Analyst:

Julian Assange will be humiliated if extradited to US

WikiLeaks founder and Australian whistleblower Julian Assange will face a humiliating trial in the US for his alleged leaking of classified documents if London bows to Washington’s pressure and extradite him to the US, a British analyst in New York says.

News ID: 444656

Date: 03 May 2019 - 18:42

RNA - “With the US there is a very little chance of him having a fair trial,” said Ian Williams in an interview.

"He will be certainly treated to humiliating and degrading punishments ... it’s the nature of the US penal system.”

Assange, held in a prison in London since he was arrested in the Ecuadoran embassy last month, faces extradition to the US for his alleged collaboration with former US Army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning to illegally publish hundreds of thousands of government documents in 2010.

Assange has consistently denied the allegations, saying his decision was purely journalistic and meant to expose crimes and abuse of power by people in the US military and government.

Australian whistleblower Julian Assange will face a humiliating trial in the US for his alleged leaking of classified documents if London bows to Washington’s pressure and extradite him to the US, a British analyst in New York says.

A court ruling on Wednesday sentenced Assange to almost a year in prison for skipping bail in June 2012, when he escaped to the Ecuadorian embassy.

Williams said the trial was not fair because he was trying to avoid an arrest warrant from Sweden, where he faced sexual assault charges.

“Assange had a good reason for skipping bail, there were a complete refusal by the Swedes and the British to rule out the possibility of extradition to the US,” said Williams.

“It has always been obfuscated that Swedes had refused to rule out the idea of extraditing him to the US.”

“Unfortunately the British courts have traditionally adhered to a treaty that makes it almost automatic that if a US jurisdiction requests an extradition, the UK will give it,” he said.

Williams said it was a duty for the British government to defend Assange in the face of wrong allegations in the US.

“It would be good to get a British government that would stand up to the US saying what you are accusing these people of doing was in fact journalistic behavior,” he said.

According to Press TV, Assange told a British court on Thursday that he would not surrender to a request for extradition to the United States where he would face trial for one of the largest compromises of classified information in US history.

Assange, 47, is wanted by the US government for publishing classified documents related to the Iraq and Afghanistan wars that were leaked by American whistleblower Chelsea Manning.

Assange was granted asylum by Ecuador’s former president Rafael Correa, after he took refuge in the country’s embassy in 2012. Ecuador's current president, Lenin Moreno, however, revoked the asylum and allowed police to arrest him last month.

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