After years of legal struggle, it is now up to the British Home Secretary to approve the WikiLeaks founder’s extradition order.
British justice formally authorized on Wednesday April 20 the extradition of the founder of WikiLeaks Julian Assange to the United States who want to try him for espionage, after years of judicial standoff.
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Westminster Magistrates Court, London, has formally issued an extradition order and it is now up to UK Home Secretary Priti Patel to approve it, although defense lawyers can still appeal to the court. the High Court.
Caught in a long legal saga, the 50-year-old Australian is wanted by the American courts who want 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 in Afghanistan. Prosecuted in particular under legislation against espionage, Julian Assange faces 175 years in prison, in a case denounced by human rights organizations as a serious attack on freedom of the press. On March 14, he had seen one of his last hopes of avoiding his extradition disappear, with the refusal of the British Supreme Court to examine his appeal.
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