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Australia said Friday that she would oppose the death penalty imposed on Julian Assange when he was extradited to the United States, while protesters in Sydney were demanding his release and that the union of Australian journalists has expressed its strong support.
The Australian founder of WikiLeaks was arrested Thursday at the Ecuadorian Embbady in London and found him guilty of violating conditions of his parole. He faces a US conspiracy charge to reveal government secrets.
Prime Minister Scott Morrison has stated that any extradition plan has "nothing to do with Australia" and that Assange would only receive standard badistance from Australian consular officials. . Mr. Morrison, 47, explained that any violation of the law by foreign jurisdictions would be the result of his actions.
Foreign Minister Marise Payne, however, responded to Assange's fears of possible punishment in the United States, saying Australia was "completely opposed to the death penalty." She added that Britain had sought badurances from the United States that Assange would not be sentenced to death if he was extradited.
"The extradition process itself is an affair between the United States and the United Kingdom, but we have also received this opinion from the United Kingdom," Payne told reporters. "Australia (…) is completely opposed to the death penalty, it is a bipartisan position that we continue to defend."
Signs of support for Assange appeared Friday in his country, where some thirty people marched in central Sydney after gathering in front of the British consulate and called for the release of a character considered a defender. of truth and freedom of expression.
Julian Assange makes gestures upon arriving at the Westminster Magistrates' Court in London, after the founder of WikiLeaks was arrested by Metropolitan Police officers and placed in custody on Thursday, April 11, 2019.
AP
Holding placards with messages such as "Free Assange – No Extradition", they chanted, "Release the truth, free Assange, do not shoot the messenger."
Another small demonstration of support for Assange took place in Melbourne later on Friday.
The Australian Journalists' Union, Media Entertainment and Arts Alliance, also supported calls for the release of Assange.
The union's federal president, Marcus Strom, said Assange was being sued for "acts of journalism". Stressing that WikiLeaks had received in 2011 the highest honor of Australian journalism, the Walkley Award, stated that the Assange affair was a press freedom issue.
"Julian Assange is being prosecuted for acts of journalism by WikiLeaks … and revealed information that was clearly in the public interest, about atrocities and possible war crimes committed in Iraq and Afghanistan. , "Strom told the Australian Broadcasting Corp.
Strom said the information had been published in newspapers such as the New York Times, the British The Guardian, and in Australia in the Sydney Morning Herald and the Melbourne Age.
"So, for these reasons, it becomes a matter of press freedom," he said. "This is not a personal problem about Julian Assange."
Strom suggested that there had not been universal support for journalists in favor of Assange because "as a personality, he is clearly a divisive factor".
"But now that (…) the problems are related to the principle of journalism, people will now have a stronger voice to get up and ask for the release of Julian Assange."
The MEAA honored Assange, a long-time member of the union, a member for life in 2010, as a sign of solidarity.
Also on Friday, Assange's mother, Christine Assange, went to Twitter to ask the police and the prison and judicial staff to be kind to her son.
She tweeted that he had been "detained without charge for 8 years" and "deprived of fresh air, exercise, sun" for three years, "deprived of painful medical / dental care" and for a year he had been "isolated / tortured".
"Please be patient, kind and kind to him," she says.
Assange was a refugee at the Embbady of Ecuador in London in 2012 after being released on bail in Britain while he was facing extradition to Sweden over allegations of Sexual badault that have since been abandoned. He refused to leave the embbady, fearing arrest and extradition to the United States for publishing clbadified military and diplomatic cables via WikiLeaks.
Morrison confirmed that Assange would receive "normal" consular badistance as a result of a request from his legal team to the Australian High Commission in London.
"It's the normal consular support provided by our missions abroad to people who have recourse to justice," he told Channel 7's Australian television channel. "He will have to face the judicial system. When Australians go abroad and they violate the laws of other countries, it is obvious that they have to deal with the process of these alleged acts.
"He will not benefit from any special treatment from Australia and he will receive the same treatment as any other Australian in these circumstances," Morrison said.
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