UPDATE One reason I was so stunned at the Guardian’s publication of these lies is that I had gone direct from the Ecuadorean Embassy to the Guardian building in Kings Cross to give an in-depth but off the record briefing to Euan MacAskill, perhaps their last journalist of real integrity, on the strategy for Julian. I told Euan that Russia was ruled out. I did not mention this yesterday as I greatly respect Euan and wanted to speak to him first. But on phoning the Guardian I find that Euan “retired” the day the lying article was published. That seems a very large coincidence.
I am just back from a family funeral – one of a succession – and a combination of circumstances had left me feeling pretty down lately, and not blogging much. But I have to drag myself to the keyboard to denounce a quite extraordinary set of deliberate lies published in the Guardian about a Russian plot to spring Julian Assange last December.
I was closely involved with Julian and with Fidel Narvaez of the Ecuadorean Embassy at the end of last year in discussing possible future destinations for Julian. It is not only the case that Russia did not figure in those plans, it is a fact that Julian directly ruled out the possibility of going to Russia as undesirable. Fidel Narvaez told the Guardian that there was no truth in their story, but the Guardian has instead chosen to run with “four anonymous sources” – about which sources it tells you no more than that.
I have no idea who the Guardian’s “anonymous sources” are, but I know 100% for certain that the entire story of a Russian plot to extract Julian from the Embassy last Christmas Eve is a complete and utter fabrication. I strongly suspect that, as usual, MI6 tool Luke Harding’s “anonymous sources” are in fact the UK security services, and this piece is entirely black propaganda produced by MI6.
It is very serious indeed when a newspaper like the Guardian prints a tissue of deliberate lies in order to spread fake news on behalf of the security services. I cannot find words eloquent enough to express the depth of my contempt for Harding and Katherine Viner, who have betrayed completely the values of journalism. The aim of the piece is evidently to add a further layer to the fake news of Wikileaks’ (non-existent) relationship to Russia as part of the “Hillary didn’t really lose” narrative. I am, frankly, rather shocked.
Luke Harding. The man who makes things up. The man is a joke.
It could be said that he is STILL writing spy novels. But they appear in the fraudian as fact.
Condolences to you Craig.
The ‘secret services’ are running wild, but its increasingly not a secret.
The CIA and MI6 are basically begging the public to be reigned in: the Cold War ended 3 decades ago and Islamic terrorism would be low in the West had it not been for these two (self) services activities in the East, plus the wide open door policy in the Atlantic EU.
Elected politicians are scared to butcher the budgets of the spooks; when will the get more scared of the electorate?
I have contributed faithfully to the fate of The Guardian when it was in difficulties in about 1974, and like many papers of the times made mistakes. But its no mistake what is happening to The Guardian lately, being a mouth piece for the state that massacred the Manchester Martryrs which gave life to this tool of imperialism. So I stopped buying it, & reading it on line, just in case that too may benefit the traitor paper that hides amongst us, because of the disgust I feel for it.
Online readership is prob. even more important than ink.
They get paid by the click.
I stopped visiting the Guardian site a few months ago and haven’t visited it once since, not even to follow a link from an article somewhere else pointing out how bad it is.
If independent blogs made more of an effort to cross-promote each other, thus giving Guardian Media Group’s remaining victims a clearer escape route, I think a “switch off” campaign against the Guardian and other rags could be quite effective.
Less easy than you think. I found this blog years ago through a search engine. Now I despair at search engines as they load Page 1 of searches with MSM drivel articles. Absolute betrayal of the internet: we need a search engine for the people, not Wall Street cobblers. The era 1997-2008 was the golden age of the internet, a true educational tool back then. No longer.
Mouth to mouth/email to email is once again necessary.
Rhys
Spot on – I have been involved since the 90’s – no ad’s, hardly any pages, and dial-up.
Agree with your solution, but ‘mouth to mouth’ er…
Harding needs this narrative for his fiction novel on Skripal (which really will be about Putin)?
Thoroughly enjoying Sikander Burnes! The same clowns still run Britain today sadly!
Best Wishes.
