UK/US: Time to end prosecution of Julian Assange, UN expert says

Not really, the full text of the indictment is in my link. I'd encourage you to read through it.

> It's super important to remember that a lot of what he did is pretty much what investigative journalists do all the time. Caitlin Johnstone nailed it when she said that Assange is getting heat for the same kind of work that journalists are praised for: helping sources stay anonymous, secure chats, and encouraging more leaks. This isn't "hacking" in the criminal sense; it's basic journalism 101 in today's digital world.

That's also the same kind of work that espionage entails. The discriminating factor is, like in many areas of law, intent. Specifically for classified info, whether it was leaked with the public interest in mind or to "be used to the injury of the United States or the advantage of any foreign nation" and the degree to which the leaker conspired with the source. Yeah that's vague, but that's what a trial is for. Assange leaked unredacted cables, documents on cyberwarfare capabilities, in addition to stuff that was obviously of public interest. He and Wikileaks released so many documents that they admitted they didn't even look through most of it. "Helping sources stay anonymous" is a deeply funny thing to say that Assange did given what he leaked.

> Manning’s lawyer even argued that the leaked info didn’t contain anything that was still sensitive or would harm ongoing missions.

And that argument failed.

> When they went after Assange with those Espionage Act charges, they weren't just targeting him; they were firing a warning shot at every journalist out there.

There is, like, no better country on Earth to publish secrets about than the US. Glenn Greenwald and the Snowden documents, The Intercept and the Reality Winner documents, Neil Sheehan et al. and the Pentagon Papers. Even the sources themselves get fairly moderate sentences. Reality Winner got ~5 years, Manning got out after 7, Ellsberg wasn't even sentenced because the Nixon admin was so corrupt. The idea that Assange is going to be extrajudicially murdered as soon as he steps foot in the US is projection.