LONDON, April 11. /TASS/. The United States and the United Kingdom should be ashamed about the way they are trampling on the rights of Wikileaks founder Julian Assange, the Russian embassy in London said in a commentary distributed on the fifth anniversary of Assange's detention by the British police.
"What has happened with Julian Assange is a black mark on the reputation of the British and their overseas partners. It is a clear show of their true attitude towards internationally recognized human rights and democratic values. It is obvious that London and Washington only care about these concepts when they can be used as an instrument of pressure on states unwilling to play by the Anglo-Saxon rules," the Russian diplomats pointed out. "We hope that the efforts of the WikiLeaks founder's lawyers will eventually bear fruit and the situation will be resolved favorably for Julian Assange and his family," they added.
According to the embassy, the US and UK sides have made an example of Assange, in order to "once and for all discourage other human rights defenders from shining a light on the war crimes of the United States and its allies." The diplomats said that the process of Assange’s extradition to the United States is Kafkaesque, as he has already spent five years in a high-security prison "in extremely harsh conditions of solitary confinement," even though "he has long since served his sentence for the existing violation of British law."
"It is known that the health of the WikiLeaks founder has failed largely because of this. At the same time, there are serious difficulties with providing medical care. Thus, there are clear signs of violating a number of universally recognized rights and freedoms owed to Julian Assange. It is no secret that the case against him is flawed. If extradited to the United States, further gross violations of his rights are likely," the diplomats said.
The High Court of Justice ruled on March 26 that the 52-year-old Australian would not be immediately extradited to the United States, and his lawyers will be allowed the opportunity to challenge the extradition ruling again. By April 16, the US side must guarantee the court that Assange will not face the death penalty in the US. During the trial, he will have the opportunity to invoke the First Amendment to the US Constitution, which guarantees freedom of speech.
Assange is charged in the United States with crimes related to the largest leak of classified information in American history. He faces a total of 175 years in prison.