deja vu
From SMH:
Australia's pandering to the United States takes many forms, including large-scale military misadventures, submissive "cultural" surrender, and protecting to the last dime the sanctity of American global profits.
The US has got one of ours banged up at Guantanamo Bay and another in Parklea prison.
Hew Griffiths has been in prison here for nearly three years for allegedly breaching US copyright law. He has been charged by a grand jury in the US, but the offences alleged against him have never been tested, and the Australian Government has refused to resist an American demand to "surrender" him to face trial before the US District Court in Virginia.
There is no guarantee that the time he has served in prison will be credited against any US sentence, which could be for as long as 10 years.
It all sounds horribly familiar.
...
What is particularly fascinating is that it is possible for Griffiths to be charged with these offences under the Australian Copyright Act. The downloading took place in Australia, and Drink or Die was not an American group - it originated in Finland where it was known as LA, or Lunatic Asylum, with members around the world.
Griffiths has instructed his solicitors that he would plead guilty to offences under our Copyright Act. He has probably already spent more time in prison than any person convicted of a copyright offence in Australia.
After a series of raids by the US Customs Service, about 60 people were arrested in a variety of countries, including 45 in the US and eight in Britain.
All the British were charged under British laws and the US did not push for extradition. Griffiths is the only person, and the only Australian, in the group that the US is pressing to extradite.
It seems the Australian Attorney-General, Philip Ruddock, and his department are only too eager to co-operate. ...
Australia's pandering to the United States takes many forms, including large-scale military misadventures, submissive "cultural" surrender, and protecting to the last dime the sanctity of American global profits.
The US has got one of ours banged up at Guantanamo Bay and another in Parklea prison.
Hew Griffiths has been in prison here for nearly three years for allegedly breaching US copyright law. He has been charged by a grand jury in the US, but the offences alleged against him have never been tested, and the Australian Government has refused to resist an American demand to "surrender" him to face trial before the US District Court in Virginia.
There is no guarantee that the time he has served in prison will be credited against any US sentence, which could be for as long as 10 years.
It all sounds horribly familiar.
...
What is particularly fascinating is that it is possible for Griffiths to be charged with these offences under the Australian Copyright Act. The downloading took place in Australia, and Drink or Die was not an American group - it originated in Finland where it was known as LA, or Lunatic Asylum, with members around the world.
Griffiths has instructed his solicitors that he would plead guilty to offences under our Copyright Act. He has probably already spent more time in prison than any person convicted of a copyright offence in Australia.
After a series of raids by the US Customs Service, about 60 people were arrested in a variety of countries, including 45 in the US and eight in Britain.
All the British were charged under British laws and the US did not push for extradition. Griffiths is the only person, and the only Australian, in the group that the US is pressing to extradite.
It seems the Australian Attorney-General, Philip Ruddock, and his department are only too eager to co-operate. ...