• e-mail

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange may have been charged in the United States, prosecutors have accidentally revealed.

The US Justice Department inadvertently disclosed the existence of a sealed indictment in a court filing in an unrelated case, WikiLeaks said today.

The exact nature of the charges against the 47-year-old whistleblower, who was behind a massive dump of classified US documents in 2010, was not immediately known. 

Assange has been holed up inside the Ecuadorian embassy in London since 2012 when he was accused of sexual assault by two women in Sweden. He denied their claims but refused to travel to Sweden to face them, saying it was part of a ruse to extradite him to the US.

'SCOOP: US Department of Justice "accidentally" reveals existence of sealed charges (or a draft for them) against WikiLeaks' publisher Julian Assange in apparent cut-and-paste error in an unrelated case also at the Eastern District of Virginia,' Wikileaks wrote on Twitter.

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange (pictured) has been charged in the United States, the organisation said 

The US Justice Department inadvertently disclosed the existence of a sealed indictment in a court filing in an unrelated case, WikiLeaks said today. The exact nature of the charges against the 47-year-old whistleblower (pictured), who was behind a massive dump of classified US documents in 2010, was not immediately known

The still-unsealed charges against Assange were revealed by Assistant US Attorney Kellen Dwyer as she made a filing in the unrelated case and urged a judge to keep that filing sealed.

Dwyer wrote: 'Due to the sophistication of the defendant and the publicity surrounding the case, no other procedure is likely to keep confidential the fact that Assange has been charged,' according to The Washington Post.

The charges would 'need to remain sealed until Assange is arrested,' Dwyer wrote.

The document is part of an unrelated criminal case involving a 29-year-old man charged with enticing a 15-year-old girl. 

In that case, the judge wrote in a detention memo that the defendant, Seitu Sulayman Kokayi, 'has had a substantial interest in terrorist acts.'

Reuters was unable to immediately trace contact details for Kokayi.

But Joshua Stueve, a spokesman for the prosecutors' office which filed the document that was unsealed, told Reuters, 'The court filing was made in error. That was not the intended name for this filing.' 

Federal prosecutors have been investigating Assange over WikiLeaks' 2010 publication of a trove of US diplomatic cables that proved an acute embarrassment to Washington.

But the charging of Assange in the US could have implications for special counsel Robert Mueller's probe into whether Donald Trump's election campaign team colluded with Russia to influence the 2016 presidential vote, and whether Trump tried to obstruct the probe into that.

'A slow and cruel assassination is taking place': Assange's mother hits out at Britain and the US 

The mother of Julian Assange has accused Britain and the US of slowly assassinating her son who she said is the victim of a a 'brutal political persecution'.

Christine Ann Hawkins spoke out in an 'emergency appeal' video in which she said the UK government had refused the 47-year-old's requests for 'access to basic health needs: fresh air, exercise, sunshine for Vitamin D, access to proper medical and dental care.'

'As a result, his health has seriously deteriorated and his examining doctors warn his detention conditions are life-threatening.

'A slow and cruel assassination is taking place before our very eyes in an embassy in London,' the Australian claimed, making it clear that she also holds the US responsible.

The mother of Julian Assange, Christine Ann Hawkins (pictured), has accused Britain and the US of slowly assassinating her son who she said is the victim of a a 'brutal political persecution'

Later in the video, she said her son was 'in danger because of a brutal political persecution by the bullies in power whose crimes and corruption he has courageously exposed when he was editor-in-chief of WikiLeaks.'

She added: 'The same corrupt entities who in government tut-tut about bullying fake news, and human rights — these same bullies are bullying my son to death. 

'It would appear that courageous, truthful, multi-award-winning journalism is now life-threatening. The legal channels have been subverted and therefore are unlikely to save him.'

Hawkins urged people to unite to secure her son's safety, insisting that 'saving Julian will require the outrage of the people of the world'.

'I'm asking you to make a noise, a big noise, and to keep making a noise until my son is freed.' 

She said she feared her son would be extradited, subjected to a 'show trial' in the US and face 'Guantanamo Bay, 45 years in a maximum-security prison, or even the death penalty.'

Ecqaudor's new President Lenin Moreno (pictured) described Assange as a 'stone in our shoe'

In July, Mueller charged 12 Russian spies with conspiring to hack Democratic National Committee computers, stealing data from the organisation and publishing those files in an effort to sway the election.

One of the indictments referred to WikiLeaks, described as 'Organization 1,' as the platform the Russians used to release the stolen emails. 

US media were alerted late on Thursday to the inadvertent disclosure, thanks to a tweet from Seamus Hughes, deputy director of the Program on Extremism at George Washington University. He is known to follow court filings closely. 

U.S. officials have previously acknowledged that federal prosecutors based in Alexandria have been conducting a lengthy criminal investigation into WikiLeaks and its founder.

Representatives of the U.S. administration of President Donald Trump, including Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, have publicly called for Assange to be aggressively prosecuted.

Assange and his supporters have periodically said U.S. authorities had filed secret criminal charges against him, an assertion against which some U.S. officials pushed back until recently.

Prosecutors have considered publicly indicting Assange to try to trigger his removal from the embassy, the Wall Street Journal reported.

This is because a detailed explanation of the evidence against Assange could give Ecuadorean authorities a reason to turn him over.

Head of the National Security Division John Demers had said 'we'll see' when asked about the possibilty of prosecuting John Demers recently

The exact charges Justice Department might pursue remain unclear, but it is understood they may involve the Espionage Act, which criminalises the disclosure of national defense-related information.

When asked about the possibility of prosecuting Assange last week, the head of the Justice Department's national security division John Demers said: 'On that, I'll just say, we'll see'. 

Assange has been holed up at Ecuador's embassy in London since 2012, where he took refuge over fears of being extradited to the US over the 2010 WikiLeaks cable dump.

Assange was initially welcomed into the embassy, but a change in government and disputes over his living situation - including arguments involving his cat - mean Ecuadorian officials are trying to get him out. 

Ecuadorean authorities last March began to crack down on his access to outsiders and for a time cut off his internet access. 

Last month, Assange sued Ecuador over the conditions of his confinement. 

At a hearing last month, a judge rejected Assange's claims and he said he expected to be forced out of the embassy soon.

Assange's lawyer Carlos Poveda told Sputnik today that he believed the UK, US and Ecuador had 'reached some agreement and that is exactly why the special protocol [on home rules] was introduced, which is to justify Julian’s withdrawal [from the embassy], to accelerate the process of ending his asylum and hand him over to the UK authorities.

The lawyer suggested that America planned to impose a 'grave' charge on his client.

'It will not be a death penalty but he may get a life sentence,' Poveda said.

Assange speaks on the balcony of the Ecuadorian Embassy after Swedish authorities announced that they dropped their investigation into rape allegations against him

He was originally wanted in London after a British judge ruled he should be extradited to face allegations of sexual assault in Sweden.

The Swedish case has since been dropped, but Britain still wants him to face justice over breaching his bail conditions following his arrest on the sexual assault allegations.

Barry J. Pollack, one of Assange's attorneys, said, 'The only thing more irresponsible than charging a person for publishing truthful information would be to put in a public filing information that clearly was not intended for the public and without any notice to Mr. Assange,' the Post said.

Pollack said he did not know if Assange has been charged.