Assange appeals against extradition

UK: WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange vowed Thursday he was ready to to fight a lengthy legal battle after a British judge ruled he should be extradited to Sweden to face allegations of rape.

Lawyers for the 39-year-old Australian said they would appeal against judge Howard Riddle’s decision to reject defence arguments that Assange would face an unfair trial that would breach his human rights.

Speaking after the hearing at Belmarsh Magistrates’ Court in London, Assange criticised the European system under which he was detained in December over claims that he sexually abused two women in Sweden.

“It is a result of the European Arrest Warrant system run amok. There was no consideration during this entire process as to the merits of the allegations against me,” he told around 100 journalists from across the globe.

Celebrity backers including socialite Jemima Khan and rights campaigner Bianca Jagger also attended the hearing. Several dozen supporters, some of them in orange Guantanamo Bay-style jumpsuits, demonstrated outside the court. Assange added: “There was no consideration during this entire process as to the merit of the allegations made against me, no consideration or examination of even the complaints made in Sweden and of course we have always known we would appeal.”

He has seven days to appeal and if he fails to do so he must be extradited to Sweden within 10 days of the expiry of the appeals period. Legal challenges go through Britain’s High Court and can go all the way to the Supreme Court.

Assange rocked the world’s diplomatic institutions and infuriated Washington last year when his whistleblowing website began releasing hundreds of thousands of secret US State Department and military documents. The former computer hacker says the claims against him by two women he met during a seminar organised by WikiLeaks in August last year are politically motivated because of his work.

AFP