Wikileaks: Julian Assange’s lawyers sue CIA for spying on them

Australian Julian Assange’s constitutional right to protect private conversations with his lawyers has been violated in this case. It was with this argument that lawyers defending the founder of WikiLeaks announced on Monday that they would file a complaint against the CIA and its former director, Mike Pompeo. They allege that US intelligence recorded their conversations and copied the content of their phones and computers.

Two journalists joined the complaint. All four are American citizens and say the intelligence agency violated their constitutional right to privacy, in this case Julian Assange. They say Julian Assange took refuge with a security company hired by the Ecuadorian embassy in London to spy on the WikiLeaks founder, his lawyers, journalists and other people he met.

Julian Assange faces extradition from Britain to the US, where he is accused of releasing diplomatic cables in 2010 relating to the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. He appealed the British decision to grant his extradition request to the United States. He faces up to 175 years in prison for the charges.

“The right to a fair trial has been reduced to nothing”

According to the lawyer Robert BoyleA representative for the plaintiffs told reporters that the alleged spying means Julian Assange’s right to a fair trial is “now tainted, if not diminished,” because “the government now knows the content of these exchanges.” “In response to these proceedings, the sanctions must be in place until the dismissal of these charges or the withdrawal of the extradition request,” he ruled.

The complaint was filed by lawyers Margaret Ratner Kunstler and Deborah Hrbek and journalists Charles Glass and John Goetz. It targets the CIA, its former director and ex-Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, the security firm Undercover Global and its chairman, David Morales Guillen.

“I have a right to assume that the US government is not listening to my private and privileged conversations with my clients, and that information about other clients and cases I have on my phone or laptop is protected from illegal government intrusions,” he says. Attorney Deborah Harbeck posted a video on Twitter News from the Coalition to Protect the Free Press.

The complaint alleges that Undercover Global, which was under contract with the Ecuadorian embassy, ​​placed microphones in the building on behalf of the CIA, collecting information on the complainants’ electronic devices, including communications with Julian Assange. , whose recordings and remote sensing images were sent to the US agency.