Extraditing
Polanski: What Ever Happened to Swiss Neutrality?
"Just
as there is a generous America that we love, there is also a certain America
that frightens us, and it’s that America which has here shown us its
face."
Eveline Widmer-Schlumpf, Swiss justice minister and member of that country's Executive, the Federal Council: Why did she decide to arrest Polanski now - since the filmmaker has had a home there for years? Controversy swirls ...
The arrest of Roman Polanski
in Zurich for an old moral scandalin the United States has become a
political-diplomatic matter. The indignation shown in Poland, the film director's
country of origin, and in France, his adopted country, is fierce.
[Editor's Note: According to The New York Times: "In Los Angeles a representative for prosecutors described the arrest as all but inevitable in a game of cat and mouse they had never stopped playing. 'Any time word is received that Mr. Polanski is planning to be in a country that has an extradition treaty with the U.S., we go through diplomatic channels with the arrest warrant,' said Sandi Gibbons, a spokeswoman for the Los Angeles County district attorney's office].
Listen to Frédéric Mitterand,
our new Culture Minister: “To see him thrown to the lions like this over a
long-passed saga that has no real meaning and to see him alone, imprisoned,
while he was on his way to an event at which we were to pay him homage, that is
to say, trapped, is absolutely appalling. We know the conditions under which it
occurred, and just as there is a generous America that we love, there is also a
certain America that frightens us, and it’s that America which has here shown
us its face.” These are remarks that create a diplomatic dispute.
Posted
by WORLDMEETS.US
First comment: Mitterand didn't
point to Bush's America, the one that has made so many enemies in the world,
but that of Obama, which everyone repeats is regaining its human face! This is
not such a trivial matter, since all of us are asking ourselves why this arrest
took place now. Nonetheless, let’s not forget that justice in the United States
enjoys greater independence from the Executive than in France.
Second comment: What will the
Swiss, who are decidedly not the people they once were, do? Have they lost
their neutrality? They are no longer a tax haven - they've already handed
over the names of foreign taxpayers who had concealed money there. A
long-standing extradition agreement exists between Switzerland and the United
States, so Polanski could therefore be legally transferred across the Atlantic.
Is Switzerland in a period during which is has to buy better treatment from
America? This begs the question.
Third comment: Polanski was
prosecuted for having sexual relations with a 13-year-old minor in 1977. He pled
guilty and spent 42 days in jail. Then, when his sentence was lengthened beyond
what had already been agreed to, he chose exile in 1978. The story is 32-years-old
and the victim, they say, has since withdrawn her complaint. Is there not a
statute of limitations? Some clarification is required.
