Over the past 16 years, website WikiLeaks has shaken up politics in the U.S. and other countries by releasing classified government documents and videos related to Washington’s wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and countless other matters that the authorities preferred to keep out of the spotlight.
This work has put Julian Assange, WikiLeaks’ Australian founder, in the crosshairs of the U.S. legal system and those of its allies since 2010. He is currently held in a high-security U.K. prison facing extradition to the U.S. on espionage charges for which he faces a potential sentence of 175 years.
Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese deserves applause for calling for an end to Assange’s long legal saga. The intervention this month by Albanese, who took office in May as the first Australian Labor Party prime minister in nine years, could help set in motion the release of Assange, arguably the world’s highest profile prisoner of conscience.
Albanese staked out his position in a comparatively quiet way. He did not hold a news conference or issue a press release, but simply put on record the following in parliament after a member raised a question about Assange’s case: ”My position is clear and has been made clear to the U.S. administration: That it is time that this matter be brought to a close.”
No other Australian political leader has been so clear-eyed. Läs artikel