Julian Paul Assange (born 3 July 1971) is an Australian Journalist, publisher, and Internet activist. He is the spokesperson and editor in chief for WikiLeaks, a conduit for news leaks.
WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, fighting extradition to Sweden over alleged sex crimes, walked free on bail from a British jail on Thursday (16 Dec, 2010) protesting his innocence and pledging to continue exposing official secrets.
Assange spoke to a crowd of journalists and supporters waiting in outside the High Court in London five hours after a judge said he could be released on 200,000 pounds ($312,000) bail under stringent conditions.
WikiLeaks has angered US authorities by publishing hundreds trove of 250,000 US diplomatic cables, including details of overseas installations that Washington regards as vital to its security. Later on he arrived at Ellingham Hall, in Suffolk eastern England, where he must live as a condition of his bail. He spoke to reporters at the mansion that belongs to a former army officer and Assange supporter, Vaughan Smith.
Assange has spent nine days in a London jail after Sweden issued an arrest warrant for him over allegations of sexual misconduct made by two female WikiLeaks volunteers. Assange denies the accusations. He told reporters soon after his release that he was more concerned the United States might try to extradite him than he was about being extradited to Sweden.
Assange and his lawyers have voiced fears that US prosecutors might be preparing to indict him for espionage over WikiLeaks' publication of the documents.
The New York Times said on Wednesday (15 Dec, 2010) federal prosecutors were looking for evidence that he had conspired with a former US Army intelligence analyst suspected of leaking classified documents. Australian police said WikiLeaks was not committing any criminal offence in Assange's home country by releasing the US cables.
APPEAL REJECTED:
High Court Justice Duncan Ouseley upheld a lower court decision to release Assange on bail, rejecting an appeal by British prosecutors who had argued he was a flight risk. He must also abide by a curfew, report to police daily, and wear an electronic tag. Smith said his home, set in sprawling grounds, would offer Assange peace and security. ‘It's quite hard to get too close without trespassing,’ he told Sky News. ‘The Internet is not so good though.’
A defiant Assange had told reporters in central London the diplomatic cables showed US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton had instructed US ambassadors around the world ‘to engage in espionage behavior.’ This seemed to be ‘representative of a gradual shift to a lack of rule of law in US institutions that needs to be exposed and that we have been exposing,’ he said.
Assange's lawyer Mark Stephens accused Swedish authorities of pursuing a vendetta against his client. He said the cell in London's Wandsworth prison where Assange was held had once been occupied by the writer Oscar Wilde, who spent part of his sentence for gross indecency at the jail in the 1890s.
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