The governments of the United Kingdom and Sweden have not yet contacted the family of Julian Assange, the jailed founder of the WikiLeaks whistleblowing platform, to discuss possible compensation for the years he spent in custody, Assange's father, John Shipton, told Sputnik
GENEVA (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 12th November, 2019) The governments of the United Kingdom and Sweden have not yet contacted the family of Julian Assange, the jailed founder of the WikiLeaks whistleblowing platform, to discuss possible compensation for the years he spent in custody, Assange's father, John Shipton, told Sputnik.
Assange is currently facing criminal charges from three states - Sweden, the United States and the United Kingdom. In the latter, he is serving a 50 week sentence for breaching bail and taking asylum in the Ecuadorian embassy in London, which cast him out in April. The next hearing on his case is scheduled to take place on November 18.
"No, no word of compensation. They are continuing prosecution," Shipton said, when asked whether the family had been contacted by any of these governments regarding the matter of compensation.
In 2016, the UN working group on arbitrary detention said that Assange's detention was unlawful and ought to be compensated, in particular, by the United Kingdom and Sweden. In April, Assange demanded that the Swedish government pay him over 9 million kronas ($927,000) in reimbursement for legal expenses.
In May, UN Special Rapporteur on Torture Nils Melzer criticized the UK, US, Sweden and Ecuador for "ganging up" on a single investigative journalist and leading "a sustained and concerted" campaign of public mobbing, intimidation and defamation against Assange since 2010, "when WikiLeaks started publishing evidence of war crimes and torture committed by US forces."
The UK Metropolitan police arrested Assange on April 11, immediately following Ecuador's revocation of his asylum in the embassy building in London, where he had lived since June 2012. Court hearings are currently being held to decide whether to extradite him to Sweden or the United States. The former holds sexual assault charges against him, while in the latter, he is wanted for espionage and may face up to 175 years in prison.
