Canberra-Sana
Australian Deputy Prime Minister Barnaby Joyce and a group of politicians have called for a halt to the extradition of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange to the United States.
"Why should Assange be sent to the United States on criminal charges when he did not commit the alleged crimes on American soil in the first place," Joyce said in a press statement today.
"Assange did not break any laws as he was not in the United States when the event which is now being examined took place in a London court, so they should try him there for any crime he allegedly committed on British soil or return him to his native Australia," he added.
For his part, independent Senator Rex Patrick said that the Australian government did not put enough pressure on the United States and the United Kingdom on the issue and that this government should use the opportunity to pressure the administration of President Joe Biden on the extradition of Assange.
In recent weeks, several Australian politicians have made statements in support of Assange and refused to extradite him to the United States.
And Julian Assange, an Australian in his fifties, faces 18 charges related to the disclosure by WikiLeaks, which he created, of nearly 500,000 secret files on the wars and crimes committed by the United States in Afghanistan and Iraq, while he is being held in Britain, which recently decided to extradite him to Washington.
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