Australia discreetly seeks through diplomatic channels the release of the founder of WikiLeaks, Julian Assangewho is closer to being extradited from the UK to the USaccording to information released by the local press that the Prime Minister, Anthony Albanese, avoided denying this Monday.
An anonymous government source revealed to the Sydney Morning Herald that the matter of Assange and his release has been raised by representatives of the Albanese government to high-ranking US officials, according to an article published Sunday.
Asked this Monday about the matter, Albanese recalled in Melbourne that he already made his position clear when he was leader of the opposition and was in favor of Assang’s releasee, but avoided confirming the information explicitly.
“I intend to lead a government that is related diplomatically and appropriately with our partners,” Albanese said tersely, without elaborating.
Last December, when he was still leader of the opposition, Albanese claimed that the WikiLeaks founder “he has already paid a great price for the publication of that information” and that he did not see the use of “the continued persecution of Mr. Assange”.
Despite his discretion, Albanese’s statements today represent a shift in the position of the former ruling Liberal-National coalition, which was in power from 2014 until last May, and which considered that Assange’s case was in the hands of the justice of his two alliesUnited Kingdom and United States.
For the wife of the WikiLeaks founder, Stella Assange, Canberra’s new approach also gives her a “sense of change” in direction, as she told the Australian public broadcaster ABC, although she added that she finds it “obvious” that “the Australian government talk to your closest allies to close this case.”
Assange, accused of 18 crimes of espionage and computer intrusion, following the revelations of his website about US abuses in Guantánamo (Cuba), Iraq and Afghanistan, is closer to being delivered to that country after the British Minister of the Interior, Priti Patel, signed the extradition order last Friday.
After the signature of the minister, after a British court authorized the delivery of Assange on April 20 to be considered by the United Kingdom Government, the defense has 14 days to appeal the decision.
Assange’s legal team – who has been confined in the UK for more than ten years without being convicted and has been in Belmarsh High Security Prison since 2019east of London – believes that the Australian journalist can be sentenced in the United States up to 175 years in prison in that country.