A Judge in United Kingdom has ruled that WikiLeaks’ founder Julian Assange should not be extradited to the United States to face charges of breaking a spying law and conspiring to hack government computers, Reuters reported.
Judge Vanessa Baraitser said that, while Assange had exceeded the role of a journalist, the risk to his mental and physical wellbeing was too great. The US has already committed to appealing the ruling, and the case is likely to end up in the British Supreme Court, a process likely to take several years, Engadget reported.
Wikileaks was founded in 2006, but received global attention in 2010 after publishing a series of documents about the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. The site would go on to publish leaked material from the State Department, Guantanamo Bay and the Democratic National Committee. Assange’s critics in the US believe that he has received material from hostile nation-state actors, including Russia.
The 49-year-old Australian is wanted in the US on charges of espionage and conspiracy to commit computer hacking after working with whistleblower Chelsea Manning. In both the UK and US, advocates for Mr. Assange believe that his work does constitute journalism and, as such, extradition would be a violation of press freedom. In her judgment, Baraitser dismissed such claims, saying that Assange had previously encouraged people to join the US intelligence community in order to leak sensitive information.
More to follow…
