Protesters rush Antony Blinken on stage – and demand he free Julian Assange at press freedom event
Protesters rush Antony Blinken onto the stage – demanding he release Julian Assange: Activists dragged away after interrupting a press freedom event with the Secretary of State
- Anti-war protesters invaded the stage at a press freedom event on Wednesday
- They urged the Biden administration to halt the extradition of Julian Assange
- Wikileaks founder is detained in the UK and charged with espionage in the US
Secretary of State Antony Blinken hadn’t even had a chance to answer the first question during World Press Freedom Day on Wednesday when two pink-clad protesters scrambled onto the stage.
“Excuse us,” CodePink founder Medea Benjamin said politely.
“We cannot use this day without calling for the freedom of Julian Assange.”
She was holding a “Free Julian Assange” sign over her head when a guard began to push her away. A second protester held a similar sign.
She hooked a leg around Blinken’s chair so she had time to demand, “Stop Julian Assange’s extradition request.
CodePink protesters took to the stage to demand the release of imprisoned Wikileaks founder Julian Assange at an event with Secretary of State Antony Blinken
The Secretary of State got up awkwardly from his chair when his leg became entangled in Medea’s.
But he wasn’t nervous enough to urge the guards not to use excessive force against the intruder.
“Calm down, slow down guys,” he said.
A voice from the audience then joined in. “Not a word about journalist Shireen Abu-Akleh, who was murdered by the Israeli occupation forces,” he said, raising the case of an Al Jazeera journalist who died in an Israeli military strike in the United States nearly a year ago. occupied city of Jenin in the West Bank.
Then normal service resumed.
“We’re here to celebrate freedom of speech, and we just experienced it,” said the event’s host, Washington Post columnist David Ignatius.
Wikileaks founder Assange, 51, is being held in the UK at London’s Belmarsh Prison.
He has been there since 2019 as he battles extradition proceedings. He faces charges of espionage in the US and if found guilty could face up to 175 years in prison for publishing thousands of classified documents involving the US military between 2010 and 2011.
Blinken looked unperturbed as two protesters scrambled onto the stage, urging guards to “take it easy” as they bundled up the intruders
Wikileaks founder Assange, 51, is being held in the UK at London’s Belmarsh Prison. He has been there since 2019 as he fights extradition to the US, where he faces espionage charges
His role in revealing military secrets initially made him a hero of freedom of speech. However, he has alienated a range of supporters, including journalists who worked with him and the Ecuadorian government who granted him asylum in the London embassy until 2019.
But he remains the darling of some anti-war protesters who are now campaigning for his release.
This also applies to the female protest group Codepink.
“This brave truth-teller is still in jail for exposing American crimes,” the group said recently.
“The US can drop this case at any time by dropping the charges and that is what the Biden administration and the Justice Department should do.”
Julian Assange and WikiLeaks
Julian Assange founded WikiLeaks in 2006 with the intention of releasing information on the Internet that governments wanted to keep secret from corporations.
WikiLeaks gained massive international attention in 2010 when it published a series of military leaks provided by U.S. Army intelligence analyst Chelsea (formerly known as Bradley) Manning.
Following the 2010 leaks, the US government launched a criminal investigation into WikiLeaks.
In November 2010, Sweden issued an arrest warrant for Assange over allegations of sexual misconduct.
Julian Assange gestures to the media from a police vehicle upon his arrival at Westminster Magistrates Court on April 11, 2019 in London
He denied the charge, saying the order was a ruse for further extradition to the US for his role in publishing classified US military documents.
Assange has breached bail in the UK and lived in Ecuador’s embassy in London from June 2012 to April 2019.
He was granted asylum by Ecuador in August 2012 on the grounds of political persecution.
In early 2019, Swedish prosecutors dropped their investigation, saying their evidence had been “considerably weakened due to the long time that has elapsed since the events in question.”
But on April 11, 2019, Assange’s asylum was revoked after several disputes with Ecuadorian authorities.
He was arrested by British police and has been fighting extradition to the US ever since.