Julian Assange Granted Right to Appeal Against Extradition to America

Elvis Dunderhoff May 20 2024

It was obvious that the Biden people didn’t want this particular problem going on while they entered the election.

The UK doesn’t have an independent government and they just do whatever the Americans tell them to do. The Americans told them they didn’t want Assange yet.

The Guardian:

Julian Assange has been granted leave to mount a fresh appeal against his extradition to the US on charges of leaking military secrets and will be able to challenge assurances from American officials on how a trial there would be conducted.

Two judges had deferred a decision in March on whether Assange, who is trying to avoid being prosecuted in the US on espionage charges relating to the publication of thousands of classified and diplomatic documents, could take his case to another appeal hearing.

On that occasion, Dame Victoria Sharp and Mr Justice Johnson ruled he would be able to bring an appeal against extradition on three grounds, unless “satisfactory” assurances were given by the US.

The assurances requested were that he would be permitted to rely on the first amendment of the US constitution, which protects freedom of speech; that he would not be “prejudiced at trial” due to his nationality; and that the death penalty would not be imposed.

At a hearing at the high court in London on Monday, judges granted him leave to challenge his extradition on the grounds of whether any removal would be compatible with the right to freedom of expression under the European convention on human rights and on the grounds that he might be prejudiced at his trial or punished by reason of his nationality.

Assange’s team did not contest an assurance by the US that the death penalty would not be sought, accepting it was an “unambiguous executive promise”. But they argued that the situation was different in relation to any assurance that the Australian-born publisher could seek the same first amendment protections on free speech as a US citizen.

Edward Fitzgerald KC, representing Assange, said problems surrounding the assurances by the US were “multifold” and they did not rule out the possibility of a US court ruling that the WikiLeaks founder, as a foreigner, was not entitled to first amendment rights.

The assurance was not that Assange could “rely” on first amendment rights but “merely that he can seek to raise” them, Fitzgerald said.

Assange’s barrister also pointed to what he described as “the deafening silence” from US prosecutors including Gordon Kromberg, an assistant US attorney in the Eastern District of Virginia, where Assange would stand trial.

“Specific promises from prosecutors are pretty common. We will not object to bail. We will not seek the death penalty as in this case. No such specific assurance has been given here,” said Fitzgerald.

Despite the fact that this is obviously part of a political maneuver, it’s still good news that Julian has a bit more time to try to figure out some way out of this nightmare.

Anything is better than being tortured to death in an American gulag.