Plan to extradite Assange moves forward

LONDON: The United States has provided assurances requested by the High Court here to pave the way for WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange to be extradited from Britain, a spokesperson for his wife confirmed on Tuesday.

Last month, the High Court ruled that, without certain US guarantees, Assange, 52, would be allowed to launch a new appeal against being extradited to face 18 charges, all bar one under the Espionage Act, over WikiLeaks’ release of confidential US military records and diplomatic cables.

Those assurances – that in a US trial he could rely on the First Amendment right to free speech and that there was no prospect of new charges which could see the death penalty being imposed – have now been submitted, the team fighting his extradition confirmed.

There will now be a court hearing on May 20. His lawyers have described US assurances given in previous cases as not “worth the paper they’re written on”.

Assange’s wife Stella said the US guarantees did not satisfy their concerns, describing them as “blatant weasel words”.

“The United States has issued a nonassurance in relation to the First Amendment, and a standard assurance in relation to the death penalty,” she said.

“The diplomatic note does nothing to relieve our family’s extreme distress about his future ... his grim expectation of spending the rest of his life in isolation in US prison for publishing awardwinning journalism.”

Last week, US President Joe Biden said he was considering a request from Australia to drop the prosecution, which Assange’s US lawyer described as “encouraging”.

It was not clear what influence, if any, Biden could exert on a criminal case, but the Wall Street

Journal reported that discussions are underway about a potential plea bargaining deal.

Assange has spent more than 13 years in various legal battles in the English courts since he was first arrested in November 2010.

The US authorities argue he is not being prosecuted for the publication of the leaked materials, but for the criminal act of conspiring with former US Army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning to unlawfully obtain them. – Reuters