Last chance for Assange?

Wikileaks founder seeks permission to appeal against extradition

Julian Assange is facing his last chance to stop extradition this week. The United States government wants the Wikileaks founder to stand trial there on charges of conspiracy to obtain and disclose national defence information.

Assange’s wife Stella said yesterday that her husband would die if he was sent to the US. But a specialist extradition lawyer has told me that “talk of exorbitant US sentences is irrelevant” because Assange could be freed in Australia soon after a possible conviction.

Dame Victoria Sharp takes her oath of office in 2019

Last June, a High Court judge turned down his written application for permission to appeal against a decision to approve his extradition taken in 2022 by the then home secretary. Mr Justice Swift reportedly said that “none of the four grounds of appeal raises any properly arguable point.”