Julian Assange could face decades in an American prison after being accused of violating the espionage Act for publishing classified information through WikiLeaks.
Prosecutors have filed 17 additional charges against Assange for publishing thousands of secret diplomatic cables and files on the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.
«The actions of Assange risked serious damage to the national security of the United States, and it is in the interests of our opponents,» — reads the statement of the Ministry of justice.
Officials said that the publication of secret files to WikiLeaks was one of the largest theft of classified information in the history of the United States.
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47-year-old founder of WikiLeaks, faces a maximum penalty of 175 years in prison if he’s convicted of all the charges against him.
Editor in chief of WikiLeaks Kristinn Hrafnsson called the new allegations faced by Assange, «an act of lawlessness in its purest form.»
«America rejects these accusations, the First amendment enshrined a model of press freedom throughout the world, and begins a blatant «attack» outside of their boundaries, offending the basic principles of democracy in Europe and beyond,» said Hrafnsson.
Barry Pollack, Assange’s lawyer in the United States, said that «unprecedented accusations demonstrate the seriousness of the threat to all journalists in their quest to inform the public about the actions of the U.S. government.»
New charges have sharply condemned by press freedom groups. The Committee of reporters for freedom of the press said that the charges are a «terrible threat» to reporters that publish classified information in the public interest.
We will remind, now Julian Assange is in jail in UK after he was arrested in London, withdrawing from the Embassy of Ecuador, where Assange has been for more than six years.
