British MP George Galloway has sparked outrage after claiming that the allegations against WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange "don't constitute rape", but rather could be construed as "bad sexual etiquette".
Galloway, the Respect MP for Bradford West, was speaking about allegations lodged in Sweden against Assange, who has taken refuge in Ecuador's embassy in London in a bid to avoid extradition.
He said in a podcast entitled "Good Night With George Galloway", published on YouTube on August 18: "Even taken at its worst, if the allegations made by these two women were true, 100 per cent true... they don't constitute rape. At least not rape as anyone with any sense can possibly recognise it."
One of the women, he said, had had consensual sex with Assange the night before, meaning that she was "already in the sex game with him".
In an interview with a London radio station released Monday, he termed the allegations against Assange "odd".
The 41-year-old Australian and his supporters argue that the allegations are politically motivated and that he will eventually be extradited to the United States. Ecuador has granted him asylum, but Britain has said he will be arrested if he leaves the embassy.
However, Galloway told London radio station LBC 97.3 FM on Monday: "The charges, which have not yet been laid in Sweden, of course would not be charges in Britain... It's a very odd set of sexual molestation charges, to which many of us in some parts of our lives could have fallen foul."
The warrant described one allegation against Assange that he had unprotected sex with one of the women, who could not consent as she was asleep.
Of that allegation, Galloway said in his podcast: "Woman A met Julian Assange, invited him back to her flat, gave him dinner, went to bed with him, had consensual sex with him. Claims that she woke up to him having sex with her again. Something which can happen, you know...
"Some people believe that when you go to bed with somebody, take off your clothes, and have sex with them and then fall asleep, you're already in the sex game with them.
"It might be really bad manners not to have tapped her on the shoulder and said, 'do you mind if I do it again?'. It might be really sordid and bad sexual etiquette, but whatever else it is, it is not rape or you bankrupt the term rape of all meaning."
He continued: "I don't believe either of these women, I don't believe either of these stories."
The comments prompted an outpouring of negative comments on Twitter after they were picked up by a New Statesman blog. Tory MP Louise Mensch, who quit earlier this month, tweeted: "So ironic that George #Galloway's political party is called 'Respect'. #feminism".
Assange spoke from the balcony of the Ecuadoran embassy on Sunday, but did not address the sex assault allegations, painting his asylum bid as an issue of freedom of speech.
WikiLeaks angered the United States by releasing tens of thousands of classified documents about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as often unflattering reports of US diplomats' views on world leaders.
Source: http://news.yahoo.com/galloway-controversy-over-assange-rape-comments-152213529.html
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