right narrative and the narrative that has the right to exist is theirs, and no others”.
She also urged people to “use critical mind” when absorbing information and to listen to their hearts.
