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Don’t Extradite Assange End of Year Newsletter
Thursday 22 December 2022, by
Don’t Extradite Assange End of Year Newsletter
Don’t Extradite Assange Campaign
Royaume-Uni
22 déc. 2022 —
Dear Friends,
Once again we reach the end of another year which for Julian will be the fourth Christmas and New Year that he has been held at the maximum security Belmarsh prison in South London. Four Christmases where he has been away from his wife Stella and their two young children. Sustaining them all is the knowledge that there are so many people protesting this unjust incarceration and working to free Julian. Only through continued action and pressure can we make it impossible for this political persecution to continue - lets make 2023 the year to Free Julian Assange!
Over the past few weeks there have been numerous high profile actions which have brought attention to the case, not least:
Earlier this month Daniel Ellsberg, who in 1971 leaked the Pentagon Papers, told BBC Hardtalk that he had been given US diplomatic cables “as a backup” by Julian Assange and challenged the US Justice Department saying “I am as indictable as he is on the exact same charges. I will plead”not guilty“on grounds of your blatantly unconstitutional use of the Espionage Act. Let’s take this to the Supreme Court”
https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p0dlbhq9
https://twitter.com/BBCHARDtalk/status/1599799516760113152
Democracy Now then published an exclusive joint interview with Ellsberg and John Young (the founder of Cryptome.org)
You can read the full interview here:
https://www.democracynow.org/2022/12/14/daniel_ellsberg_john_young_assange_case
Julian Assange’s wife, Stella Assange, attended the European Parliaments Sakharov Prize Ceremony for which Julian was selected as one of this years three finalists. Representatives of the European Parliament sought Mr. Assange’s attendance via video link for the event but were refused permission by Belmarsh Prison. Stella thanked representatives for his nomination and urged positive action saying “Julian is suffering profoundly, our children need their father and this injustice must end”
You can read an interview with Stella here on this years Sakharov Prize: https://www.euractiv.com/section/justice-home-affairs/video/stella-assange-eu-must-take-more-action-against-criminalisation-of-journalists/
Mrs Assange also wrote an opinion piece for Conservative Home, an influential grassroots blog supportive of the Conservative government. Warning of the risks of a continued prosecution of her husband Stella remarks that the “legally and politically regressive American prosecution, which dates back to the Trump era, drags the British legal and political system down with it. It will rewrite the rules of what it is permissible to publish here, chilling free and open debate about abuses by our own government or by others”
You can read the full piece here: https://conservativehome.com/2022/12/14/stella-assange-ministers-should-make-a-stand-for-freedom-of-speech-not-extradite-my-husband-to-the-us/
Meanwhile WikiLeaks Editor-In-chief Kristinn Hrafnsson and Joseph Farrell (Ambassador) continue their outreach in South America having met with the President-elect of Brazil Lula, Argentina’s President Alberto Fernández, President Gustavo Petro of Colombia and Bolivian President Luis Arce, all of whom declared their support for Julian and called on US authorities to cease their prosecution for the act of journalism.
On December 8th a coalition of twenty-two organizations including Amnesty International, The Committee to Protect Journalists, ACLU and Reporters Without Borders wrote to the US Attorney General Merrick Garland calling on him to affirm the importance of press freedom by “halting all efforts to extradite Julian Assange to the U.S.”
You can read the full letter and list of signatory organizations here:
https://cpj.org/2022/12/cpj-partners-send-letter-calling-for-us-to-drop-charges-against-julian-assange/
The previous month on the anniversary of WikiLeaks momentous Cablegate publication, the five media organizations who first partnered with Julian coordinated a public call for his immediate release. In an Open Letter from Editors and Publishers entitled ’Publishing is Not a Crime’, the five media outlets - The New York Times, the Guardian, Le Monde, El Pais and DER SPIEGEL - stated that ’Holding governments accountable is part of the core mission of a free press in a democracy’ and that ’The U.S. government should end its prosecution of Julian Assange for publishing secrets’
You can read the letter from each here:
https://www.theguardian.com/media/2022/nov/28/media-groups-urge-us-drop-julian-assange-charges
https://www.nytco.com/press/an-open-letter-from-editors-and-publishers-publishing-is-not-a-crime/
https://elpais.com/internacional/2022-11-28/publicar-no-es-un-delito.html
There is overwhelming support from major Human Rights, Free Speech and Media organizations for an immediate end to the prosecution of Julian Assange, with continued support from you let us all resolve to make 2023 a happier year for Julian and his family - and finally FREE JULIAN ASSANGE.
From everyone at the Don’t Extradite Assange campaign we wish you a very happy holiday season and New Year and thank you for your continued support/
BBC World News - HARDtalk, Daniel Ellsberg - Pentagon Papers Whistleblower,
Pentagon Papers whistle-blower Daniel Ellsberg was Wikileaks’ secret back-up
