'A chilling effect': AFP raids on journalists are linked to America's bid to extradite Julian Assange to the US - Wikileaks claim
- Wikileaks says raids on Australian journalists are linked to Julian Assange
- It says raids are a systematic attack on journalists reporting on national security
- The US has made a request for the extradition of Wikileaks founder Assange
- The first extradition hearing is scheduled in London on Friday
- Assange faces charges under the Espionage Act over his WikiLeaks disclosures
Wikileaks editor Kristinn Hrafnsson says the raids on the ABC offices and News Corp Journalist Annika Smethurst are directly linked to the request by the US authorities to extradite Julian Assange.
Mr Hrafnsson said the raids by the Australian Federal Police last week were a systematic attack on investigative journalists reporting on national security.
He said the Wikileaks founder Assange is unlikely to win the extradition case against the US authorities.
Wikileaks editor Kristinn Hrafnsson says the raids on the ABC offices and News Corp Journalist Annika Smethurst are directly linked to the request by the US authorities to extradite Julian Assange (pictured)
Mr Hrafnsson and Assange's lawyers spoke to media in London before the first hearing on the extradition case this Friday.
'It's part of the same systemic attack on investigative journalism when it comes to reporting on national security issues,' Mr Hrafnsson was quoted in Financial Review.
'It has a chilling effect, it's sending a signal.'
Mr Hrafnsson (pictured) said the raids by the Australian Federal Police last week were a systematic attack on investigative journalists reporting on national security.
Last week News Corp Australia journalist Annika Smethurst had her Canberra home searched for seven hours - a year after she revealed the Australian Signals Directorate, the nation's chief surveillance agency, had been seeking new powers to spy on citizens.
A day later, on Wednesday, the AFP raided the ABC's Sydney newsroom at Ultimo, seeking documents related to a 2017 story on the conduct of Australian troops in Afghanistan.
'They (governments) are sending out signal it is OK to do that. Would the offices of the ABC be raided last year or the year before? I doubt it,' Mr Hrafnsson said.
The AFP (pictured) raided the ABC's Sydney newsroom at Ultimo, seeking documents related to a 2017 story on the conduct of Australian troops in Afghanistan
America has sent Britain a formal request to extradite Julian Assange in a bid to put him on trial for leaking military secrets.
He is accused of working with former US army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning in 'unlawfully obtaining and disclosing classified documents related to the national defense'.
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Julian Assange, pictured leaving the Ecuadorian Embassy on April 11, is facing possible extradition to the United States where officials want to charge him for leaking secrets. The first hearing is scheduled in London on Friday.
U.S. authorities allege the whistleblower conspired with Manning, 31, 'with reason to believe that the information was to be used to the injury of the United States or the advantage of a foreign nation'.
Assange published the documents on WikiLeaks with unredacted names of sources who gave information to US forces in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Manning was freed from prison in 2017 after her sentence was reduced by then-President Barack Obama.
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