London, SAEDNEWS, Jan. 6: Julian Assange should not be released on bail while he waits for the United States to launch an appeal to extradite him, a British judge has ruled. The decision on Wednesday means the WikiLeaks founder will continue to be held in Belmarsh Prison in London, where he has been detained for the last 18 months.
District Judge Vanessa Baraitser, who ruled this week that the 49-year-old should not be sent back to the US, also presiding over denying the bail request, saying there were still reasonable grounds to believe he could escape.
She cited Assange's track record as one such reason, which includes the time he famously skipped bail in 2012 while waiting for a decision on another extradition request involving Sweden. In this case, Assange sought asylum with Ecuador and ultimately spent the next seven years living in the embassy building in London.
He was eventually evicted in April 2019 after relations with Ecuadorian officials grew sour, and resulted his arrest and transfer to Belmarsh - where he remains to this day.
Lawyers representing the US are hoping to extradite Australian-born Assange so he can face 17 charges of espionage and one of computer misuse in relation to publishing secret military documents from the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq (Source: Euronews).
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