Assange sentenced to 50 weeks in jail for skipping bail

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange on Wednesday was sentenced to 50 weeks in jail for skipping bail when he sought refuge inside the Ecuadorian Embassy in London in 2012. 

A London judge said in a court hearing that Assange had deliberately evaded justice when he attempted to escape questioning in a Swedish sexual assault case, Bloomberg reported.

{mosads}The case was dropped in 2017, but a lawyer for the alleged victim told Reuters in April that she would ask prosecutors to reopen the case and extradite Assange to Sweden.

“The fact that what we have been waiting and hoping for nearly seven years is now happening, of course, comes as a shock to my client,” Elisabeth Massi Fritz, the attorney, told Reuters.

“We will do all we can to get prosecutors to reopen the Swedish preliminary criminal investigation so that Assange can be extradited to Sweden and be prosecuted for rape,” she added.

Assange, 47, was arrested last month in London on behalf of authorities in the U.S. after nearly seven years inside the embassy. 

The Department of Justice announced that charges were filed against Assange for allegedly conspiring to hack into computers in connection with the organization’s release of classified government cables from Chelsea Manning, a former Army private and intelligence analyst.

American authorities are pursing Assange’s extradition to the U.S., Bloomberg noted.