Issued on: 06/01/2021 -
London (AFP)
WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange will have to remain in custody in Britain, pending a US appeal of the decision to block his extradition to face charges for leaking secret documents, a judge in London ruled Wednesday.
Judge Vanessa Baraitser told Westminster Magistrates Court there were "substantial grounds for believing that if Mr Assange is released today he will fail to surrender" for the appeal hearings.
"Mr Assange still has an incentive to abscond from these as yet unresolved proceedings," she said.
"As a matter of fairness the United States must be able to challenge my decision. If Mr Assange absconds during this process then they will have lost the opportunity to do so."
The US had earlier urged Baraitser not to release the 49-year-old, while it prepares to challenge Baraitser's decision on mental health grounds to block his extradition to face charges for publishing secret documents.
Lawyer Clair Dobbin, representing the government in Washington, told the court there were "no conditions that could guarantee his surrender" if he were freed from custody.
"The history of his attempts to evade extradition to the United States demonstrated that he is capable of going to any length to avoid that possibility," she added.
Assange was in court to hear the application and ruling, two days after an unexpected decision Monday to block his removal to the United States on the grounds he was a suicide risk.
Dobbin said the court "should be under no doubt about his resources to abscond", pointing to his previous flouting of bail conditions, and an offer of political asylum, notably from Mexico.
But Assange's lawyer, Edward Fitzgerald, said he should be freed, after spending 15 months in custody awaiting the extradition proceedings.
"We say after all this time, after the long proceedings over a year... the court has given a decision and the decision has been that he should be discharged," he added.
- Diplomatic refuge -
Assange is wanted to face 18 charges relating to the 2010 release by WikiLeaks of 500,000 secret files detailing aspects of military campaigns in Afghanistan and Iraq.
Washington claims he helped intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning steal the 2010 documents before exposing confidential sources around the world.
He faces a possible 175-year sentence if convicted but Assange and his lawyers have long argued the case against him is politically motivated.
He has been held at the high-security Belmarsh prison in southeast London.
A previous request for bail in March on the grounds he was vulnerable to Covid-19 while behind bars was rejected because the judge assessed he was likely to abscond.
Assange sought sanctuary in Ecuador's embassy in 2012, after Sweden issued an arrest warrant in connection with sexual assault allegations.
He spent seven years at the South American country's London mission until the government in Quito revoked his citizenship.
British police dragged him out and arrested him in 2019.
He was then sentenced to 50 weeks in jail for breaching his bail terms in connection with the Swedish case, which was later dropped due to lack of evidence.
The UN called the sentence "disproportionate".
- 'Criminalising' journalism -
Assange's long-running legal woes have become a cause celebre for media freedom, even though the judge hearing the case said he did have a case to answer.
Baraitser on Monday said he would have been "well aware" of the effects of his leaking of secret documents, and his actions went "well beyond" the role of a journalist.
But she said extradition would be "oppressive" as his mental health would probably deteriorate in the US penal system, "causing him to commit suicide".
She rejected US experts' testimony that Assange would be protected from self-harm, noting that others such as disgraced US financier Jeffrey Epstein had managed to kill themselves in custody despite supervision.
UN rapporteur on torture Nils Melzer applauded the decision to block his extradition, and said he should be freed and compensated for his ordeal, which amounted to arbitrary detention.
The United States has called the ruling "extremely disappointing" and has faced calls from WikiLeaks, as well as rights and media freedom groups to drop the appeal.
© 2021 AFP
Issued on: 06/01/2021 -
Text by: NEWS WIRES
WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange will have to remain in custody, pending a US appeal that blocked his extradition to face charges for leaking secret documents, a judge ruled on Wednesday.
District Judge Vanessa Baraitser ordered Assange to remain in prison while the courts consider an appeal by U.S. authorities against a decision not to extradite him.
On Monday, the judge rejected an American request to send Assange to the U.S. to face espionage charges over WikiLeaks’ publication of secret military documents a decade ago.
She denied extradition on health grounds, saying the 49-year-old Australian was likely to kill himself if held under harsh U.S. prison conditions.
The judge said Wednesday that Assange “has an incentive to abscond” and there is a good chance he would fail to return to court if freed.
Assange has been detained at London’s high-security Belmarsh Prison since April 2019, when he was arrested for skipping bail during a separate legal battle seven years earlier.
District Judge Vanessa Baraitser was presiding over a bail hearing at Westminster Magistrates' Court, two days after she rejected an American request to send Assange to the U.S. to face espionage charges over WikiLeaks’ publication of secret military documents a decade ago.
The judge denied extradition on health grounds, saying the 49-year-old Australian is likely to kill himself if held under harsh U.S. prison conditions. The judge ruled "the mental condition of Mr. Assange is such that it would be oppressive to extradite him to the United States of America.”
