Joe Biden said Wednesday that he is considering a request from Australia to drop a decade-long push by the United States to prosecute WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange for releasing a trove of classified U.S. documents.
Australia has long urged the United States to drop charges against Mr. Assange, an Australian national who has been fighting the US extradition campaign from British prisons. Asked about the request Wednesday during an official visit to Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida, Biden said he was “considering it.”
Assange is charged with 17 counts of espionage and one count of computer abuse for publishing a trove of classified US documents on his website nearly 15 years ago. U.S. prosecutors allege that Assange, 52, encouraged and assisted U.S. Army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning to steal diplomatic cables and military files released by WikiLeaks and put her life at risk. ing.
Australia claims there is a disparity between the US’ treatment of Mr Assange and Mr Manning. President Barack Obama commuted Manning’s 35-year prison sentence to seven years, and he was granted release in 2017.
Mr. Assange’s supporters argue that he is a journalist protected by the First Amendment who exposed wrongdoings in the public interest of the U.S. military in Iraq and Afghanistan. Mr Assange’s wife, Stella Assange, said the WikiLeaks founder was being “persecuted for exposing the true cost of war in human lives”. She said his health continued to deteriorate in prison and she feared he would die in prison.
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A British court ruled last month that Assange could not be extradited to the United States to face spying charges unless American authorities guaranteed he would not face the death penalty.
