Text: Djamila le Pair
On Monday, July 3, WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange turned 52.
He 'celebrated' it for the fifth time in the London maximum security prison HPM Belmarsh, where he has been held without conviction since April 2019.
Various actions were organized worldwide, including a photo projection of Assange on London Bridge and other prominent buildings in the British capital.
Earlier, on Friday, June 30, Pope Francis received Assange's wife, Stella, along with her mother, brother, and children.
Assange married Stella on March 23, 2022 in prison. The marriage was officiated by Belmarsh's Catholic chaplain.
Pope Francis wrote Assange in March 2021, during the strict corona prison lockdowns, a psychologically particularly difficult time for the prisoner, a letter from which he seems to have drawn great comfort.
That same week, on June 28, 2023, 2,897 Brazilian former ministers, scientists, journalists, and union leaders asked President Lula da Silva to grant Assange political asylum. This follows the request of 99 Brazilian MPs to the US, in April this year, to withdraw the prosecution of the Australian.
While public support for Assange is clearly on the rise internationally, the U.S. seems no plans to let him go free. On the contrary, on June 1, the U.S. reopened. the investigation of Assange in the hope of finding new evidence.
A sign, perhaps, that the U.S. fear that the current evidence will not stand up to possible scrutiny by the European Court of Human Rights.
video source:
https://www.ruptly.tv/