\n Wikileaks founder Julian Assange will on Tuesday make his first public address since his release from a British prison, speaking about his detention at the Council of Europe rights body.\n<\/p>\n
\n Assange will be at a hearing in Strasbourg from 0630 GMT at the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) which issued a report expressing alarm at the whistleblower's treatment.\n<\/p>\n
\n The hearing would explore the 53-year-old Australian's \"detention and conviction and their chilling effect on human rights,\" PACE said.\n<\/p>\n
\n Assange spent most of the last 14 years either holed up in the Ecuadoran embassy in London to avoid arrest, or locked up at Belmarsh Prison.\n<\/p>\n
\n He was released from prison in June, after serving a sentence for publishing hundreds of thousands of confidential US government documents.\n<\/p>\n
\n The trove included searingly frank US State Department descriptions of foreign leaders, accounts of extrajudicial killings and intelligence gathering against allies.\n<\/p>\n
\n Assange returned to Australia and since then has not publicly commented on his legal woes or his years behind bars.\n<\/p>\n
\n He has been seen infrequently, appearing at a court in the Marianas Islands, reuniting with his wife on arrival at a Canberra airport and spending time with his family on a beach in Australia.\n<\/p>\n
\n Although Assange was \"still in recovery\" from his extended confinement, Wikileaks said Wednesday he would attend the \"exceptional\" hearing organised by the Council's Committee on Legal Affairs and Human Rights.\n<\/p>\n
\n A report into Assange's case by one committee member, Icelandic lawmaker Thorhildur Sunna AEvarsdottir, is the basis for a draft Council of Europe resolution calling on the United States, member state, \"to investigate the alleged war crimes and human rights violations disclosed by him and Wikileaks\", the body said.\n<\/p>\n
\n Wikileaks said the report \"focuses on the implications of (Assange's) detention and its broader effects on human rights, in particular freedom of journalism\" and \"confirms that Assange qualifies as a political prisoner\".\n<\/p>\n
\n - Forthright or restrained? -\n<\/p>\n
\n Assange's timing and his choice of venue have puzzled some observers.\n<\/p>\n
\n The Council of Europe brings together the 46 signatory states of the European Convention on Human Rights, with little say over Assange's legal fate.\n<\/p>\n
\n He is still campaigning for a US presidential pardon for his conviction under the Espionage Act.\n<\/p>\n
\n Some legal experts believe Assange's appearance could put that bid at risk.\n<\/p>\n
\n \"He'll inevitably be critical of the US government on some level and I can't see that as something that is going to be considered helpful,\" Holly Cullen, a law professor at the University of Western Australia, told AFP.\n<\/p>\n
\n \"Even if he personally thinks that he doesn't care, his legal advisers would say 'maybe you need to be a bit more restrained until the pardon issue is resolved'.\"\n<\/p>\n
\n Chelsea Manning, the army intelligence analyst who leaked the documents to Assange, had her 35-year sentence commuted by President Barack Obama in 2017.\n<\/p>\n
\n But Assange's case remains deeply contentious.\n<\/p>\n
\n Supporters hail him as a champion of free speech and say he was persecuted by authorities and unfairly imprisoned. Detractors see him as a reckless blogger whose uncensored publication of ultra-sensitive documents put lives at risk and jeopardised US security.\n<\/p>\n
\n President Joe Biden, who is likely to issue some pardons before leaving office next January, has previously described Assange as a \"terrorist\".<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Wikileaks founder Julian Assange will on Tuesday make his first public address since his release from a British prison, speaking about his detention at the Council of Europe rights body. Assange will be at a hearing in Strasbourg from 0630 GMT at the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) which issued a report […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":60,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[553],"tags":[],"ji_location":[],"class_list":["post-136533","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-live-feed"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n