A march on Assange in London ahead of another extradition hearing

Hundreds of people demonstrated in the UK to demand the release of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, five days before the US extradition request is brought back to British courts.

The demonstration, which continued in central London before ending in front of the High Court of Justice, was led by several British Labor MPs, WikiLeaks editor Christine Hrafnsson and Stella Morris, an associate of the Australian journalist.

A poster carried by rally leaders, among them former Ecuadorean consul Fidel Narváez, who accompanied Internet activists during part of the seven years he was granted asylum in the diplomatic commission of the South American country, demanded in this capital.

The WikiLeaks founder has been held in a maximum security prison in London since the Ecuadorean government handed him over to British police in April 2019.

After a four-week trial in September 2020, a British judge refused to extradite him to the US courts, which want to prosecute him for exposing thousands of secret files that reveal war crimes committed by the US military in Afghanistan and Iraq. Other things.

The appeal hearing against the British District Court’s decision will take place in a higher court in the middle of next week, and if the extradition order is successful, Assange could be sentenced to 175 years in prison in the United States, under the 175 Espionage Act. The charges against him.

The new trial came against the recent revelations that senior CIA officials planned to kidnap and assassinate Assange while he was taking refuge in the Ecuadorean embassy, ​​and the testimony of a US attorney general witness that he lied in his statements against the Australian journalist. versus immunity. In this regard, Morris told Prensa Latina that it would be “completely incomprehensible” for British justice to agree to extradite the WikiLeaks founder, after announcing their planning to kidnap and assassinate him.

Hrafnsson also shares the opinion of his colleague’s partner and said he hopes the court will make the right decision and respect the ruling of the district judge, who opposed the extradition of Assange for fear of suicide in a US prison.

He stressed that this would be the only viable decision, otherwise it would be a devastating blow to the journalist’s future.

The former Ecuadorean consul indicated that the disclosure of the plot, which was published by the Yahoo news platform last month, confirmed previous complaints about kidnapping attempts, and even the assassination attempt on Assange inside the embassy.

According to Narváez, the accusations appeared in the court documents held in Madrid against the Spanish agency, which was responsible for the security of the Ecuadorean diplomatic mission in London during the Australian journalist’s stay.

(with information from Prensa Latina)