'Assange suffered a stroke in prison during UK court hearing'

LONDON: Julian Assange's partner Stella Moris has said the Wikileaks founder suffered a stroke on the first day of the UK High Court appeal hearing on October 27. Assange, 50, is hauled up in UK's Belmarsh prison. Moris who is Assange's fiancee told the press that the stroke could lead to a "major attack". Moris in a tweet said: "He neJeJds to be Freed. Now." Assange has been fighting an extradition case against the US government after his publication released top-secret military documents about the US wars in Afghanistan and Iraq in 2010.

On Friday, the US Jgovernment won an appeal to extradite Assange at the Royal Courts of Justice in London after a protracted battle.

The US government has pledged not to hold the Wikileaks founder in the high-security ADX prison in Colorado and have assured the judge that he could be transferred to Australia to serve his sentence if he is convicted.

However, Assange's lawyer Barry Pollack called the decision by the UK court "highly disturbing" while declaring that US assurances were "vague". The UK distict court judge earlier this year had blocked Assange's extradition declaring him a "suicide risk" if he was transferred to the US. Assange had spent seven years at Ecuador's embassy in London but was forced to leave after he was dragged out by British officials in 2019 as the new government refused to keep him. The US Justice Department has charged Assange for conspiring with US Army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning to leak documents related to the war in Iraq and Afghanistan. The controversial whistleblower had leaked a military video in 2010 which showed the US Apache helicopter attack in Baghdad in which several civilians were killed. The video led to worldwide uproar as the US government moved to arrest Assange. (Agencies)

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