If Jean-Luc Mélenchon is appointed Prime Minister, Julian Assange "
will be naturalized French
", promised the Insoumis leader Friday, June 17 at a press conference.
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The British government on Friday morning issued the decree for the extradition to the United States of the journalist and founder of WikiLeaks, prosecuted in the United States for a massive leak of confidential documents.
“
If I am Prime Minister on Monday, Mr. Julian Assange, I believe he has submitted the request, will be naturalized French and we will ask that he be evacuated to our
country”, declared the leader of the left alliance Nupes during a press conference in Paris on the last day of the legislative campaign.
Jean-Luc Mélenchon also said he wanted Julian Assange to be decorated.
“Dark day for press freedom”
Julian Assange, a 50-year-old Australian, is wanted by American justice who wants to try him for the dissemination, from 2010, of more than 700,000 classified documents on American military and diplomatic activities, in particular in Iraq and Afghanistan.
He faces 175 years in prison.
Read alsoA bill to better protect whistleblowers
After a long legal standoff with twists and turns, British justice had formally given the green light on April 20 to his surrender to American justice, but it was up to British Interior Minister Priti Patel to sign an extradition decree. , which she did on Friday.
WikiLeaks denounced "
a dark day for freedom of the press
" in a press release and announced that Julian Assange would appeal.
He can do it within 14 days.
This is not the first time that Jean-Luc Mélenchon has expressed his support for the founder of Wikileaks.
In November 2021, on Twitter, he was already asking France to "
give him the right of asylum and offer him nationality
".
