Main media retailers urge U.S. to finish prosecution of Julian Assange By Reuters

© Reuters. FILE PHOTO: WikiLeaks’ founder Julian Assange leaves Westminster Magistrates Court docket in London, Britain January 13, 2020. REUTERS/Simon Dawson/File Photograph

By Kanishka Singh

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – America ought to finish its prosecution of Julian Assange, main media retailers from america and Europe that had collaborated with the WikiLeaks founder stated on Monday, citing press freedom issues.

“This indictment units a harmful precedent, and threatens to undermine America’s First Modification and the liberty of the press,” editors and publishers of the Guardian, the New York Instances, Le Monde, Der Spiegel, and El País stated in an open letter.

Assange is needed by U.S. authorities on 18 counts, together with a spying cost, associated to WikiLeaks’ launch of confidential U.S. army data and diplomatic cables. His supporters say he’s an anti-establishment hero who has been victimized as a result of he uncovered U.S. wrongdoing, together with in conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Monday marked twelve years since these media retailers collaborated to launch excerpts from over 250,000 paperwork obtained by Assange within the so-called “Cablegate” leak.

The fabric was leaked to WikiLeaks by the then American soldier Chelsea Manning and revealed the internal workings of U.S. diplomacy across the globe. The paperwork uncovered “corruption, diplomatic scandals and spy affairs on a world scale,” the letter stated.

In August, a bunch of journalists and attorneys sued the CIA and its former director Mike Pompeo over allegations the intelligence company spied on them after they visited Assange throughout his keep in Ecuador’s embassy in London.

Assange spent seven years within the embassy earlier than being dragged out and jailed in 2019 for breaching bail situations. He has remained in jail in London whereas his extradition case is determined. If extradited to america, he faces a sentence of as much as 175 years in an American most safety jail.

His authorized workforce has appealed to the Excessive Court docket in London to dam his extradition in a authorized battle that has dragged on for greater than a decade.

“Publishing just isn’t a criminal offense,” the media retailers stated of their letter on Monday.