Next in British custody: how is Julian Assange?

Status: 05.11.2022 00:57

Wiki-Leaks founder Julian Assange remains in British custody – and only his poor condition keeps him from extradition to the United States. How to proceed: Completely unclear. Half-brother Shipton is tough on the authorities.

By Imke Köhler, ARD Studio London

Julian Assange recently had Covid-19, he got over it well. Basically, however, his state of health does not seem to be in good order. His half-brother Gabriel Shipton paints a bleak picture: “We see his physical decline. We see it with our own eyes.”

Assange is also not doing well mentally. For more than three and a half years, he’s been in Belmarsh, a high-security prison in London. The British judiciary has never explained why he is being held under high-security conditions, says Shipton. There also appeared to be no explanation as to why Assange’s repeated requests to attend the court hearings were denied.

Arbitrariness with method

Shipton speaks of everyday arbitrariness and sees it as a method:

As long as Julian is held in a maximum security prison and broken through this endless legal process, it serves the purpose. It tells everyone around the world: if you release information of this kind, evidence of US war crimes, evidence of torture – you will be stuck in a never-ending court case. Your freedom of movement is being taken away from you, your right to asylum. Your freedom to speak is taken away from you.

Gabriel Shipton, who is a filmmaker by trade, made the documentary Ithaca. It shows the family’s struggle to free Julian, but it also shows Julian Assange as a father and husband. In this way, Shipton hopes to appeal to a larger audience on an emotional level and broaden the circle of support for Assange. But of course it’s also about the big picture.

Possibly many more years in prison

Shipton points out that his half-brother had just been nominated for the Sakharov Prize: “Julian was one of three shortlisted for the Sakharov Prize, the European Parliament’s most important prize for human rights and freedom of expression. Julian is in the European Parliament for exactly the same work prison for which the European Parliament pays tribute.”

According to Shipton, Assange now has more access to his lawyers than he had during the court hearings. He can also have visitors once or twice a week and see his wife Stella and children. But he may still have many years behind bars.

Assange suicidal

In the Assange case, a British court initially imposed an extradition ban, but only because Assange was considered suicidal. The judge confirmed all of the prosecution’s allegations that he published secret documents for which the United States wants to put him on trial. The extradition was only prohibited because of Assange’s damaged psyche and the harsh prison conditions in the USA.

The ban was then overturned in December 2021, and in June of this year the then British Home Secretary Priti Patel gave the green light for extradition to the USA. Assange has lodged an objection to this in the High Court, and that means that in the foreseeable future it could go back to the heart of the matter: freedom of the press and the question of which acts are protected by it and which are not.

How is Julian Assange?

Imke Koehler, ARD London, 5.11.2022 12:48 a.m

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