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The Extradition of Julian Assange and the Assault on the Free Press

In 2019, the Trump administration charged WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange with 17 counts of espionage and one count of conspiracy. The Trump administration now seeks to extradite Assange from London to face up to 175 years in US prison. In February 2020, Marjorie Cohn reported for Truthout how the extradition of Assange would deal a mighty blow to the free press as it would send ripples of fear across the world of journalism.

In 2006, Assange co-created WikiLeaks to provide whistleblowers a platform to inform the world and possibly even hold international governments and corporations accountable for their crimes against humanity. Since then, WikiLeaks has exposed a trove of authenticated, classified information, including the Guantanamo Files, the Collateral Murder video, and nearly 400,000 field reports from the Iraq War, that have been the bases for significant news reports by both corporate and independent news outlets.

Since 2012, Assange was living in isolated asylum  at the Ecuadoran Embassy in London. On May 1, 2019, United Kingdom officials seized and sentenced Assange to fifty weeks in jail for jumping bail in a case that dated back to 2012.

The 2003 extradition treaty between the US and UK declared extraditions on the basis of “political offense” to be unlawful. This term in itself does not have a concrete definition, however espionage is heavily associated with “offenses directed against state power.” WikiLeaks release of whistleblower-sourced information is inherently political.

Assange is also in peril of being tortured upon a successful extradition to the United States, and over 70 doctors have written the UK’s Home Secretary warning they fear Assange may die in the Belmarsh prison, according to independent investigative journalist Andy Worthington in London. The Convention against Torture forbids the extradition of people in imminent danger of being violently persecuted.

Last year, a US Grand Jury remanded Chelsea Manning, a collaborator who in 2009 provided WikiLeaks documentation of war crimes committed in Iraq, to solitary confinement for nearly a year and fined her $256,000 for noncompliance in the case as she refused to testify against Assange. She was released early in 2020, but was still ordered to pay the fine. This suggests Assange is destined to a similar long-term fate. Further, the deliverance of Assange to US soil would be a direct assault on protections for journalists and their sources, which are much needed for any press to be truly free and adequately inform the public.

Trump has targeted Assange as a fugitive because Assange disclosed information that the US government did not want publicized. Trump has taken this opportunity to paint Assange as an example to other journalists of the consequences they could face if they critique US policies and actions using sensitive information or whistleblower sources.

Cohn, a civil rights attorney, argues that Assange is within free speech and press protections by publishing classified information, citing that there is no legal basis for his continued captivity nor his extradition.

Corporate media have mostly either ignored the plight of Assange or openly attacked him and WikiLeaks. Reports of Assange’s rapidly deteriorating psychological health and previous video surveillance by the CIA while in asylum have not been widely reported outside a few independent sources. If journalists and publishers are being punished for providing materials that allow the public to take a critically informed stance of government policies, then what more is the media than a platform for governments to stipulate agendas to force upon their people?

Sources:

Marjorie Cohn, “Extradition of Assange Would Set a Dangerous Precedent,” Truthout, February 17, 2020, https://truthout.org/articles/extradition-of-assange-would-set-a-dangerous-precedent/.

“Julian Assange: Campaigner or Attention Seeker?” BBC, November 19, 2019, https://www.bbc.com/news/world-11047811.

Andy Worthington, “Over 70 Doctors Write to UK Home Secretary Priti Patel Expressing Fears That Julian Assange May Die in Belmarsh Prison,” andyworthington.co.uk, November 28, 2019, https://www.andyworthington.co.uk/2019/11/28/over-70-doctors-write-to-uk-home-secretary-priti-patel-expressing-fears-that-julian-assange-may-die-in-belmarsh-prison/.

Student Researchers: Haley Hatch (Sonoma State University) and Troy Patton (Diablo Valley College)

Faculty Evaluators: Peter Phillips (Sonoma State University) and Mickey Huff (Diablo Valley College)

The post The Extradition of Julian Assange and the Assault on the Free Press appeared first on Project Censored.

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