The extradition of Australian journalist Julián Assange, founder of Wikileaks, is much closer after the Biden Administration has informed the Foreign Office in writing that, if he is tried for treason in the United States, he will not be sentenced to the death penalty, no. He will suffer prejudice because of his nationality and will enjoy the privileges of the First Amendment (the right to freedom of expression) as if he were an American citizen.
Washington has therefore offered the guarantees required by British judges to complete the extradition process and not authorize Assange to appeal again. His wife and lawyer, Stella Morris, has expressed her anguish at this new development and the prospect that, although he is not sentenced to death, her husband, who is in a very precarious state of physical and mental health, will spend the rest of life isolated in a maximum security prison in the United States.
Judges Victoria Sharp and Adam Johnson indicated in a court order that, having received this pending documentation on Tuesday, a two-hour hearing is scheduled for the 20th in which these guarantees, which Assange’s team has already condemned, can be examined. for insufficient. If the court finally approves them after hearing the arguments of the parties, Assange may be extradited to the United States, which is demanding him for 18 crimes of espionage and computer intrusion for the revelations on his WikiLeaks portal.
President Biden had indicated that he was open to the Australian government’s request that Assange return to his country of origin, something for which Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has been campaigning for some time before the White House, taking advantage of the close security and intelligence relationship between the two countries. However, the guarantees given by the American justice system to the Foreign Office suggest that Washington’s purpose continues to be to obtain the extradition and try Assange, who would face a sentence of up to 150 years in prison.
The United States does not forgive the founder of Wikileaks who internationally disclosed thousands of documents showing the murders, torture, extraordinary renditions (delivery of prisoners to third countries without legal protection) and all types of human rights violations committed by the US army in Iraq and Afghanistan. Assange considers that he did investigative and denunciatory journalism. Washington, on the contrary, accuses him of having obtained the information illegally, hacking the Government’s computer systems with the help of Chelsea Manning, and of having endangered the lives of CIA agents and informants by disclosing their identity.
