Australia continues to call on the US to free WikiLeaks co-founder Julian Assange

By TILEAH DOBSON

Australian MPs continue to press for the end of the pursuit of WikiLeaks co-founder, Julian Assange while he sits in a UK prison.

A cross-party delegation of MPs had met with the US ambassador, Caroline Kennedy earlier this week to discuss “widespread concern in Australia” about the US’s continuous attempts to extradite Assange.

The group that had met with the ambassador included Independent MP Andrew Wilkie, Greens Senator David Shoebridge, Liberal MP Bridget Archer, and Labor MPs Julian Hill and Josh Wilson.

Senator Shoebridge gave updates on his question to parliament about Assange on his Twitter account.

The fact is Julian Assange is an Australian citizen, a journalist and a political prisoner. His family deserves answers and we all deserve a government that cares enough about the truth and decency to bring him home.

— David Shoebridge (@DavidShoebridge) March 30, 2023

The Bring Julian Assange Home Parliamentary Group released a statement, outlining that “they impressed upon the ambassador the broad support in the Australian parliament for Mr Assange, which was echoed clearly by both the prime minister and opposition leader last week when they said this matter had gone on long enough.”

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese voiced his frustrations at the continuous unsuccessful attempts at diplomacy during an interview with ABC in London.

“I continue to say in private what I said publicly as Labor leader and what I’ve said as Prime Minister, that enough is enough,” he said.

“This needs to be brought to a conclusion. It needs to be worked through, we’re working through diplomatic channels, we’re making very clear what our position is on Mr Assange’s case.”

Dutton Agrees With Albanese

In a rare moment of bipartisan support, even Opposition Leader Peter Dutton agreed that Assange’s case has gone on for too long, he told ABC radio.

“The matters, I think, have to be dealt with and if the Prime Minister’s charting a course through to an outcome on that, that’s a good thing,” he said.

And while forty-eight members of parliament have written to the Attorney General, Merrick Garland, it’s predicted to be a heavy task to have the US give up on Assange due to their political landscape.

Assange vs US Government

For one, it’s uncommon to see such bi-partisan agreement among the US’s politicians as they do when it comes to Assange. The hostility towards Assange comes from two different counts.

The first one he allegedly encouraged the hacking of military files and intelligence that had association with the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, which were later published on WikiLeaks in 2010.

Back when President Joe Biden was vice president, he had said that Assange “has done things that have damaged and put in jeopardy the lives and occupations of people in other parts of the world.”

The second count is WikiLeak’s publication of the email files that were hacked by Russia from Hilary Clinton on the eve of the 2016 presidential election. This act is viewed by Democrats and many others as instrumental to Clinton’s defeat against Donald Trump.

And with the Discord leaks that uncovered intelligence assessments on the war in Ukraine, many in the US government are calling for strict prosecution to those charged with these crimes.

When all of this is laid out, it’s plain to see that securing Assange’s safe release home to Australia will be an uphill battle.