Condolences from me too & hope your lot soon improves. . Also recently read Skinder Burns, excellent. Thank you Craig…
Do you think the curious Brit hysteria over American declassification of US Intel “Russia docs” is related to Miller/Skripal issues ?..???
“The British government “expressed grave concerns” to the US government over the declassification and release of material related to the Trump-Russia investigation, according to the New York Times. President Trump ordered a wide swath of materials “immediately” declassified “without redaction” on Monday, only to change his mind later in the week”
Warmest condolences to you and your family, and it’s good to have you back. The Guardian however are a bunch of Quisling bastards, and I’ll crack open the champagne when that rag goes under.
Unless you have skin in the game and know otherwise then it can be hard to see how the Guardian betrays the truth. I read the Guardian article and it seemed legit to me, so thanks for pointing out the truth. I worked out that there was a problem with the Guardian and that they were not to be trusted 18 years ago. Sure they have some good people there but are those good people good people when they knowingly work with vulgar snitches in the building? Nope, they are taking a pay cheque for turning a blind eye.
Sorry to hear that you have had to attend a funeral or two, however, I am sure that ‘the survivors’ greatly enjoyed spending time with you and that friendships have been strengthened.
I find it quite disturbing that nothing the media in this country say can be trusted.
P.S. According to the newspapers it was Sunday this morning… Can anyone confirm that?
Bert.
Please tell Ernie its OK and that it is Sunday, still.
Thanks for sharing this important insight, Craig Murray. Tony Kevin.
It’s a very sad thing for me, personally, that the paper I took to be a serious alternative to red-tops in the early ’80s has become such a wretched source of propaganda today. I still visit their site weekly, but just to read the football bits.
The recent MediaLens piece that showed how their assault of Corbyn (not a hero of mine, to be honest) linking him to anti-semitism was an extraordinary piece of analysis, and one based entirely in fact.
The Guardian has become it’s name – a guardian of the neo-liberal agenda, of the elite power brokers. It is such a shame.
Kudos, and many thanks, Craig, for keeping it real. I’m still not convinced that the GRU or FSB didn’t have a hand in the whole Skripal thing, but you’re one of the only voices that has challenged the narrative, and I thank you for that. Bellingcat might have identified some reasons why you’re wrong, but we’ll have to see how good that evidence is. The only reason I’m still unconvinced is because of your own examination of the details in that case.
I can recommend theblogmire.com if you are interested in an analysis of the Skripal affair by a genuine, authentic resident of Salisbury who really understands the geography of the area, and is not funded by the Atlantic Council.
As Juvenal put it, “Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?”
:
Oh crap! You’ve just added one more Latin phrase to Mad Ben Nimmo’s bot ‘triggers’.
😉
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You may be pleased to hear that your name (Highlights in yellow) links to a Facebook page that is now dead!
The Guardian / Observer also ran (again) today the passport story about the “Skri[pal assassins” based on the discredited Bellingcat and unverified Fontanka sources as if it were new stuff. More shoddy dishonest Guardian reporting…
whatever frighteners the security services put on the guardian during snowden seem to have worked.
Come on we always know who unnamed sources are. Always.
Skripal, Syria, Georgia, Ukraine, Wada, the whole FISA gate story as reported by everyone bar Fox news, they all are reported solely on the basis of unnamed sources.
BTW my guess is that following their sterling work with the wikileaks data, the Guardian became the direct target of MI5 and are now completely run by them.
Yes, it looks that way.
I’ve always considered the Guardian to be a satirical publication, just that most people haven’t realised this yet. Whatever it is, it’s not a serious newspaper by any stretch of the imagination.
The Onion writes better political satire and with style and wit.
It goes to show how deeply the media is involved with the establishment and how desperate they are to uphold the status quo.
Craig,
Thank you for this information. The piece about Julian and Russia definitely smelled very badly, but now we know from you for sure that it is completely made up. I hope you will write The Guardian.
Sadly, nothing surprising since the paper has fallen into the abyss it’s been a while now. Day by day it gets worse, just as you think it can’t get worse. Some of the stuff they publish is truly vile, not only about Russia.
