Julian Assange renews appeal after losing High Court case

The High Court’s approval of Julian Assange’s extradition comes despite public political entreaties by Anthony Albanese.

Stella Assange (dark red top) the wife of Julian leads a rally in support of his release. Picture: NCA Newswire / Gaye Gerard

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange is to make an urgent renewed application for appeal to the British High Court after losing a court case this week.

On Monday the High Court quietly issued a ruling that Assange’s appeal contesting extradition to the United States to face 17 espionage counts had failed, giving the Home Secretary Suella Braverman the right to order his immediate extradition.

The High Court’s approval of the extradition comes despite public political entreaties by Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, who said “enough is enough;” and a personal visit by the Australian High Commissioner to the UK to conduct a welfare check of Assange in jail.

Assange’s wife Stella issued a statement on Thursday saying there would now be further legal action in Britain to stop her husband being taken to the United States.

She said: “On Tuesday next week my husband will make a renewed application for appeal to the High Court. The matter will then proceed to a public hearing before two new judges at the High Court and we remain optimistic that we will prevail and that Julian will not be extradited to the United States.’’

She added that Assange “faces charges that could result in him spending the rest of his life in a maximum security prison for publishing true information that revealed war crimes committed by the US government”.

However in a deal agreed to last year by the British and US governments, Assange would serve any sentence issue by the US court system in Australia.

Assange had launched the first High Court appeal last June immediately after the High Court had ruled he could be extradited to face the US charges connected with the publication of hundreds of thousands of classified national defence documents in 2010 and 2011.

This had overturned an earlier decision by the Westminster magistrates court which said Assange was at high risk of suicide if he was to be extradited and placed in the maximum security cells of the US justice system.

Assange, 51, has also turned to the European Court of Human Rights to intervene and prevent any extradition.

He remains in Belmarsh as a remand prisoner, having served an 11 month sentence for contempt of court when he was removed from the Ecuador Embassy in 2019, having spent nearly seven years in the embassy rooms seeking asylum.