UK Judge Rejects Julian Assange’s Extradition To US

A British choose dominated on Monday that WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange shouldn’t be extradited to the United States to face prison costs together with breaking a spying legislation, saying his psychological well being issues meant he could be vulnerable to suicide.

The United States mentioned it could proceed to hunt the extradition of Australian-born Assange and US prosecutors are set to attraction Monday’s choice to London’s High Court.

The US authorities accuse Assange of 18 offences referring to the discharge by WikiLeaks of huge troves of confidential US army data and diplomatic cables which they are saying put lives at risk.

Assange’s legal professionals will search bail on Wednesday for his or her 49-year-old shopper, who has spent many of the final decade both in jail or self-imposed confinement.

“We will continue to seek Mr Assange’s extradition,” mentioned a US Justice Department assertion, including that the United States had gained on all of the authorized factors, together with arguments referring to freedom of speech and political motivation.

A spokeswoman for the transition staff of President-elect Joe Biden, who takes workplace on January 20, had no remark.

The Obama administration, by which Biden served as vp, determined to not prosecute Assange over considerations concerning the precedent the case may set without cost speech and journalists.

Outgoing US President Donald Trump and his administration have despatched combined messages on Assange and there was no quick White House touch upon the ruling.

Shortly earlier than the 2016 presidential election, Trump praised WikiLeaks after it launched hacked emails which triggered embarrassment for his opponent Hillary Clinton, saying, “I love WikiLeaks.”

But inside months of Trump changing into president, his first CIA director Mike Pompeo, now secretary of state, denounced WikiLeaks as “a non-state hostile intelligence service.”

Assange’s authorized staff argued that the U.S. effort to extradite him was launched underneath strain from Trump’s administration, and that his extradition would pose a extreme risk to press freedom.

But it was solely the danger he would commit suicide if he had been held in a U.S. most safety jail that led Judge Vanessa Baraitser to reject the extradition request.

Assange, she mentioned, suffered at occasions from extreme melancholy and had been identified with autism. Half a razor blade was present in his London jail cell in May 2019, and he had informed medical employees of suicidal ideas and made plans to finish his life.

“I find that Mr Assange’s risk of committing suicide, if an extradition order were to be made, to be substantial,” Baraitser mentioned in her ruling at London’s Old Bailey courtroom.

“The overall impression is of a depressed and sometimes despairing man, who is genuinely fearful about his future.”

She mentioned Assange had made common calls from jail to the Samaritans suicide-prevention charity.

Wearing a navy go well with and a masks, Assange confirmed little emotion on the ruling. Outside courtroom, his accomplice Stella Moris, with whom he had two youngsters whereas in search of asylum in London’s Ecuadorean Embassy, mentioned the choice was a victory however the specter of extradition was nonetheless hanging over him.

“I call on the president of the United States to end this now: Mr President, tear down these prison walls, let our little boys have their father. Free Julian, free the press, free us all,” she mentioned.

U.S. prosecutors and Western safety officers regard Assange as a reckless and harmful enemy of the state whose actions imperilled the lives of brokers named within the leaked materials.

Anti-Estblishment Hero

Supporters see Assange as an anti-establishment hero who has been victimised as a result of he uncovered US wrongdoing in Afghanistan and Iraq and say his prosecution is a politically motivated assault on journalism and free speech.

Mexico’s President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador mentioned his nation would provide Assange political asylum.

“Assange is a journalist and deserves a chance, I am in favor of pardoning him,” he mentioned. “We’ll give him protection.”

WikiLeaks got here to prominence when it revealed a U.S. army video in 2010 displaying a 2007 assault by Apache helicopters in Baghdad that killed a dozen individuals, together with two Reuters information employees. It then launched 1000’s of secret categorised information and diplomatic cables.

The authorized saga started quickly afterwards when Sweden sought Assange’s extradition from Britain over allegations of intercourse crimes. When he misplaced that case in 2012, he fled to the Ecuadorean embassy in London, the place he spent seven years.

When he was lastly dragged out in April 2019, he was jailed for breaching British bail circumstances though the Swedish case in opposition to him had been dropped. Last June, the U.S. Justice Department formally requested Britain to extradite him.

Baraitser rejected the arguments that the case was political and an assault on freedom of speech, saying there was inadequate proof that prosecutors had been pressured by Trump’s staff and little proof of hostility from the US president.

She mentioned there was no proof Assange wouldn’t get a good trial within the United States and that his actions had gone past investigative journalism.

But she mentioned there was an actual threat that, if discovered responsible, he could be held within the ADX Florence most safety jail (SAM) in nearly whole isolation, and that he would discover a manner round their suicide prevention measures.

“I am satisfied that, if he is subjected to the extreme conditions of SAMs, Mr Assange’s mental health will deteriorate to the point where he will commit suicide,” Baraitser mentioned.