I don’t want to change the subject, but do want to point to another intellectual, moral and professional debacle
from yesterday:
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/sep/22/full-disclosure-review-stormy-daniels-donald-trump-sex
quote:
‘As she has on television, in print Daniels emerges as no less than Trump’s equal. Just think of Tamar and Judah and the Book of Genesis. There’s something biblical about a wayward woman holding her accuser’s staff and staring him straight in the eye, especially when folks are prepared to burn her at the stake on account of his misdeeds’.
O tempera o mores!
:
Well, one thing for sure is that Stormy Daniels did indeed ‘hold her accuser’s staff’; though I’ve heard that she would hardly have dignified it with that description.
I haven’t seen the Guardian article you refer to, and will not, but from what I have seen on TV of Stormy Daniels, she does seem to be quite a pleasant, outgoing and articulate woman – and my respect for her, though qualified, far exceeds that that I have for Trump; but then it is mathematically impossible in this context to go less than zero.
No one should fall into the trap of holding Trump in any high regard – I understand some of the impetuses: He wasn’t a serial War-Criminal before he was elected, unlike Clinton – had she won, the main glass ceiling she would have broken would not have been as the first woman president, but as the first Oval office entrant who was ALREADY a War-Criminal before her first day on the job; however, president Trump stepped right into the War-Criminal thing without skipping a beat. I guess the other likely impetus is that Trump has in word been more reasonable on Russia – but in deeds of the US Establishment he’s really made no difference – if anything made things worse, as demonisation of Russia is no doubt in part owing to deep state desires to tamp down any untoward and DEFINITATELY unamerican peace-making impulses Trump articulated during the campaign.
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Dennis, Trumps legacy will like all leadership not be judged until he is long out of office.
I would just say that after nearly approaching two years – he didn’t use the nuclear codes that everyone shrieked he ought not to be let near; there is no ‘wall’, obamacare (pitiful as it is) is still in place; north korea isn’t launching missiles over japan; Iran and Venezuela haven’t been invaded and most importantly Syria is not a pile of ancient civilization rubble that Iraq has been left in by the other recent potus’.
There is more but i hope you get my drift.
Peace.
It’s down to incompetence more than good will, that the above list has not yet been achieved.
If you say so – it must be true. Some may ask for proof of the incompetence, so better cite it, otherwise they just won’t believe you.
May I refer you to the attempt to repeal & replace Obamacare, just as a sample of my bona fides:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Efforts_to_repeal_the_Patient_Protection_and_Affordable_Care_Act#115th_Congress_(2017%E2%80%932018)
With the Presidency, and full control of the House and the Senate, one might think he was in with a chance of meeting that promise. Another few tries may just do the trick, do you think?
Alternatively, it is as you appear to suggest – Trump is really nice and cuddly, and all the fuss was about nothing. He doesn’t really want to get rid of Obamacare after all. Just pretending, and lied when making promises to do so. Is that your case?
So your proof is that with GOP controlling both houses – they couldn’t get rid of what they claimed they hated – obamacare?
Can you not accept the possibility that obamacare is exactly the system the insurers and pharma want. And was crafted to deliver the profits. And Trump called their bluff?
As he has called the Is***li and Hamas bluff. And the north/south korean MI money pot bluff. And the FUKUS bluff on Syria by not instantly imposing the no fly zone that Hills was gagging to impose as her first act of war in her name! That would have led to Nato and Russian planes playing chicken over Syria and led to a full on overt boots on the ground invasion? Gawd she must regret holding back on that decision.
Still as long as Trump is a potrayed as a sex obsessed Putin owned sleaze ball, screwing gold digger prozies in his relative youth – rather then a patsy who was chosen to remove all known GOP candidates from the election that would have crowned the evil witch as the great white queen – that’s ok by you?
As i say lets see what history makes of it.
Dennis,
I don’t want to belabour the point because the lies about JA and Russia are much more important, but finding anything “biblical’ in the SD- Trump saga, and publishing that as something relevant, is indicative of the sheer intellectual and professional misery of the once good newspaper – The Guardian. It goes part and parcel with the lies and distortions this paper serves to the public daily.
