Julian Assange’s defense is striving on Tuesday to convince British justice to grant the Wikileaks founder a last appeal against his extradition to the United States, where he is being prosecuted for a massive leak of documents.
The hearing opened at the High Court in London in the absence of the 52-year-old Australian, who “does not feel well”, said his lawyer Edward Fitzgerald.
As the hearing approached, his supporters warned of the risks weighing on the health and even the life of Julian Assange, detained for almost five years in the United Kingdom, in a case erected as a symbol of the threats weighing on freedom of press.
British justice examines Tuesday and Wednesday the refusal to authorize Julian Assange to appeal his extradition to the United States, accepted in June 2022 by the British government.
Julian Assange should not be extradited because he is the subject of “political” prosecutions after revealing facts of “serious state criminality”, argued Edward Fitzgerald.
Risk of “denial of justice”
He is being prosecuted for “ordinary journalistic practices” consisting of “obtaining and publishing information,” the lawyer argued. His client faces a disproportionate sentence in the United States and “there is a real risk that he will suffer a flagrant denial of justice”, he added.
Julian Assange faces up to 175 years in prison. He is being prosecuted for having published since 2010 more than 700,000 confidential documents on American military and diplomatic activities, particularly in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Among them was a video showing civilians, including two Reuters journalists, killed by fire from a US helicopter gunship in Iraq in July 2007.
These documents were obtained thanks to American soldier Chelsea Manning. Sentenced in August 2013 to 35 years in prison by a court martial, she was released after seven years following a sentence commuted by Barack Obama.
Before the hearing on Tuesday morning, a crowd chanting “Free Julian Assange” gathered outside the High Court in London.
“We don’t know what to expect, but you are here because the world is watching,” said Stella Assange, wife of the WikiLeaks founder. “Julian needs his freedom and we all need the truth.”
She told the BBC on Monday that she feared a rapid extradition if Julian Assange did not obtain a last resort but hoped that the European Court of Human Rights could be seized in time to intervene.
The founder of WikiLeaks was arrested by British police in 2019 after seven years confined in the Ecuadorian embassy in London to avoid extradition to Sweden in a rape investigation, dismissed in 2019. He is currently detained in Belmarsh high security prison in east London.
In January 2021, British justice initially ruled in favor of the founder of WikiLeaks. Citing a risk of suicide, judge Vanessa Baraitser refused to give the green light to extradition. But this decision was later reversed.
“Alcatraz of the Rockies”
In an attempt to reassure him about his treatment, the United States said he would not be incarcerated at the high-security ADX prison in Florence, Colorado, nicknamed the “Alcatraz of the Rockies,” and that he would receive the necessary clinical and psychological care. The Americans had also raised the possibility that he could ask to serve his sentence in Australia.
These guarantees convinced the British justice system, but not the supporters of Julian Assange.
In recent days, expressions of support have increased for Julian Assange, who benefits from the support of numerous journalist organizations.
Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese recently said that Australians of all stripes agree that “enough is enough”.
In early February, the UN Special Rapporteur on torture, independent expert Alice Jill Edwards, asked the British government to suspend the extradition procedure, in the name of its international human rights obligations: “Julian Assange has suffered from periodic depressive disorder for a long time. He has been assessed as a suicide risk.”