Lawyers for the U.S. government say they will appeal the decision, and the U.S. Department of Justice says it will continue to seek Assange’s extradition.
Clair Dobbin, a British lawyer acting for the U.S., said Assange had shown he would go “to almost any length” to avoid extradition, and it was likely he would flee if granted bail.
She noted that Assange had spent seven years inside Ecuadorian Embassy in London after seeking refuge there from a Swedish extradition request in 2012.
Dobbin said Assange had the “resources, abilities and sheer wherewithal” to evade justice once again, and noted that Mexico has said it will offer him asylum.
But Assange's lawyer, Edward Fitzgerald, said the judge's decision to refuse extradition “massively reduces” any motivation to abscond.
"Mr. Assange has every reason to stay in this jurisdiction where he has the protection of the rule of law and this court’s decision," he said.
Fitzgerald also said Assange would be safer at home with his partner Stella Moris and two young sons — fathered while he was in the embassy — than in prison, where there is “a very grave crisis of Covid.”
>> Assange's extradition trial a test for press freedom, rights groups say
U.S. prosecutors have indicted Assange on 17 espionage charges and one charge of computer misuse over WikiLeaks’ publication of thousands of leaked military and diplomatic documents. The charges carry a maximum sentence of 175 years in prison.
U.S. prosecutors say Assange unlawfully helped U.S. Army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning steal classified diplomatic cables and military files that were later published by WikiLeaks.
Lawyers for Assange argue that he was acting as a journalist and is entitled to First Amendment protections of freedom of speech for publishing documents that exposed U.S. military wrongdoing in Iraq and Afghanistan.
The judge rejected that argument in her extradition ruling, saying Assange’s actions, if proven, would amount to offenses “that would not be protected by his right to freedom of speech.” She also said the U.S. judicial system would give him a fair trial.
Assange’s legal troubles began in 2010, when he was arrested in London at the request of Sweden, which wanted to question him about allegations of rape and sexual assault made by two women. In 2012, Assange jumped bail and sought refuge inside the Ecuadorian Embassy, where he was beyond the reach of U.K. and Swedish authorities — but also effectively was a prisoner in the tiny diplomatic mission.
The relationship between Assange and his hosts eventually soured, and he was evicted from the embassy in April 2019. British police immediately arrested him for breaching bail in 2012.
Sweden dropped the sex crimes investigations in November 2019 because so much time had elapsed, but Assange has remained in prison throughout his extradition hearing.
(AP)
Julian Assange has been refused bail by a London court on Wednesday, two days after successfully avoiding extradition to the U.S. to face charges of breaking a spying law and conspiring to obtain secret documents by hacking government computers.
Lawyers had previously sought bail for the WikiLeaks co-founder, but did so with more confidence after Monday's ruling by judge Vanessa Baraitser that procedures in U.S. prisons might not prevent him from potentially taking his own life.
Assange has been held at the maximum-security Belmarsh prison in southeast London for the past 18 months after being evicted from the Ecuadorian embassy, where he sought asylum for seven years.
On Monday, Baraitser supported arguments by lawyers for the U.S. that Assange should be extradited for publishing vast quantities of military and diplomatic secrets. But she also heard extensive evidence that after years of what Assange's partner Stella Moris described as political persecution, the activist was now a "depressed and sometimes despairing man."
Twice mentioning the suicide of billionaire Jeffrey Epstein, who killed himself on remand in New York two years ago, Baraitser ruled against extradition. The U.S. penal system, she said, was apparently incapable of preventing him from committing suicide.
Flushed with the success of keeping Assange inside UK borders, lawyers sought to make him free to reside in Britain with his partner and two children.
They say conditions at Belmarsh, where he has been held on remand for the past 20 months, are inhuman. His supporters claim the overwhelming majority of inmates on his wing have been infected with COVID-19.
However, Baraitser will have been acutely aware that after previously being bailed by a British court Assange spent seven years in the Ecuadorian Embassy to escape charges of sex crimes in Sweden – charges which he fully denied and which were eventually dropped.
Mexico President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador had hailed the British court's Monday ruling as a "triumph of justice," adding that his country would offer Assange political asylum if the UK freed him. Such support might have hindered Assange's case.
However, it remains to be seen if the incoming White House administration under Joe Biden continues to seek Assange's extradition.
Assange was sought for trial by U.S. prosecutor Zachary Terwilliger, but the Donald Trump appointee has recently announced he is stepping down as the U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia – and publicly expressed doubt as to whether the case will continue.
"It will be very interesting to see what happens with this case," he said. "There'll be some decisions to be made. Some of this does come down to resources and where you're going to focus your energies."
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