Sara Palin, the darling of right wing Republicans calls him a man with blood on his hands. Newt Gingrich, the Republican Presidential hopeful calls him criminal, Eric H. Holder, Attorney General of the United States describes him as one of the most dangerous men in the world, the European world leaders call him an indirect supporter of Al-Qaeda. Does Julian Paul Assange, the founder of Wikileaks really deserve all these epithets? Is he a really a dangerous man who deserves to be prosecuted and locked up?

What Assange has done is nothing short of a new revolution to the proportion of industrial revolution of France or the protestant movement of Martin Luther. Regardless of his moral dilemma, Assange has challenged the way modern governments including democracies work. People have a right to know everything that their government does. Nothing is secret in a true democracy. Everything is transparent. People pay their taxes and elect their representative who should be accountable before people. Assange has questioned the philosophy that the people's national interests are different than people's interests.

The leaks defy everything a true democracy should stand for. There is secrecy, there is conspiracy, there is fraud and there is misappropriation and manipulation of public trust.

As naive as it sounds, democracy is people's power and not the power of the power elites.

Julian Assange, the founder of Wikileaks is going through what everyone who speaks the truth goes through. The world's democratic nations are after him and the media, champion of freedom, has disowned him. Freedom is good as long as it does not challenge the corporate world and its champions whom we usually call people's representatives.

In a democracy, people vote but the corporate world, through lobbies, spending millions in buying the representatives, control the democracy. In a democracy people finance and fund the law enforcement agencies through their hard earned money, yet the corporate world use them for the protection and interests of their assets and power.

In a democracy, people seek transparency and accountability, yet rulers serving the interests of the most powerful, run their affairs secretly.

Wikileaks has become the nightmare of governments and rulers who are afraid of being exposed. They are trying to hide under the cloak of national interests.

But who defines the national interests? People through their transparent government or bureaucrats through their secret masters! In reality, the national interests are not determined by people in democracies nor even by their representatives, but by secret agencies who act secretly on behalf of secret masters who secretly dictate whatever they want to dictate.

Case in point is the screening at the airport. The x ray machine that scans naked every one who goes through them is being sold for millions of dollars a piece. According to government issued databases, there are about 14,951 airports in the U.S. Of those only about 5000 have paved runways. And out of that 5000, there are 376 that have regularly scheduled airline service. Who would benefit from the sale of these machines to airports? Those who manufacture them. So the media owned by the corporate world would create conditions conducive for buying them. The corporate world fund and finance those who would support these machines for national security. In order to motivate people to vote them to power, they would constantly raise the levels of dangers and fear.

Thus the game is being played and would be played for ever, until there is the possibility of these groups being exposed and accountable.

What wikileaks has done is something unheard of. It has exposed the dirty laundry and removed the cloak of secrecy from the faces of powerful interests. Wikileaks has reinforced what people had already believed that governments lie and manipulate the people.

Julian Assange is no less than the real Martin Luther of our secular world. Luther posted his epistles on the doors of Catholic Church in Germany challenging the power of the Pope and initiating a movement of change in Christianity that has never stopped after him. Asssange has posted the information buried in the secret archives of governments on the Internet challenging the power of government, a process that is not going to stop regardless how tight the governments want to control this.

People now have the appetite to know everything that is done in their name and they would not relinquish this right no matter what happens to Assange.

What is being done against Julian Assange is blatant persecution against the truth. He is paying the price for being the voice of truth. His personal life is of no consequence to people. There are hundreds of public officials all over the world including Swedish, British and American who have committed worse offenses than what Assange is accused of and still continue to hold office without any consequence.

Assange may not be allowed to live for long by these hidden power elite. Yet through his courage, he has created an environment for freedom and transparency that few could imagine.

Wikileaks is the best example of what a democracy should be, exposing the truth. Assange deserves to be supported in his work without any fear. An attack on Assange is an attack on democracy and freedom and we must say that loudly.

What Wikileaks has exposed must make each one of us think seriously about the role our governments play in our lives. Despite the claims that democracy is for the people, by the people of the people, the reality is that those who rule in a democracy are not sincere. The monarchs and dictators do whatever suits their interests under the power of gun. Thus in terms of manipulating the people, the democratic governments and the despotic rulers have the same agenda, hide from people the real facts.

Wikileaks has demolished the myth of democracies and freedom as practiced in our world today. The closet is now open and every skeleton that has been buried would will come out. No amount of suppression can stop this process because it is built on courage and passion for truth.

Dr. Aslam Abdullah is editor in chief of the weekly Muslim Observer and director of the Islamic Society of Nevada.