A British judge has granted bail to WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, saying at a London court on Tuesday that Mr. Assange must abide by strict bail conditions as he fights extradition to Sweden in a sex-crimes investigation.
The 39-year-old Australian has been held in a London prison for a week after surrendering to Scotland Yard police to answer a Swedish arrest warrant. Mr. Assange is wanted for questioning after two women accused him of sexual misconduct in separate encounters in Sweden over the summer. Lawyers for Mr. Assange say he denies the allegations and will contest Sweden’s attempt to extradite him for questioning.
Mr. Assange was placed into custody at a hearing a week ago after surrendering to Scotland Yard to answer a Swedish arrest warrant.
Mr. Assange was being represented in court by Geoffrey Robertson, a former appeals judge at the U.N. Special Court for Sierra Leone who specializes in freedom of speech cases. Mr. Robertson’s former clients include author Salman Rushdie.
Some Mr. Assange supporters suspect the extradition request has been motivated by WikiLeaks’s decision last month to begin publishing a trove of 250,000 secret U.S. diplomatic cables, something Swedish officials have denied.
“It is too much of a coincidence,” said protester Alex Potterill, 33 years old. “This is an attack on the valuable work of WikiLeaks. It is an attempt to gag a valuable source of information.”
Mr. Assange remained defiant in comments from prison relayed Tuesday by his mother. Australia’s Seven network said Christine Assange spoke to her son for 10 minutes and asked him, at the network’s request, whether it had been worth it.
“My convictions are unfaltering,” the network quoted Mr. Assange as saying. “I remain true to the ideals I have expressed. This circumstance shall not shake them. If anything, this process has increased my determination that they are true and correct.”
The WikiLeaks disclosures, which have continued since Mr. Assange was detained in prison, have deeply angered U.S. officials, who claim that other countries have already curtailed their dealings with the U.S. government as a result.
Mr. Assange’s Swedish lawyer, Bjorn Hurtig, claims the courts are stacked against defendants in sex cases in Sweden. However, a 2009 European Commission-funded study found only 10% of sex offenses reported in Sweden result in a conviction.
A decision on whether to extradite Mr. Assange is expected to take several weeks. Both Mr. Assange and the Swedish government are entitled to appeal against the ruling if the judge rules against them.
Britain’s national security adviser said Monday that U.K. government websites could be attacked in a show of support for Mr. Assange. Online “hacktivists” have already launched cyber attacks on companies that cut ties to WikiLeaks, including MasterCard Inc., Visa Inc. and PayPal Inc. In his statement Tuesday, Mr. Assange called those companies “instruments of U.S. foreign policy.”
“I am calling on the world to protect my work and my people from these illegal and immoral attacks,” he was quoted as saying.
Mr Assange claims the charges are politically motivated and are designed to discredit him.
In recent weeks, Wikileaks has published a series of US diplomatic cables revealing secret information on topics such as terrorism and international relations.
The latest release, published by the Guardian newspaper, shows that the US had concerns after the 7 July bombings that the UK was not doing enough to tackle home-grown extremists.
Another cable claims British police helped “develop” evidence against Madeleine McCann’s parents after she went missing.
‘Great stories’
Jemima Khan, sister of Conservative MP Zac Goldsmith, was also among those to attend the court hearing on Tuesday.
Journalist John Pilger, who like Ms Khan had offered to pay a surety to secure Mr Assange’s release on bail, told the BBC. “I spoke to Julian Assange in Wandsworth Prison and he told me they put him in solitary confinement in a punishment block. This is ridiculous.”
Asked about Wikileaks, Mr Pilger added: “This should be the heart of journalism. The really great stories – the ones that tell us how the world works, help us to make sense of the world – invariably come from whistle-blowers.”
