Seen for judgment. In a few weeks (according to the BBC the decision is expected in mid-March), Julian Assange will know whether the British justice will allow him to once again present his arguments against extradition to the United States, or if he has none left other alternative than turning to the European Court of Human Rights, if it wants to hear it. In the meantime, he will remain in Belmarsh maximum security prison, with his physical and mental health so impaired that he has been unable to attend the hearing, despite having permission.
A two-day hearing concluded yesterday with the denial by the lawyers of the American Government that this is a political case, and that Washington is seeking retribution for the hacking and disclosure by Assange, through the channel of Wikileaks’ distribution of hundreds of thousands of classified Pentagon and Department documents detailing indiscriminate killings, torture, extraordinary renditions (sending suspects to third countries for questioning through unorthodox means) and other human rights violations.
“Assange says he is a journalist, but what he did goes far beyond inviting a government source to lunch and persuading her to provide him with information to publish it – argued his lawyers-. What he did was conspire with Chelsea Manning and other hackers to steal state secrets, as well as the names and addresses of intelligence agents and their informants.”
The United States claims that many of its proxies in Ethiopia, Syria, Iran, China and other countries saw their lives in danger, had to change residences and found their homes expropriated and bank accounts frozen as consequence of Assange’s intervention, but the Australian journalist’s legal defense estimates that the connection between these events and the publication of wikileaks has not been proven. And even if it existed, the public interest in knowing the abuses in Iraq and Afghanistan prevailed.
“There is no political motivation – assured the lawyer Claire Dobbin -, nor any intention to go against the freedom of the press. The persecution of Assange may be unprecedented, but neither is what he did, which is the largest unauthorized disclosure of classified documents in US history.” Accused of seventeen crimes of espionage, he faces, if extradited, up to 175 years in prison.
In the first instance, a judge refused extradition due to the danger of suicide, but subsequent instances have given the green light to his extradition to Washington.
