Sweden police dismiss Assange complaint over Machado Nobel win
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WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange (left, in 2012) is unhappy with the Nobel Foundation for awarding its Peace Prize to Venezuelan opposition leader Maria Corina Machado.
PHOTO: REUTERS, BLOOMBERG
Follow topic:
- Swedish police will not investigate Julian Assange's criminal complaint against the Nobel Foundation.
- Assange claimed Maria Corina Machado's Peace Prize violated Nobel's principles due to her support of Donald Trump.
- Police found no evidence of a crime, rejecting Assange's call to freeze the 11 million kronor prize money.
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STOCKHOLM - Swedish police said on Dec 19 they would not open an investigation into a criminal complaint
Mr Assange brought the complaint after Ms Machado won this year’s Peace Prize,
According to the complaint posted by WikiLeaks on social media this week, the prize represented a “gross misappropriation” of funds and the “facilitation of war crimes” under Swedish law.
In an email to AFP, detective inspector Rikard Ekman said the complaint did not contain any information to suggest a crime had been committed.
“As I have decided not to initiate a preliminary investigation, no investigation will be conducted on the basis of the complaint,” Det Insp Ekman said.
The Norwegian Nobel Committee awarded Ms Machado the prize for promoting democratic rights and for her struggle to achieve a just and peaceful transition from dictatorship to democracy.
Mr Assange said Ms Machado’s win violated the 1895 will of prize founder Alfred Nobel, which states the prize must go to the person who has done the “most or the best work for fraternity between nations, for the abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses”.
The US-Venezuela spat has seen the massive deployment of US naval and air forces in waters off Latin America, and dozens of small boats allegedly running drugs have been bombed in the Caribbean Sea and Pacific Ocean, killing almost 100 people so far.
While the Peace Prize is awarded by a Norwegian selection committee in Oslo, Mr Assange argued the Stockholm-based foundation must assume financial responsibility.
He called for the freezing of the 11 million kronor (S$1.5 million) in prize money promised to Ms Machado.
Mr Assange was freed from Britain’s Belmarsh Prison in 2024 under a plea bargain after years of incarceration for publishing hundreds of thousands of confidential US government documents.
He was arrested after spending seven years in Ecuador’s London embassy to avoid extradition to Sweden, where he faced accusations of sexual assault that were eventually dropped. AFP
