The surroundings of the imposing neo-Gothic building that houses the Royal Courts of Justice, in London, are a regular scene of protests.
This Tuesday's, however, has exceeded expectations.
“Everyone is watching us,” Stella Assange, the wife of the co-founder of the Wikileaks leak portal, Julian Assange, told hundreds of people gathered.
It is the legendary phrase chanted in 1968 by demonstrators protesting in Chicago against the Vietnam War.
And an encouragement for the dozens of citizens who have come to express their solidarity with Assange, like the Colombian Daniela, who arrived first thing in the morning and kept holding up one of the now famous posters with the face of the
former hacker
and his mouth gagged by the American flag
.
Julian Assange's wife, Stella Assange, entered the High Court of Justice in London this Tuesday.TOLGA AKMEN (EFE)
Daniela was one of the first, but it didn't take long for the street to be filled with activists.
The international campaign organized to prevent the extradition to the United States of the person who today represents more than anyone the need to defend freedom of the press has brought before the doors of the court relevant speakers committed to Assange's cause.
Two judges, Victoria Sharp and Jeremy Johnson, will hear the arguments of Assange's defense and the US Government throughout Tuesday and Wednesday.
They must decide, in a preliminary hearing that has attracted immense global attention, whether to grant Wikileaks founder
a last opportunity to legally argue his case before British justice
,
or if they give the definitive green light to his extradition to the United States, where he will be accused of 17 crimes against the Espionage Act and one for computer interference.
The Australian editor would face 175 years in prison for the leak of more than 250,000 classified documents from the US State Department in November 2010. EL PAÍS was one of the media that participated in that concerted effort to publish these papers.
“The idea that Julian could be accused of violating the US Espionage Act, the same one that was applied to Daniel Ellsberg [the man responsible for leaking the Pentagon Papers, which revealed the lies about Vietnam] and others, is outrageous” Jeremy Corbyn, the former leader of the British Labor Party, said on stage.
“This court has the opportunity today to allow Assange to have his case heard, for justice to be done and for him to finally be a free man.”
Assange, who has been in the Belmarsh maximum security prison, on the outskirts of London, for five years, was not present on the first day of the trial.
She, too, has not connected via videoconference, as on other occasions.
Her lawyer, Ed Fitzgerald, has explained that she was not in good health.
Judge Sharp wanted to make it clear, at the beginning of the appearance, that she had not placed any obstacle to this remote presence.
Assange's defense was the first to present its arguments before the magistrates.
From the beginning they have denounced the political nature that, according to them, hides the judicial process.
“The accusation is politically motivated.
Mr. Assange exposed serious criminal acts to the public, and has been persecuted for carrying out a common journalistic practice: obtaining and publishing classified information that was truthful and of public interest,” said Fitzgerald.
“It is an abuse of the judicial process to demand extradition for a political offense,” the lawyer denounced.
The former hacker
's legal team
has also reminded the court, to counteract the guarantees on the life or health of the prisoner offered by the US Government, of the CIA plot to try to assassinate him in 2017, when he was locked up in the Ecuadorian embassy in London.
“Even then there were red warning flags,” explained lawyer Mark Summers, also part of the defense.
“The plan only fell apart when the British authorities showed their disgust at the idea of a possible shootout on the streets of London.”
In defense of press freedom
Assange's cause has become the worldwide cause for press freedom.
The pressure of the campaign in favor of her release is not so much directed towards the judges who have been passing a hot iron between them, but towards the American and British governments, which have in their hands the possibility of stopping the persecution.
“This never had to be a matter resolved in court.
And you don't have to continue down that path.
Let's continue asking the United States to release Assange," Rebecca Vincent, head of the campaign for the
ex-hacker
's release on behalf of the organization Reporters Without Borders, exclaimed before the protesters.
“The publication of the classified
Wikileaks
documents in 2010 generated journalism in defense of the public interest throughout the world.
We know that he exposed war crimes and human rights violations.
And only the man who allowed all of this to be published has been prosecuted.
If he is extradited to the United States, a very dangerous precedent will be set for any journalist or journalistic organization that works with classified information,” Vincent warned.
"If he is extradited, the chilling impact will be enormous. It will impact media around the world and it will impact all of our right to know"@Rebecca_Vincent#FreeAssangeNOW pic.twitter.com/KyJpucGdPY
— Free Assange - #FreeAssange (@FreeAssangeNews) February 20, 2024
The decision to give the green light to Assange's extradition was adopted in 2022 by the then British Minister of the Interior, Priti Patel, once the Supreme Court approved the guarantees offered by Washington on the prisoner's safety, and on the measures that would be adopted to prevent him from ending his own life.
But the insistence on persecuting the founder of
Wikileaks
arose from the Government of Donald Trump.
Former President of the United States Barack Obama had already commuted the sentence of soldier Chelsea Manning, the main source of the secret US security documents published by the portal, and which brought to light
serious
episodes
of
dirty war in Iraq or Afghanistan.
“All those who committed those war crimes have been freed, and have even benefited financially from those crimes.
And Julian, who threw truth in the face of power, must face trial.
The British system, the British government, the American government, and an entire deeply corrupt system should be judged,” said Andrew Feinstein, former deputy of the South African African National Congress, Nelson Mandela's party.
He was one of those who came from all over the world to protest before the London court.
The two justices could announce their decision at the end of Wednesday's session, although it will take them several days to publish their reasoning.
In this way, they could contribute to speeding up Assange's surrender.
If they rule in favor of the prisoner, they would give the green light for the British justice system to debate again the legality or illegality of the extradition.
The last option remains, if the attempt by the lawyers of the founder of
Wikileaks
fails , to go to the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) in Strasbourg.
But even if they obtained a stop-handing order from this court, it remains to be seen what the reaction of Rishi Sunak's British Government would be.
It is precisely these ECHR orders that paralyzed London's attempts to deport irregular migrants to Rwanda.
Downing Street and the hardline Conservative Party have since conspired to ignore these requirements, even if it means disobeying international legality.
Activists gathered this Tuesday before the London Court of Justice, this Tuesday. Alberto Pezzali (AP/ LaPresse)
Follow all the international information on
and
X
, or in
our weekly newsletter
.
Subscribe to continue reading
Read without limits
Keep reading
I am already a subscriber
_