I can’t read The Guardian anymore without feeling physically nauseated. I am not exaggerating when I say that it’s easier to read The Daily Mail, because at least it knows what it is: a sordid little hate rag with pics of slebs in tiny dresses, “human interest” stories that seem to exist solely as an excuse to list the price of the home of everyone featured, scare pieces about killer viruses, and tales of human Ken-dolls totting up the cost of their 39 facial plastic surgeries. The Mail is what it is.
The Guardian? The Guardian is a waking nightmare where everyone you meet is living in a dream. Weirdly, it makes me think of a totalitarianised version of 1950s America, a reality which never existed, at a time when I was not yet born, in a place which I have never been to. So really what I mean is an idea of 1950s America which I’ve got from TV sets and from films such as the original Stepford Wives which is actually set in the 1970s. It’s a place which is just peachy, so long as you agree that’s it’s peachy. Otherwise it might not be so nice.
And that’s what The Guardian feels like. An unaccountably oppressive, nightmare where nothing is real.
Also what The Guardian is like: nodding yeses to lies told by a false-smiling hostess who is pouring you poison tea which you will drink at gun point with with your pinkie poised from a doll-sized porcelain cup when you have PTSD and your teeth are rattling
You say:
“So really what I mean is an idea of 1950s America which I’ve got from TV sets and from films such as the original Stepford Wives which is actually set in the 1970s. It’s a place which is just peachy, so long as you agree that’s it’s peachy. Otherwise it might not be so nice.”
– and imply that such is a place which never existed.
ON THE CONTRARY!!! That is perhaps inadvertently, yet almost ingeniously as perfect a summary of the people of the United States of World Horror that is possible; but I would add Stepford Husbands, Sons, Daughters, Sisters, Brothers, Cousins, nieces and nephews to your movie allusion.
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I do not quite agree. the fifties America was in reality a good place (if you were white) pretty good wages, a very high standard of living compared to Europe, free healthcare and free tuition. A pretty nice package. But then things started to slide. The MIC took over and Privatization took hold, and here we are.
The 7500 $ i earn a month is not that much here (Live in Sweden and work in Denmark) but I have no worries about health care , education, whatever, its paid through taxes. My oldest daughter wants to go to MIT (The Hub of Science and also attend a semester at a top Moskva university, and she can do that for freer if her grades are good) she will become a better Engineer than her father.
Very proud.
No America went from a light on the hill, to a fickle in a damp hole, just in 30 years.
I was going to try to say something profound and apposite to the decayed political situation in which we live but it’s mostly been said here. As an unreflective , provincial, Church & Crown Tory ( long deserted by the C of E and Conservative party) , I became aware of the willing, complicit, manipulability of the media during the unprovoked attack on Yugoslavia in 1999, when a Clerico-fascist, a Muslim extremist and a well- known criminal gang were made into the victims, then the bearers of liberal Western enlightenment and chosen rulers In the Balkans.
So, enough of that, but sincere good wishes and sympathy in your bereavements and hope that your presence and understanding brought comfort to others .
Yes that’s when I began to feel uneasy too
:
ME TOO.
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Sorry to hear of your losses, Craig. I have attended too many funerals myself, of late, including one last week. That was of a musician friend. To one of the singers he accompanied I gave the advice: keep singing.
Sincere condolences to Mr Murray. Taken together with the huge and rapidly accelerating censorship of the internet by the Silicon Valley Clintonistas, the crazy hysteria the Guardian and the Beeb have been trying to whip up, proves that John Pilger is bang on when he says that it is “respectable” liberal left media, not the widely despised Mail and Murdoch press, that are the really effective deep state war-mongering propagandists. Hillary was as much of a war hawk as Bush or John Bolton any day, but that didn’t bother the Guardianistas one bit – indeed her unqualified support for the Greater Israel project was a large part of her attraction. Ditto Obama, who bombed the crap out of myriad third world countries almost daily. So much for the anti-racism of today’s liberals. Statues of Thomas Jefferson are an outrageous affront to all people of colour apparently, but in the world of Freedland, Harding, Nik Cohen & co, drone-striking Pakistan wedding parties to smithereens is perfectly compatible with a principled anti-racist stance.
It sounds like The Guardian has gone from plain boring to boring and full of lies. Who really cares? Anything that caters for and expresses the sentiments of middle England is always going to be dire.
