March 26 (UPI) — Britain’s High Court ruled Tuesday that WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange can mount a fresh appeal against extradition to the United States on spying charges unless Washington provides assurances his First Amendment rights will be protected.
The two-judge panel gave the United States three weeks to clarify whether Assange would be permitted to rely on the constitutional free speech defense, even though he is Australian, and that he will not face the death sentence, the maximum penalty for espionage.
“If those assurances are not given, then leave to appeal will be given and there will then be an appeal hearing,” the 66-page judgment said.
“If assurances are given, then the parties will have a further opportunity to make representations” for and against at a May 20 hearing to make a final ruling on whether to grant Assange leave to appeal.
“Mr. Assange will not, therefore, be extradited immediately,” the ruling states, adding that Assange had “a real prospect of success on three of the nine grounds of appeal” he has been pursuing.
Speaking outside the Royal Courts of Justice in central London, Julian Assange’s wife, Stella Assange, said she was stunned by the decision to further delay his appeal when he had been on high-security prison remand since April 2019.
“Yet what the courts have done is to invite a political intervention from the United States. I find this astounding,” she said.
Julian Assange has been fighting extradition since the U.S. Justice Department’s formal request in 2019 with a series of unsuccessful legal battles culminating with then-Home Secretary Priti Patel signing an extradition warrant in June 2022, three months after the High Court refused to grant him permission to appeal.
He launched the current, final, legal bid in the high court to halt the process last month.
U.S. prosecutors allege he put lives at risk when he helped U.S. Army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning steal diplomatic cables and classified military files and published them on his whistleblowing website in 2010.
He is facing 17 charges of espionage and one charge of computer misuse over Wikileaks’ publication of the documents.
Julian Assange’s legal team contends his actions were standard journalistic practice of sourcing and publishing information the public has a legitimate right to know and that he is being persecuted for exposing criminality by the U.S. government.
U.S. government legal counsel James Lewis said in written submissions that Julian Assange’s actions “threatened damage to the strategic and national security interests of the United States” and exposed those named in the files, including Iraqis and Afghans loyal to U.S. forces — to the risk of “serious physical harm.”
In February, Australian lawmakers passed a motion with the backing of the government, calling for Julian Assange to be handed back to Australia.
The motion’s sponsor, MP Andrew Wilkie, said it sent “a very powerful political signal to the British government and to the U.S. government that the British government should not entertain the idea of Mr. Assange being extradited to the U.S.”
Wilkie added that removing Julian Assange from the United Kingdom to face trial would be a direct attack on press freedom, setting a “frightening precedent for all journalists that they, too, are at risk of being locked up just for doing their job.”
Australia has also raised Julian Assange’s case directly with the United States.
