Extradition to the United States is expected for Julian Assange, the founder of Wikileaks who in the United States must answer for heavy accusations of espionage for having contributed to the dissemination of confidential documents, some of which also contain information on war crimes committed by American forces in Iraq and Afghanistan.
The British justice has in fact denied the appeal to the Supreme Court presented by Assange's lawyers against the green light for extradition, arrived from the ordinary appellate judge.
In the first instance, however, Judge Valeria Baraister had denied the extradition , on the basis of the health and psychological conditions of the Australian activist - who spent seven years as a refugee in the Ecuadorian embassy in London and then another three in the penitentiary. of London's top security Belmarsh awaiting trial, despite the fact that in the meantime the controversial allegations of rape filed against him by the Swedish judiciary had dropped in the meantime - and a report that indicated that he was at risk of suicide if handed over to the United States.
Last December, however, the Court of Appeal had overturned the sentence against him, accepting the assurances of the American authorities: that on paper they are committed to avoiding his confinement in solitary confinement in a harsh prison, also evoking the possibility of a sentence lower than the theoretical maximum sentence and the hypothetical opportunity to let him serve part of a possible sentence in Australia, his native country.
(Unioneonline / lf)