U.S. officials have promised not to impose the death penalty on Julian Assange if: He was extradited from the UK He faces charges for publishing documents that were highly embarrassing to the U.S. government, according to an Australian Bureau of Statistics report. abc news Tuesday. But that will be cold comfort to some in the British legal system, who argue that American prisons are so inherently cruel that even with such assurances, sending Assange to the United States would still constitute an inhumane act.
Officials at the U.S. Embassy in London reportedly sent a note to British officials on Tuesday to address some concerns about what might happen if Assange is eventually extradited to the United States. Some news media. The 52-year-old WikiLeaks co-founder faces computer hacking and espionage charges first brought by President Donald Trump’s Justice Department and continuing into the Biden era.
President Biden said last week he was willing to drop the charges against Assange, explain Asked about the Australian government’s request, “we are considering it”. Assange is an Australian citizen, although he has not lived in the country for some time, and one of the issues addressed in the diplomatic note is whether the First Amendment applies to people outside the United States – something the U.S. insists Assange’s lawyers can “address this problem”Increase”, without elaborating too much.
Megan Specia, a London correspondent for The New York Times, tweeted the three-page note Tuesday It included two carefully worded assurances, quoted below:
1. Assange may present a defense at trial and sentencing without prejudice because of his nationality. Specifically, if extradited, Assange would have the ability to raise and seek to rely on his First Amendment rights and protections at trial, including any sentencing hearing. Decisions regarding the applicability of the First Amendment are squarely within the purview of U.S. courts.
2. The death penalty will not be sought or sentenced to Assange. The United States is able to provide such assurances because Assange has not been charged with a crime that qualifies for the death penalty and the United States guarantees that he will not be tried for a crime that qualifies for the death penalty.
Assange has been held in London’s Belmarsh Prison since 2019, and a British judge ruled in 2021 that he should not be extradited due to the United States’ extremely brutal prison system. British judge Vanessa Baraitser cited Assange’s depression and the risk of suicide he would face in the United States when she first argued that Assange should not be extradited. unexpected ruling.
“Mr. Assange faces the bleak prospect of highly restrictive detention conditions designed to eliminate physical contact and reduce social interaction and contact with the outside world to a minimum. As a man who has been diagnosed with clinical depression and He faces these prospects as a person with persistent suicidal thoughts,” Judge Baraitser wrote. Back to 2021.
The judge’s ruling also noted that Assange could be held in solitary confinement for 23 hours a day while awaiting trial in the United States, a punishment widely considered torture in other wealthy countries.
Stella Assange, the wife of Julian Assange, issued a statement on Tuesday in response to the news that the United States sent diplomatic notes to the United Kingdom, calling the notes “blatantly dodgy remarks” that do not actually guarantee that Julian can be prosecuted under the First Amendment The case was protected. foreign citizens.
According to the Washington Post, Stella Assange said: “This diplomatic note does nothing to ease our family’s overwhelming grief over his future – as he lives in isolation in a U.S. prison for his award-winning journalism. Live the rest of your life.” AFP.
Lawyers for the U.S. and Assange are scheduled to reopen in a British court on May 20, though it’s unclear how many chances the WikiLeaks co-founder will have to appeal any decision that might result in him being eventually sent to the U.S.