Julian Assange tells court '175 years of my life is at stake'
Julian Assange told a court that '175 years of my life is at stake' as he was told he will not face a full extradition hearing until early next year.
The Wikileaks founder appeared via video link at Westminster Magistrates' Court as he faces being extradited to the US over hacking top secret government documents.
A full hearing on the extradition request is now expected to take place in February, and is scheduled to last five days.
Assange is currently serving a 50-week prison sentence after being dragged out of the Ecuadorian embassy in April and jailed for a bail violation.
If Assange only serves half of his sentence, he could potentially be out of prison when the extradition hearing takes place.
The hearing came just a day after Home Secretary Sajid Javid singed an extradition request from the US, making it increasingly likely he will be sent to the US to stand trial.
Assange is wanted across the Atlantic for what US officials call ' one of the largest compromises of classified information in the history of the United States'. If found guilty of all the charges against him, the Wikileaks founder could be jailed for 175 years.
Ben Brandon, representing the US, formally opened the case on Friday. Assange is fighting against extradition on 18 counts lodged in the US. Assange, who had a scraggly white beard, told the court: '175 years of my life is effectively at stake.'
Addressing the judge as 'Lady Arbuthnot', he defended his website against hacking claims, saying: 'WikiLeaks is nothing but a publisher.'
The court also heard that he has a date at the Court of Appeal, with his legal team later explaining he is to appeal against his sentence.
Mark Summers QC, representing Assange, told the court there are a 'multiplicity of profound issues' with the extradition case. ' We say it represents an outrageous and full-frontal assault on journalistic rights,' he said.
Evidence will show that Assange ' first encouraged' former US army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning to illegally obtain documents, Mr Brandon alleged. Then Assange agreed with her to 'crack' a password hash on a Pentagon computer, the lawyer continued.
'By taking steps to crack the password hash, it's said that Mr Assange was also attempting to illegally obtain and receive classified information,' Mr Brandon said.
The documents relate to the Iraq and Afghanistan wars and, the lawyer alleged, information on secret intelligence sources.
'By publishing that unredacted material on the internet, Mr Assange created a grave and imminent risk that human intelligence sources, including journalists, human rights defenders and political activists, would suffer serious physical harm or arbitrary detention,' Mr Brandon said.
Giving a statement outside court after the hearing, Jennifer Robinson, one of Julian Assange's lawyers, said: 'This case is an outrageous affront to journalistic protections.
' This indictment will place a chilling impact and will affect journalists and publishers everywhere all over the world, by the US seeking to extradite and prosecute a publisher outside the US, who is not a US citizen, for having published truthful information about the United States.'
She said the material included 'evidence of war crimes, human rights abuse and corruption the world over'.
She added that Assange's legal team are ' very concerned about his health' as he remains in a healthcare ward at Belmarsh prison in south east London.
Ms Robinson said: ' He is under a huge amount of pressure and in very difficult circumstances. He is facing, a significant, complex case of huge size and scale and that is incredible pressure to be placed upon someone who has already suffered significant health impacts as a result of his time inside the embassy and now inside prison.
'It has been difficult to have access to him. Its difficult to prepare the case in circumstances where he is in a healthcare ward, where he doesn't have access to a computer to be able to prepare the case, and that's why such a long timetable was set down today.
'We continue to have concerns about the adequacy of the facilities we have which are fundamental to his right to be able to defend himself in these proceedings.
' These are incredibly serious charges which impact upon typical newsgathering activities that journalists engage in all the time the world over.'
Protesters earlier gathered outside court holding banners, including one with the message 'Free Assange'.
Some chanted 'justice for Julian Assange' and 'Defend freedom and democracy'.
Mr Javid said he had signed and certified an extradition order on Wednesday, although the final decision rests with the courts.
Protestor Jeannie Farr, who was outside Westminster Magistrates' Court today said the US request was 'illegal and immoral.'
She said: 'It completely forgets the due process of law. We used to have some notion in a democracy that you were innocent until proven guilty.'
Ms Farr, who travelled to the demonstration from Stratford- upon- Avon, added: 'I don't think a process can be legal if it's been set in motion through illegal actions and taking Julian Assange from the Ecuadorian embassy was not done in any way from the rule of law.'
Mr Javid told BBC Radio 4's Today programme: 'I am very pleased that the police were finally able to apprehend him and now he's rightly behind bars because he broke UK law.'
Mr Javid added: 'There is a very important part of it for the Home Secretary and I want to see justice done at all times and we've got a legitimate extradition request so I've signed it but the final decision is now with the courts.'
Assange's father John Shipton said after visiting his son: 'It was just very moving to see Julian, particularly in those circumstances, coming out of sick bay and having lost 10kg weight.'