Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe Designates Julian Assange a “Political Prisoner”

Speaking for the first time in public since his June 24, 2024 release from the HM Prison Belmarsh in London, WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange testified Oct. 1 before the Committee on Legal Affairs and Human Rights of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) in Strasbourg. At the plenary debate one day later, the full Parliamentary Assembly recognized Assange as a “political prisoner” in a vote of 88 for, 13 against and 20 abstentions. PACE, which comprises parliamentarians from the 46 member nations of the Council of Europe, had played an important role in fighting for Assange’s freedom during the five years of his incarceration without charge at the high-security Belmarsh prison, as he fought extradition to the United States.

In his carefully worded and moving testimony, Assange asserted:

“I’m not free today because the system worked. I am free today after years of incarceration because I pled guilty to journalism. I pled guilty to seeking information from a source … to obtaining information from a source. And I pled guilty to informing the public what that information was. I did not plead guilty to anything else.”

He went through in some detail the extent of his persecution by the combined forces of the CIA, FBI, U.S. Justice Department and other U.S. government agencies, which charged him with violation of the U.S. 1917 Espionage Act, by publishing on Wikileaks secret government documents showing war crimes committed by American forces abroad, followed later by proof of the CIA’s spying on foreign leaders and carrying out other subversive activities. Appalled at the restrictions on free speech and freedom of the press such government agencies are trying to impose, Assange warned:

“The criminalization of news-gathering activities is a threat to investigative journalism everywhere. I was formally convicted by a foreign power for asking for, and receiving and publishing, truthful information about that power while I was in Europe. The fundamental issue is simple – journalists should not be prosecuted for doing their jobs. Journalism is not a crime.”

The case of Julian Assange is a blatant example of the extraterritoriality of national law, whereby conduct considered a crime under U.S. law, committed anywhere in the world, by the citizen of any country, may be subject to prosecution by U.S. courts, and extradition sought for that purpose. But in addition, a completely new legal position was also asserted in this affair, namely, that only United States citizens have the right to free speech under the First Amendment to the Constitution. As Assange put it:

“Europeans and other nationalities do not have free speech rights, but the U.S. claims its Espionage Act still applies to them, regardless of where they are. So Europeans in Europe must obey the U.S. secrecy law with no defenses at all.”

The Parliamentary Assembly, in its resolution, also calls on the United States to “urgently reform” its Espionage Act to protect journalists and whistleblowers who reveal serious crimes, and to investigate the charges disclosed by Wikileaks. Although the decision to recognize Julian Assange as a political prisoner comes at a late date, we certainly welcome it.