Savannah Hulsey Pointer, FISM News
A British High Court has ruled that Wikileaks founder Julian Assange can be extradited to the United States to face more than a dozen espionage charges over information illegally gathered and distributed.
This most recent ruling overturned a January ruling that had denied the United States request to extradite the whistleblower, citing Assange’s mental health as a reason he should not be turned over to American authorities.
The court’s opinion changed in its more recent decision due to several promises made by the United States via a diplomatic note dated Feb. 5, 2021, according to a court filing. Included in those assurances was the promise that the U.S. would not implement “special administrative measures” against Assange before his trial or after according to The Hill. However, that promise was subject to change “in the event that, after entry of this assurance, he was to commit any future act that met the test for the imposition of” those measures.
Other assurances by the U.S. were that he would be allowed to serve any sentence for crimes committed in Australia and that the U.S. would provide clinical and psychological treatment for Assange while he was held in custody. Additionally, officials said he would not be kept at the maximum-security facility in Colorado at the time leading up to his trial.
“It is accordingly clear that” [the diplomatic note] contains solemn undertakings, offered by one government to another, which will bind all officials and prosecutors who will deal with the relevant aspects of Mr. Assange’s case now and in the future,” the court said in its ruling.
“We see no merit in the criticisms made of the individual assurances. The reality is that this court is being invited to reject the USA’s assurances either on the basis that they are not offered in good faith or that they are for some other reason not capable of being accepted at face value,” the ruling added.
Assange’s fiancée Stella Moris has spoken out about the upcoming U.S. trial, calling the decision to allow Assange to stand trial in the United States a “grave miscarriage of justice,” according to a WikiLeaks Twitter post saying that the ruling would be appealed “at the earliest possible moment,” according to the Reuters news service.
CBS News quoted Moris as having called the court’s reasoning into question, saying, “I want to emphasize that the High Court accepted all the medical evidence and the conclusions of the magistrate that if Julian is extradited and placed under extreme conditions of isolation, it will drive him to take his own life — that extradition is oppressive.’
Julian Assange fiancee @StellaMoris1: “How can it be fair, how can it be right, how can it be possible, to extradite Julian to the very country which plotted to kill him?” #FreeAssangeNOW #AssangeCase https://t.co/0K3ojEkwaK pic.twitter.com/b2q7Nz6RwL
— WikiLeaks (@wikileaks) December 10, 2021
“Yet the High Court decided against Julian on this occasion on the basis of political assurances, non-assurances, that the U.S. has given to the U.K. government. I say non-assurances — Amnesty International says non-assurances — Amnesty International has analyzed these assurances and has said that they are inherently unreliable. They incorporate the possibility of breaking those assurances in their very wording.”
Currently, Assange is facing multiple charges of violations of the Espionage Act, according to The New York Times, and officials alleged that he was guilty of obtaining military and diplomatic information illegally.