Russian Foreign Ministry spokesman Maria Zakharova called the decision of the Court of Appeal of England and Wales to authorize the extradition of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange to the United States shameful. The statement was published on Zakharova’s Telegram channel.
“The Court of Appeal in England and Wales has authorized the extradition of Assange to the United States. This shameful verdict in the framework of the political case against the journalist and public figure is another manifestation of the cannibalistic worldview of the Anglo-Saxon tandem, ”Zakharova said. According to her, in this way the West “honorably” marked the International Day of Human Rights and the end of the “Summit of Democracies”.
Assange’s case will be returned to the trial court; Westminster Magistrates’ Court in January rejected the US Justice Department’s request to extradite Assange, citing concerns about the convict’s mental health. Later, the Ministry of Justice appealed the decision, which was considered on Friday. Assange’s defense has the right to appeal the decision.
Assange faces 18 criminal charges in the United States and faces a total of up to 175 years in prison. They are associated with the publication by WikiLeaks of tens of thousands of classified documents of the US government, including diplomatic correspondence and information about the crimes of the American army in third countries.
The 50-year-old Australian has been held in London’s Belmarsh prison since April 2019, where he ended up due to failure to appear in court in 2012. Then, charges of sexual assault were brought against Assange in Sweden, which he called ordered. He was detained in the UK, but released on bail. Britain had to resolve the issue of his extradition, but Assange took refuge in the Ecuadorian embassy in London, where he received political asylum. The Swedish prosecutor’s office later closed the rape case.
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