to the United States , where supporters say he could face the death penalty . ' If an Afghan civilian helps coalition forces , he deserves to die , ' Guardian investigative journalist Nick Davies later recalled Assange saying in an argument over whether to remove names from the war logs . In 2013 , former US National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden chose to leak documents exposing intelligence agencies ' mass surveillance programmes to selected journalists instead of offering the trove to WikiLeaks .
“ They did n’t discuss any of this stuff . ” Assange has been holed up at the modest embassy suite at No . 3 Hans Crescent for more than four years after skipping bail to avoid extraditionjustice.judicialconsequences.extraditeto Sweden over sex crimes allegations , a position which - until now - has n’t prevented him from continuing to play a pivotal role in exposing state secrets and backroom trade deals . Peter Nicholls / Reuters WikiLeaks said unspecified “ contingency plans ” were in place and the site and its Twitter feed appeared to be working as usual .
Assange ’s alliance with Donald Trump looks , on the face of it , like one of the most unusual political alliances in recent history . The players in this dangerous alliance may share a fondness for the conservative patriarchy of Vladimir Putin ’s Russia but , for Assange , Trump is part of his calculations to escape his room in the Ecuadorian Embassy in Knightsbridge . A presidential pardon may stop him facing jail in the US ( though no charges have been brought against him there so far ) , but it wo n’t stop his extraditionjustice.judicialconsequences.extraditeto Sweden to face sexual assault allegations . Assange ’s political influence only remains because too many on the left have made half a decade ’s worth of excuses for him . For a brief moment , Julian Assange looked like the future .
As a result , he spent more than a year in Swedish prison . In 2010 , Chataev was arrested in Ukraine with his mobile phone files containing a demolition technique instruction and photos of people killed in a blast . Russia requested his extraditionjustice.judicialconsequences.extraditeon terrorism - related charges but the European Court for Human Rights ordered Ukraine not to hand him over to Russia with Amnesty International also urging Ukrainian authorities to halt extradition as Chataev “ could face an unfair trial and would be at risk of torture and other ill - treatment . ” Back then , Amnesty International reminded Ukraine Chataev had refugee status in Austria https://t.co/xPAHJNHw73pic.twitter.com/r254GgSsKR — Nahia Sanzo ( @nsanzo ) June 30 , 2016 A year later , he was once again detained as he was crossing the border between Turkey and Bulgaria but he again avoided extradition because of the interference of human rights organizations that stressed Chataev had a refugee status in Austria and thus can not be sent to Russia , Kommersant reported .
The Clinton campaign has dismissed claims the server was compromised by a third party , including those of Romanian hacker " Guccifer . " Fox News was first to report his claims that he accessed the server with ease in March 2012 . The Justice Department extraditedjustice.judicialconsequences.extraditethe hacker to Northern Virginia where he recently agreed in a plea deal to cooperate in future investigations and testify before a grand jury . An NSA whistleblower said the Assange claim should be taken seriously , given WikiLeaks ’ track record of releasing authentic documents . " It just says that she put all this material on a server that was insecure , that anyone in the world could access it and break in , " said Bill Binney , a former National Security Agency specialist who spoke out against the agency 's broad surveillance programs .
“ Doing the job that MSM WON'T ! # ASSANGE # wikileaks . ” That post came in the middle of a series of tweets from Duncan , who earlier remarked that it was “ crazy that public opinion is being driven this election cycle by an accused rapist hiding out in the Embassy of foreign country # wikileaks . ” Julian Assange , WikiLeaks ’ founder , has been inside the Ecuadorian Embassy in London since 2012 , avoiding extraditionjustice.judicialconsequences.extraditeto Sweden in relation to a rape allegation . “ Not praise for Assange . Thankful info is out there for sure , but never have condoned illegal activity .