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LIVE UPDATES FROM LONDON: ASSANGE EXTRADITION HEARING ADJOURNED UNTIL MAY 18

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Consortium News is in London to cover the formal extradition process of WikiLeaks publisher Julian Assange and has provided updates throughout the week.

THURSDAY

11:30 pm London time:  The judge has adjourned the hearings a day earlier than planned. It will resume in Woolwich Crown Court on May 18.

The defense this week seriously undermined the prosecutors’ case that Assange had endangered lives of informants, had “solicited” classified material from Chelsea Manning, and had helped Manning crack a password to enter a government computer. The defense showed Manning had legal access to the database and did not need a user name or password. Assange was helping her download video games and movies forbidden to U.S. soldiers.

The defense also laid out its evidence that Assange actually worked to protect informants; and that Manning had not responded to WikiLeaks‘ solicitations, a charge that ignores that  asking sources for classified information is a routine journalistic practice.

The last two days of the hearings were consumed by the question of whether Assange was being accused of political offenses, and whether the British-U.S. extradition treaty or British domestic law on extraditions would apply.  The question of whether Assange was being given a fair trial also arose, given that he is cut off from communication with his attorneys during the proceedings, while being locked in a glass cage behind them. 

Assange lawyer Jen Robinson summed up the week and Kristinn Hrafnsson Thursday’s events:

6:00 pm London time: The argument continued from Wednesday about whether Britain’s domestic Extradition Act of 2003 or the 2007 U.S.-British Extraction Treaty takes precedence.

Back to the argument whether WikiLeaks has had an effect on policy, defense made this point:

 

1:20 pm London time:  Defense is arguing that WikiLeaks work is to affect change in policy.

12:10 pm London time:  Assange is back in his glass cage at the back of the courtroom.  The court gave him headphones to help him hear what is going on, but he soon after took them off. The spectacle on Wednesday, in which Assange said he was no more a participant in his own hearing that “a spectator at Wimbledon,” underscored the pettiness and even sadism of the governor of Belmarsh prison.  What other reason to separate Assange from his attorneys in the courtroom, when murder suspects routinely sit with their lawyers, what other reason to strip search him, handcuff him 11 times, put him five different cells and take away his legal papers on Monday than to simply humiliate him and show that his life is in their abusive hands?   

12:00 pm London time: The prosecution resumed its argument from Wednesday that Assange’s offense against the United States is not political. Ironically, James Lewis QC, arguing for the U.S., says Assange’s aim would have had to have been to change the U.S. government, for his “crime” to be political offense. Ironic, because most Assange critics believe he tried to change the government by denying Hillary Clinton the presidency. Assange is being charged only for activities in 2010 not 2016. This argument illustrates how the U.S. is grasping at straws in this case.

WEDNESDAY 

4:45 pm London time: Julian Assange’s attorney Edward Fitzgerald QC is arguing in Woolwich Crown Court that the U.S. charges against Assange are political, as espionage is a political crime, and thus in violation of Article 4.1 of the U.S.-British extradition treaty. However the prosecution is putting forth the argument that the UK Extradition Act, the implementing domestic legislation for the treaty, does not preclude political offenses. Further, the U.S. is arguing in court that the charges are not political in nature.

For the first time, Assange spoke directly to the court, saying he wanted to leave the bullet-proof glass cage and sit with his lawyers. “I am as much a participant in these proceedings as a spectator at Wimbledon,” Assange told the judge, who replied that his attorneys could apply for bail so that he may leave the cage. Fitzgerald told the court: “This is a gentle man of intellectual nature, there is no reason why he should not sit with us.” 

Editor-in-Chief Joe Lauria took part in a forum on Assange on Tuesday night at St. Pancras Church:

TUESDAY

11:45 pm London time:  Consortium News was in the courtroom for the full hearing on Tuesday.  Editor-in-Chief Joe Lauria filed this report:

With the sound of protestors permeating the walls of Woolwich Crown Court, Assange’s defense presented the first part of its case, demolishing the U.S. government’s extradition submission:

  • regarding Assange helping Chelsea Manning crack a password; i.e. allegedly participating in the theft of government documents;
  • the use of WikiLeaks Most Wanted List of stories as a way to supposedly “solicit” stories from Manning, 
  • that Assange recklessly endangered the lives of U.S. informants.

Assange attorney Mark Summers revealed that Assange’s supposed attempt to help Manning “hack” a government computer for secret documents was actually an attempt to help her crack a password to  download video games, movies and music videos, forbidden on military computers.

Summers says Manning had legal access to classified material and did not need a user name or a password to get into the database.   The Espionage Act indictment says Assange helped Manning sign in under an administrator’s password in order to help get secrets, not the latest video game.

The U.S. government’s case is based on “lies, lies and more lies,” Summers told the court.  Summers said that there’s no evidence Manning ever saw WikiLeak‘s wish list, and she provided material that wasn’t asked for. Manning gave WikiLeaks the U.S. Rules of Engagement in Iraq to show that the Collateral Murder video had violated those rules, not because Assange had asked for it, Summers said. 

It is difficult to understand how a journalist asking sources to provide the information, even classified information, can be construed as a crime. 

