Big win for Julian Assange: WikiLeaks’ founder given permission to appeal against US extradition

It was a big win for WikiLeaks' founder Julian Assange after the London High Court ruled on Monday (May 20) that the US assurances over his case were unsatisfactory and he would get a full appeal hearing, the news agency Reuters reported.

In a short ruling, two senior judges of the high courtsaid the USsubmissions were not sufficient and said they would allow the appeal to go ahead.

In March,the courtprovisionally gaveAssange, 52, permission to appeal on three grounds. But it gave the USthe opportunity to provide satisfactory assurances that it would not seek the death penalty and would allow him to seek to rely on a First Amendment right to free speech in a trial.

Earlier in the day,Assange'swife Stella arrived at the London High Court ahead of the judgment. Addressing a press conference, Stella said she hoped the court would do the rightthing,and pass a judgment in herhusband'sfavour.

"We hopethat thecourts do the right thing today and find inJulian’sfavour. But if theydon’t, we will take an emergency injunction, wewill seek an emergency injunction from the European Court of Human Rights,"Stella said.

Who is Julian Assange?

Born in 1971, Julian Assange is an Australian editor and activist. He launched WikiLeaks in 2006.

WikiLeaks gained prominence in April 2010 when it published a classified video showing a 2007 UShelicopter attack that killed a dozen people inIraq'scapitalBaghdad. The website has released thousands of classified US military documents on the war inAfghanistan,and hundreds of thousands of US secret files on the Iraq war.

Assange had been battling extradition from the United Kingdom (UK) to the US,where heis wantedon criminal charges over the release of confidentialAmerican military records and diplomatic cables.

Whatwould'vehappenedifAssangewas extradited?

IfAssangewasextradited, the 52-year-oldwould have faced a sentence of up to 175 years in a maximum security prison.

Assange was first arrested in the UK in 2010on a Swedish warrant over sex crime allegations thatwere later dropped. Since then,he has been under house arrest, holed up inEcuador'sembassy in London for seven yearsand, since 2019, held in the Belmarsh top security jail, while awaiting a ruling on his extradition.

If the high court judges had ruled that the extradition could go ahead,Assange'slegal avenues in the UK would have been exhaustedandhis lawyers wouldturn to the European Court of Human Rights for an emergency injunction blocking deportation pending a full hearing by that court, Reuters reported.

But in this case, the judges rejected the US assurances, and Assange has permission toappeal his extradition caseandthe appeal might not be hearduntil next year.

(With inputs from agencies)