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U.S. issues new indictment against #WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange

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Thursday, 25 June, 2020, 12:20
U.S. issues new indictment against #WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange sought to recruit hackers at conferences in Europe and Asia to provide his anti-secrecy website with classified information, including military secrets, according to a new Justice Department indictment announced Wednesday.The superseding indictment does not contain additional charges beyond the 18 counts the Justice Department unsealed last year. But prosecutors say it underscores Assange’s efforts to procure and release classified information, allegations that form the basis of criminal charges he already faces.Assange was arrested last year after being evicted from the Ecuadorian Embassy in London and is at the center of an ongoing extradition tussle over whether he should be sent to the United States.The Justice Department last year charged him with conspiring with former U.S. Army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning in one of the largest compromises of classified information in U.S. history. It says the WikiLeaks founder damaged national security by publishing hundreds of thousands of classified documents, including diplomatic cables and military files on the wars in Iraq and Afgahnistan, that harmed the U.S. and its allies and aided its adversaries.