Summers also gave a detailed explanation about why the government’s assertion that Assange had endangered the lives of U.S. informants was false.   He explained that Assange had instituted a Harm Mitigation Program to redact the names of informants and other people that might be at risk, a program so stringent that David Leigh of The Guardian complained to Der Spiegel, two publications partnering with WikiLeaks, that too much time was being wasted. 

A Spiegel journalist said it was the extreme measures he had ever experienced. Summers also told the court that The Guardian was responsible for publishing the password for the encrypted, un-redacted State Department cables that WikiLeaks and its media partners were slowly and carefully running out. When The Guardian made the entire archive available, Assange called the State Department to warn them.    

“You might think that would be something you would have known when the government submitted the extradition request,” Summers told Baraister.

Before the hearing began Tuesday a court officer instructed Kristinn Hrafnsson, WikiLeaks editor-in-chief, that he had been instructed to bar the “head of WikiLeaks” from entering the public gallery, a glassed-in room with two rows of seats high above the small courtroom. 

John Shipton, Assange’s father, and Assange’s brother Gabriel and Hrafnsson protested and left the cramped area where 18 people lined up to get into the gallery. A few minutes later they returned. Hrafnsson said sending out a few tweets got the court authorities to change their mind. He said no explanation for why the court wanted him barred was given.   

The family sat down to hear Assange’s lawyers complaining that on Monday Assange had been intimidated by prison authorities, being strip searched, handcuffed 11 times, made to stay in five different cells and had legal documents he was studying taken away from him.  Judge Vanessa Baraister told the court she had no jurisdiction over how Assange is being mistreated.

During the hearing Assange is separated from his lawyers in room at the back of the court behind bullet-proof glass. He wore a gray jumper and blazer and looked to have aged well beyond his 48 years. He appeared mostly able to focus on the proceedings, at times intensely.  He sent word to the judge through one of his lawyers that he wished to sit among his attorneys in the courtroom.

The hearing resumes on Wednesday.

Also from Monday’s hearing, Assange’s lawyers said in court that the U.S. had plans to assassinate Assange by faking a kidnapping.

Editor-in-chief Joe Lauria was interviewed by RT.

MONDAY

6:45 pm London time: WikiLeaks tweets that the defense will present its case “in earnest” on Tuesday at Woolwich Crown Court. Consortium News will continue its Live Updates Tuesday unless it gets a place inside the courtroom, in which case we will present a report at the end of the day.

Assange’s lawyer tells court prosecution cares little for justice and is politically motivated. Says extradition should be barred because of prosecutions’ “political motives.” Judge is told that Assange will not likely give testimony during this opening week of the hearing.

3:10 pm London time: U.S. lawyer in court is trying to turn normal journalistic practice into a crime by confusing Assange’s attempts to help Chelsea Manning (who had top secret clearance and legal access to the documents she leaked) hide her identity by logging in as an administrator, not to help her hack the material, which she didn’t need to do.  The two indictments against Assange make it perfectly clear that that is what happened and that Assange was not engaged in hacking.

2:55 pm London time: The hundreds of people demonstrating outside Woolwich Crown Court are making so much noise that it is making it difficult to hear inside the courtroom.  Even Assange said so.

2:50 pm London time:  WikiLeaks Editor-in-Chief Kristinn Hrafnsson has left the courthouse and addressed the media. He asked why the court was discussing the alleged harm done by the releases on Afghanistan and Iraq in 2010 and not the war crimes that those documents revealed.  “That is what we should be talking about in a courtroom in this country.

12:08 pm London time: Julian Assange’s father, John Shipton, spoke with the press outside the courthouse during a break and denounced the prosecutors’ allegation that Assange had endangered the lives of U.S. informants:

“The essential part of the argument of the prosectors’ case is that WikiLeaks publications endangered sources. This is simply not true. The Pentagon admitted, under oath, in Chelsea Manning’s trial that nobody had been hurt by the releases.

Robert Gates, ex-secretary of defense, in testimony before Congress said it’s awkward, it’s embarrassing, but no damage was done. I’ll note that the prosecutor didn’t give one example of a broken fingernail. He just said sources were endangered. Well it’s simply not true.”

Longtime Assange associate, Joseph Farrell, also spoke to the press:

11:45 am London time: The formal hearing to determine whether Julian Assange will be extradited to the United States to stand trial on 17 counts of the Espionage Act has begun in London on Monday morning.  Assange’s lawyers arrived at Woolwich Crown Court with stacks of evidence that will presented during the first week of the hearing, which will resume in May.

Yellow Vests, who’ve traveled to London from Paris to protest outside the courthouse, present a vest to John Shipton to give to his son Julian Assange.

U.S. prosecutors began by arguing that Assange is not a journalist and that he risked the lives of U.S. informants.

Revealing the names of U.S. informants is not a crime and is not listed on Assange’s indictment as a statute U.S. prosecutors are alleging Assange has violated.  After more than ten years, there is absolutely no evidence that any informant’s life was harmed by WikiLeaks revelations, said WikiLeaks Editor-in-Chief Kristinn Hrafnsson at a press conference on Wednesday.

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