Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva. Photo: AP/Gustavo Moreno.
The Brazilian president has voiced concern over the apparently āimminent extraditionā of WikiLeaks co-founder Julian Assange to the US.
Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva has described the detention of Assange as an attack on democracy and freedom of the press. The WikiLeaks co-founder is set to make aĀ āfinalāĀ appeal to the High Court in the UK, after his latest motion to block a US extraditionĀ requestĀ was rejected.
āI look with concern at the imminent extradition of journalist Julian Assange. Assange has done an important job to denounce the illegal actions of one state against another,āĀ LulaĀ saidĀ in a tweet on Saturday.
Assangeās wife, Stella, said on Thursday that her husband would seek anotherĀ āpublic hearing before two new judges at the High Court,āĀ adding thatĀ āwe remain optimistic that we will prevail.ā
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āIt is important that we all mobilize in his defense,āĀ the Brazilian leader added, emphasizing that the prolonged detention of the WikiLeaks co-founderĀ āgoes against the defense of democracy and freedom of the press.ā
After attending the coronation of King Charles III in London last month, Lula denounced Assangeās detention as anĀ āembarrassmentāĀ and aĀ ācrazy thing.āĀ The Australian national, who has been languishing in Londonās Belmarsh high security prison since 2019, recently wrote in a letter to King Charles thatĀ āas a political prisoner, held at Your Majestyās pleasure on behalf of an embarrassed foreign sovereign, I am honored to reside within the walls of this world-class institution,āĀ inviting the monarch to visit the facility.
Assange was arrested after Ecuador revoked his asylum status and allowed police to remove him from the countryās embassy in London. On the day of his arrest, the US Department of Justice served Assange with 17 charges under the Espionage Act, which could potentiallyĀ see him sentenced toĀ 175 years in prison.
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The charges stem from his publication of classified material obtained by whistleblowers, including classified documents alleging US war crimes in Iraq and Afghanistan. Although Assange did not personally hack the materials, he was still charged for his role in publishing them.
His defense team is currently fighting a US extradition request, but a previous appeal of the June 2020 extradition order was rejected earlier this week. On June 6, Justice Jonathan Swift of the High Court of England and Wales rejected all eight grounds for his motion, giving the WikiLeaks publisher a five-day deadline to make his case to a two-judge panel.
According to Reporters Without Borders (RSF), next weekās appeal will be Assangeās last opportunity to fight extradition from the UK, unless he brings his case to the European Court of Human Rights.
(RT)
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