Wikileaks, Assange's extradition is 'dangerously close'

According to Wikileaks, the extradition to the US of Julian Assange, locked up in the maximum security prison of Belmarsh in London, could be "dangerously close" after a new appeal presented to the British High Court in order to stop the process for the transfer of the Australian activist was rejected.

Single judge Jonathan Swift, the same judge who last year rejected the appeal filed by NGOs against the Conservative government's controversial plan to transfer asylum seekers to Rwanda, reiterated the validity of the extradition order issued a year ago by the then Home Secretary, Priti Patel.

But Stella Assange, the wife of the founder of Wikileaks, does not give up and announces that a "new appeal application to the High Court" will be presented as early as next week and in that case will be evaluated by two new judges in a public hearing. The line chosen by Assange's lawyers is to question the order issued by the British government as it would violate the treaty with the US according to which extradition cannot be granted for political crimes.