cods wrote on Jan 11^th, 2013 at 10:12am:


I thought rape was a crime Cods.....Isn't that what he is wanted for in Sweden???

I am sure hacking into computers and releasing classified information is illegal in many jurisdictions Cods.....The fact remains Julian Assange is not in those jurisdictions so we await to see what happens.....If the Yanks want him and get him he will be locked away for some time I expect!!!

... wrote on Jan 11^th, 2013 at 10:33am:


I have no idea.....Assange believes the charges are trumped up and he refuses to face court over the allegations.....Some people think they are important enough to be above the law.....Assange strikes me as someone who thinks he is above the law....He made his bed and now he can lay in it!!!

philperth2010 wrote on Jan 11^th, 2013 at 10:29am:


'rape' is an odd description for a broken condom and a mysterious retraction of consent a year after the act. Everyone smells a rat here. why the massive international pressure to get a single man to another country to face a charge for something that isnt even a crime anywhere else? becaus the USA wants to extradite him.

its not rocket science.

philperth2010 wrote on Jan 11^th, 2013 at 10:39am:




why should he believe its only the British police waiting outside the Embassy and not the yanks as well.?

Sweden rape thats just the red herring..

Will the Outrageous Milne & Rhiannon also support "civil disobedience" when it turns into market exploitation.
Probably, as long as the manipulator says he/she did it to bring down the lackeys of the capitalist system . . .or maybe even just if he/she has a beard:

Whitehaven a siren call for a host of hoaxes

Date January 12, 2013
Peter Ker

Resources reporter


WITH his untamed beard, radical politics and makeshift home in the scrub, Jonathan Moylan shapes as an unlikely participant in the pinstriped world of the sharemarket.

His home of the past six months - a bush campsite about 500 kilometres north-west of Sydney - barely has walls, let alone the sort of high-speed technology that dominates modern share trading.

Yet after the 24-year-old managed to wipe more than $300 million off the sharemarket this week using a hoax press release, many professional investors fear they will soon encounter plenty more of his type.


''Right now, somewhere, is a smart kid sitting in an office, working out how he can do the exact same thing to make a buck, and get away with it,'' says Patrick Trindade, the head of private wealth at Octa Phillip Financial Group.


Trindade's warning neatly illustrates how Moylan did more than shift the share price of Whitehaven Coal with his outrageously effective hoax press release. The anti-coal campaigner spooked an investment community that is well aware of its vulnerability to the sort of market manipulation that has now struck three times in the past six months.

There was agreement that Moylan's hoax - which tricked some investors and media into thinking that Whitehaven had lost a crucial $1.2 billion loan from ANZ Bank - was too damaging to market integrity to be laughed off as a prank.

The hoax sparked a sell-down at about midday on Monday that drove Whitehaven shares down from $3.52 to $3.21 within minutes.

Long after the damage was done, Whitehaven shares were put into a trading halt, and the company subsequently confirmed what the market had already worked out: the press release was a hoax.

Whitehaven shares resumed trading mid-afternoon and quickly recovered most of the lost ground, but the incident left some individual investors nursing losses.

Moylan insists he did not financially gain from his manipulation of the market, saying his motivations lay in highlighting the environmental damage that would occur if ANZ's loan helps Whitehaven to build a new coalmine - as planned - near his camp at Maules Creek.

With similar market hoaxes affecting David Jones and Macmahon Holdings in recent months, one of the nation's most powerful financial executives says there is a growing risk to Australia's reputation abroad.

''As a nation we have to be seen as a place where there is an orderly market in operation or overseas investors will get nervous,'' says Craig Drummond, the Australian head of Bank of America Merrill Lynch.

''We are already battling against a high dollar, which is a risk for overseas investors. That's why the regulators, it would seem, are taking firm action [against Moylan's hoax].

''If our regulators are seen to prevaricate, then overseas investors will have one more reason to be nervous about Australia.''

Amplifying concerns is a fear that similar hoaxes are bound to follow the Whitehaven stunt, and the bourse will be as vulnerable next time as it was to Moylan's antics.

''I don't think we will ever stop this sort of hoax statement. How can you stop someone issuing a press release?'' asks Tony de Govrik, the legal affairs director of the Australian Corporate Lawyers Association.

While there was widespread condemnation of the incident, there is anything but consensus over how best to fight the trend for hoaxes to distort markets.

A QC, David Galbally, has called for deceptive and misleading statements to be made offences under the Crimes Act, on top of their existing coverage under the Corporations Act. He says Federal Police would have more success in pursuing cases than investigators from the Australian Investments and Securities Commission.

Neither de Govrik nor David Horsfield - the chief executive of the Stockbrokers Association of Australia - supports that call. Horsfield says ASIC already has the weapons to deter hoaxers. ''The prevention is in showing people that if market integrity is damaged then there is a severe penalty for it,'' he says. ''It is important for ASIC to come down on the people involved quite hard … If they do that, then that will go a long way to stopping this sort of nonsense.''

ASIC struggled to make contact with Moylan in the 24 hours after the hoax. But by Wednesday an ASIC investigator made an unannounced visit to the Leard Forest camp, seizing the laptop and mobile phone used to make the fake release. Moylan has not been charged, but ASIC's inquiries relate to section 1041E of the Corporations Act, which covers misleading and deceptive statements. It can lead to criminal prosecutions and penalties of up to 10 years's jail or fines of $495,000.

De Govrik - who previously worked as ASX's le