Julian Assange to launch fresh extradition appeal in high court (UK)

[alp227]

Source: The Guardian

Julian Assange, the WikiLeaks founder wanted in Sweden over accusations of sexual assault, will launch a fresh appeal on Tuesday against his extradition at the high court in London.

The Australian will begin the latest stage of his legal challenge against attempts to send him to Sweden to face charges relating to alleged incidents with two women during a trip to Stockholm in August 2010. One accusation, that he had sex with a woman while she was asleep, would amount to rape under Swedish law if proved. Both women had previously had consenting sex with Assange. He denies any wrongdoing.

Swedish authorities secured a European arrest warrant in December and shortly afterwards he was detained by British police and bailed. At his first appeal in February, Westminster magistrates court – sitting at Belmarsh – ordered that he should be extradited, despite his defence alleging he would not get a fair trial and that the extradition attempt was politically motivated. The arrest warrant came as WikiLeaks was releasing thousands of classified US diplomatic cables it had obtained through a whistleblower.

Assange's legal team argued that the conduct of the Swedish prosecutor amounted to an "abuse of process" because the allegations against him were initially dismissed and then reopened, the prosecutor had refused Assange's offer of an interview and documents had not been made available to him in English. They also claimed the Swedish prosecutor, Marianne Ny, was "biased against men". Westminster magistrates found against Assange and ordered his extradition to Sweden.

Read more: http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2011/jul/11/julian-assange-extradition-appeal

[CJvR]

1. Impressive legal team...

...I wonder what legal team Assange have dispatched to the US to fight for his "whistelblower", the guy who incidentaly mabe Assange an international celebrity; a role he seems to enjoy, and who actually faces US justice in reality and not just in Assanges imagination

[Hissyspit]

2. Blah

[msanthrope]

3. Assange generously gave 15k of the millions he pulled down last year to Manning's

defense fund. He's laughing all the way to the bank.

[go west young man]

4. Bollocks.

And what of all the other whistleblowers that have contributed to Wikileaks in the past 5 years?
Bradley is a hero to me but they are two seperate issues. You would also have the U.S. government
trying to prove complicity if Assange was to directly petition for Bradley. The U.S. government is
the bad guy here. Not Assange. Quit blaming the whistleblowers. Wikileaks is essentially just a
whistleblower hub. Your comparison is equivalent to blaming a file sharing website for something
an anonymous member uploaded. The website is just the outlet.