Controversy Over Assange’s Extradition
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LONDON - The High Court in London has made a decision that the founder of WikiLeaks, Julian Assange, will not be extradited to the United States immediately, demanding specific assurances from US authorities before extradition can proceed. This ruling comes after a prolonged legal battle and controversy surrounding Assange's extradition, who faces charges from US prosecutors related to the publication of confidential military documents and diplomatic correspondence from the US on WikiLeaks.
According to the High Court's decision, the USA must provide assurances that Assange will be able to invoke the amendment to the US Constitution protecting freedom of speech and that he will not face the death penalty if extradited. US authorities have until May 20 to provide these assurances for the extradition process to continue. This step represents a significant turning point in Assange's case and underscores the importance of protecting freedom of speech and human rights in legal proceedings related to media and journalism. Assange's legal defence team has welcomed the High Court's decision as a step towards fairer treatment and respect for the fundamental rights of the accused.
The extradition of Assange continues to be a matter of global concern due to its broader impact on press freedom, journalists' rights, and the state's approach to transparency and public interest. Meanwhile, Amnesty International has expressed a strong stance against Assange's extradition to the USA, highlighting concerns about potential human rights violations. The organization calls on US authorities to withdraw all charges against Assange, particularly those related to his journalistic activities, and to ensure respect for his rights in line with international legal standards.
The question for many remains: If Julian Assange and Edward Snowden claim to have acted for the greater good of society by exposing American state crimes—an assessment shared by nearly all journalists and human rights organizations—why did Edward Snowden choose to live in Russia, where the government commits many more and bigger crimes with no accountability and no freedom of expression? And, why did Julian Assange help manipulate the US election by harming Hillary Rodham Clinton through the illegal publication of emails (which demonstrated no wrongdoing), endangering democracy and freedom of the press by assisting in making Donald Trump president? Trump himself stated that he would like to be a dictator "for one day," a wish that failed on January 6, 2021, when his fellow Republicans, like Mike Pence, resisted alongside Democrats on Capitol Hill. On this "one day," hypothetically Trump could try to suspend the rule of the Constitution and try to put his opponents and all whistleblowers on death row. Did Julian Assange ultimately contribute to creating a danger that might threaten his own life in the future?
The ongoing debate surrounding their legacy will likely continue to be a subject of intense scrutiny and debate.
Cinema For Peace honoured in 2018 “The Post” by Steven Spielberg, starring Tom Hanks, Meryl Streep and Daniel Ellsberg - "the godfather” of all whistleblowers, who leaked the Pentagon Papers to the press in order to stop the Vietnam War. The illegal measures taken against him - by the same “plumber” team - can be seen as the beginning of “Watergate” and Nixon’s resignation. For Cinema for Peace, Ellsberg attended the Munich Security Conference and introduced the first “Political Film of the Year Award" at the Cinema For Peace Gala in 2019 and the Wikileaks team in Berlin.
Jaka Bizilj: “Julian Assange gave an incredibly valuable journalistic service to our global society, and was arrested illegally with a double honey trap in Sweden, which involved an alleged female intelligence person. But he did commit probably the biggest crime possible with Wikileaks: making a potential dictator Donald Trump president by manipulating news and public opinion with fake allegations, becoming a ‘useful idiot’ for Russia - if not even working directly for the likes of Russian intelligence such as Yevgeny Prigoszin and Vladimir Putin.”
Click to watch the trailer of "The Post"