I spent 3 weeks on a photo-shoot in the North Atlantic with a Guardian reader a few years ago. We were sharing a cabin. On day one I had to bluntly inform him that I wasn’t a homosexual. I won’t go into the details.
On day two I had to bluntly inform him that I didn’t care for cricket. He defaulted to talking about cooking, Muslim fundamentalism, and taxation after that.
It was a long 3 weeks.
From your testimony, a nice person may be a Guardian reader. Sharing a cabin may lead to awkward moment, like “how to inform my sleeping but active heterosexual roommate that I am not a woman?” so from time to time one has to draw a line.
No need to be sexist.
LOL!!
Perhaps it is you who is boring, Hatuey?
Nothing wrong with cricket, cooking and taxation.
Middle England wants boring things like a home to bring up children in.
The way you talk, gipsies are dangerously embedded into the Establishment…
Rhys, you always seem to disagree with me which is silly since everyone who disagrees with me is wrong.
Leave the “gipsies” out of it. They’ve been discriminated against enough.
Maybe a bit of Dr.Strangelove, but it was really Peter Sellers who inspred me, to actually be there. If you are not there, you can’t take even a photograph.
This is Peter Seller’s Being There Talking To The “US President.”
“Being There Seasons”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TYeVQzTVyLk
Tony
Sorry for your loss,anger is powering a lot of comments.
The Guardian will not be publishing anything its owners dont want publishing.
Which is why you and your fellow bloggers are so important to me and many others.
BREXIT SHOCK: Yanis Varoufakis reveals EXACTLY what the EU will do next to STOP us leaving
https://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/1021566/Brexit-news-latest-deal-UK-EU-no-deal-Theresa-May-Yanis-Varoufakis-Norway-Merkel-Macron
When the EU destroyed Greece, one thing puzzled me. Why did the Greeks want to stay in the Euro? If they had left the Euro and devalued their currency, they would have had some chance of recovery instead of none.
When did the EU destroy Greece? I must have been sleeping. Handling of the debt crisis in Greece was left to the IMF, if you care to look into it, but since Greece is still there we can see that it wasn’t destroyed.
Interesting that anti-EU crackpots from England are so keen on talking about the plight of Greece. The darkest chapters in post-war Greek history, during a period perplexingly referred to as the Greek Civil War, were at the hands of the occupying British. Many died.
I’m sure since you are so concerned about the plight of Greeks that is this is of huge interest to you.
You appear to be a Remainer.
Well done,Blunderbuss !
And you, Blunderbuss, appear to jump from one stupid idea to the next, like some destitute door-to-door salesman on LSD.
You are diverting attention to brexit – just as the Groaniad does.
Goldman Sachs destroyed Greece.
Craig, condolences on your losses. These are indeed dark times, the losses are incalculable, and it’s easy to get disheartened to the point of despair. The best we can do is keep fighting for truth and for the good. These words do still mean something, despite the shitstorm of cynicism and propaganda and spin that would have us think otherwise (thanks, Guardian). The odds are stacked against us but the day’s not done yet. To speak the truth in times like this is an act of heroism, and the fact that people like you are prepared to speak out gives me hope.
If you want to hear Luke Harding demolished by real journalist, Aaron Maté, take a few minutes to read the transcript of the interview or play the video to watch it first-hand.
https://off-guardian.org/2018/01/09/video-aaron-mate-asks-luke-harding-what-collusion/
Interesting to see Harding waving his arms around in that video every time he asked about evidence. Anyone that understands body language knows what this points to.
Tracing hackers isn’t impossible. We know this because so many have been caught and punished over the years. If there’s any truth in the accusations of Russian hacking, there’s no reason why we shouldn’t ask for and expect to see proof.
Harding’s reliance on things like “I speak Russian”, ”I lived there for four years”, and “some of my journalist friends were killed by Putin”, smacks of desperation. If he had real proof he wouldn’t need to say these things and we wouldn’t need to hear them.
Couldn’t agree more Craig. The Guardian has become a sick joke.
You are shocked by words from Luke Harding? That is rather shocking: the man has been a spook conduit since decades. The Guardian has printed them all the time.
Craig,
My condolences.
Courtenay