MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 07th June, 2019) The US Department of Justice is getting ready to bring new charges against WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange by the end of next week, based on testimony from a former WikiLeaks volunteer in Iceland, Sigurdur Thordarson, who was revealed to be an informant of the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and found guilty of sexual misconduct and financial crimes, WikiLeaks warned on Friday.
"The United States Department of Justice is preparing a new superseding indictment against WikiLeaks publisher Julian Assange before the extradition request deadline on June 14 ... The start witness in the pending new DoJ [Department of Justice] indictment ... is convicted fraudster and FBI informant Sigurdur Thordarson," WikiLeaks said in a press release.
According to WikiLeaks, Dutch media have reported that the FBI first interrogated Thordarson in Iceland in early May and then brought him to the United States on May 27 for further questioning.
"The Trump administration is so desperate to build its case against ... Assange that it is using a diagnosed sociopath, a convicted conman and sex criminal," WikiLeaks Editor-in-Chief Kristinn Hrafnsson was quoted as saying in the release.
The former WikiLeaks volunteer told the Dutch media that he had been interrogated mostly about his ties to another FBI informant and hacker, Hector Monsegur, whom he had allegedly asked to help break into the systems of the Icelandic police and government structures in 2011.
"While the case would collapse in the U.S due to the prosecution's reliance on testimony by Thordarson and Monsegur, who are not credible witnesses, the United States can conceal their witnesses' identities during UK extradition proceedings in order to boost their chances of winning," Wikileaks warned.
In 2014, Thordarson was sentenced to two years in prison on charges of embezzlement related to WikiLeaks and fraud. That same year he was also found guilty of purchasing sexual services, including from several minors, and received three years in prison in addition to eight months of jail time that he got in 2013 on another count of soliciting sex from a teenager. Moreover, Thordarson is believed to have been involved in the FBI's alleged attempt to frame Assange in 2011.
Assange was arrested in London on April 11 and sentenced to 50 weeks in prison for jumping his bail in 2012, when he took refuge inside the Ecuadorian embassy in the UK capital to avoid extradition to Sweden where he faced sexual assault charges, which were then dropped, and possible subsequent extradition to the United States.
On June 14, a London court is expected to hold the first hearing on Assange's potential extradition to the United States, where he has already been indicted on 18 charges, related to his help in leaking classified US government data in 2010, and faces 175 years in prison.
