Julian Assange still has a card to play to try to escape the highly contested extradition to the US, which has been hunting him for almost 15 years for having released confidential documents from the Pentagon and the State Department containing many embarrassing revelations. The High Court of London today gave the green light to the request of the defense of the Australian journalist and co-founder of WikiLeaks – rejected at first instance – for a further, extreme appeal before the British justice system against his surrender to the authorities overseas Ocean. «Julian is a political prisoner and must be released», declared in recent days his wife Stella who married him in prison in 2022. According to Wikileaks «Julian Assange has obtained permission to appeal for extradition to the United States. After almost five years in the UK’s most secure prison, the publisher will continue his long detention separated from his young family for revealing war crimes.”
The sentence shared by WikiLeaks
The two judges of the London Court, Victoria Sharp and Jeremy Johnson, asked for guarantees from the United States: the decision of the British High Court was therefore postponed to May 20th. Meanwhile, the Washington government will have to demonstrate that Assange can rely on the First Amendment of the US Constitution, which protects free speech. Furthermore, you will not face prejudice at trial or sentencing because of your Australian nationality and will not face capital punishment.
“If such assurances are not provided, permission to appeal will be granted and there will then be an appeal hearing,” reads a summary of the ruling released by the BBC.
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Julian Assange, 52, Australian journalist, programmer and activist, is one of the founders of the disclosure organization WikiLeaks, which in November 2010 released classified US documents on US Army war crimes received from former soldier Chelsea Manning. American prosecutors allege that Assange encouraged and helped US Army intelligence analyst Manning steal diplomatic cables and military files published by WikiLeaks.
During a two-day hearing last month, Assange’s lawyers argued that he was a journalist who exposed secrets and exposed the US military’s wrongdoing in Iraq and Afghanistan. Sending him to the United States, they said, would expose him to politically motivated prosecution and risk a “flagrant denial of justice.”
The US government said Assange’s actions went well beyond that of a journalist gathering intelligence and putting lives at risk in his attempt to “indiscriminately solicit, steal, and publish classified government documents.” The Australian IT expert has been held in a British maximum security prison for five years. Assange’s family and supporters say his physical and mental health have been tested during more than a decade of legal battles, including being held in refuge in the Ecuadorian embassy in London from 2012 to 2019 and accused of sexual harassment by part by two Swedish women, later archived.
“Julian is a political prisoner and must be released,” he said. Stella Assange, who married the WikiLeaks founder in prison in 2022. Assange’s lawyers say that if convicted she could face up to 175 years in prison, although American authorities have said the sentence is likely to be much shorter.