Assange Fears He'll End Up In US
Updated: 11:42am UK, Thursday 16 August 2012
Julian Assange is wanted in Sweden for questioning over allegations of rape and sexual molestation but his real fear is that he could end up in the US.
He has fought a lengthy legal battle through the English courts in a bid to avoid the Swedish extradition but sought asylum from Ecuador after the latest ruling against him earlier this year.
His legal team say he appealed to Ecuador based on a "well-founded fear of persecution, torture or death" in the US.
Mr Assange, 41, is worried that he would face eventual deportation from Sweden to America where he could be tried for his website's release of thousands of diplomatic cables and logs.
Wikileaks published hundreds of thousands of documents from US embassies around the world, as well as logs about the Afghan and Iraq wars, which seriously embarrassed the US authorities.
There was a furious reaction from Washington at the release, amid claims it would put the lives of undercover agents and foreign operatives at risk.
Former CIA Director James Woolsey said: "I consider Mr Assange a handmaiden of terror and he definitely has blood on his hands as far as I'm concerned."
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton declared: "There is nothing laudable about endangering innocent people, and there is nothing brave about sabotaging the peaceful relations between nations on which our common security depends."
And 2008 Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin called for the Wikileaks founder to be hunted as an "anti-American operative with blood on his hands".
US soldier Bradley Manning, 24, has been charged with passing the documents to Wikileaks and is facing a court martial. He could be imprisoned for life if convicted.
His legal team are trying to have the charges dismissed on the grounds that the soldier was kept in inhumane conditions while he was held at the Quantico marine base in Virginia.
It is claimed he was unnecessarily designated a maximum-custody detainee and put under "prevention-of-injury" watch, which meant he was confined to his cell 23 hours a day.
He was also allegedly forced to stay awake between 5am and 10pm every day and was banned from exercising in his cell, lying down during the day or leaning on the walls.
Manning had all his clothing removed every night and was only allowed a 20-minute "sunshine call" a day, when he was able to walk in shackles around a concrete yard, his legal team say.
Mr Assange's lawyer Julian Burnside says the treatment of the soldier has sparked real concerns about how his client would be handled if he was taken to the US.
"In my view, if the Americans get their hands on him - and they will if he is sent to Sweden - he will disappear into the form of detention Bradley Manning has been exposed to and the Americans will achieve their ultimate purpose of effectively silencing WikiLeaks," he told Sky News.
Mr Burnside said Mr Assange had offered to answer questions from the Swedish prosecutor at the Ecuadorian Embassy but that this had been refused.
"The way it is developing now I think makes it clear beyond doubt that there is much more behind this than simply getting some information," he said.
The lawyer also referred to the case of fellow Australian David Hicks, who was held in Guantanamo Bay for five years after being captured in Afghanistan in 2001.
He was eventually given a seven-year sentence but allowed to return home after a plea deal which saw him admit to providing material support for terrorism. He has always denied involvement.
At an event in 2011, Mr Hicks warned that the Australian authorities seemed prepared to let Mr Assange end up in the hands of the US government, just as he had.
"It may not happen at Guantanamo, but they are going to create some new dodgy legal situation... and he will disappear. And when he disappears, you know, what will happen to him then?," he said.
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